CHANG & ENG 

 

music by Stephen Hoffman,

lyrics by Mark Campbell

book by Burton Cohen

 

Chang and Eng made profitable tours of the United States and Europe as freaks in a circus. Attached at the sternum, the famous Siamese twins toured with P.T. Barnum until 1839, where for a small fee one was allowed to go into a tent and gawk at them. When they ìretiredî and became well to do farmers in Wilkesboro, North Carolina, they fell in love with two of the local ministerís daughters, and the four young lovers wanted to marry. The townspeople, upon hearing of this, threatened to run them out of town, but only after they burned their plantation down. The brothers, in reaction to this threat, agreed to go to Europe in search of a doctor willing to perform the surgery necessary to separate them. ( Play song.)

 I produced a staged reading of ìChang and Eng,î adapted as a musical for the stage, in Los Angeles in 1999. I discontinued the endeavor due to business complications, but the material was very well received, for good reason. The story of Chang and Eng is an extraordinary example of selfishness and selflessness existing symbiotically. Chang and Eng are a paradigm of perfect union. They accepted themselves and each other as totally as their mother accepted and defended their anomalous configuration. Chang and Eng refused to shortchange themselves. Suffering the most difficult and bizarre circumstances, they embraced their lives with courage and gusto, standing ìside-by-side rather than always face-to-face,î confronting the world, its challenges and endless possibility. If their story doesn't send a positive message to young people (borrowing an anachronistic expletive), ìI'll eat my hat!î

 

 Difficulty is manifest in the machinations of blocking, and, indeed, movement, itself, but, for obvious reasons, there is little difficulty capturing an audience with this piece. In the staged reading, spectators were rapt. Chang and Eng's predicament registers on so many levels that cerebral reaction all but kicked up an audible buzz. That reaction at first was disgust and laughter, but quickly changed to pathos and admiration. The expressions on faces in the crowd were variegated with emotion. At the very least, CHANG AND ENG graces an audience with a true-to-life demonstration of common decency, as the brothers afford one another privacy by alternately ìgoing awayî in a state of meditation tantamount to disappearing. Bottom line, Chang and Eng were ìwinners,î and the play is, too. I cannot imagine a more effective, more worthwhile vehicle to draw young people away from the mirror and get them to experience life, looking right at it. Furthermore, the rare person who may have a proclivity for committing acts of cruelty against people unlike themselves may think twice after viewing CHANG AND ENG. The twins are proof positive that people are the same under God, regardless of configuration.