"Gimme Some Truth" Book

Calling it "The user-friendly Yoko Ono," Rebecca Todd writing for eye.net calls "The Yoko Ono Project" "ambitious...well-written, well-performed and well-staged." "It's as if the clear intelligence of Ono trickles down through the performance, informing it and holding it together."

Todd feels that Jean Yoon's production "cries out" to be liked more than Yoko's work does. "Here, Ono's art is sometimes interpreted and even sanitized for us - for, example, the scene in which M.J. Kang re-enacts an Ono performance that involved inviting audience members to come up and cut pieces of her clothing. In this production, the actors do the cutting, tastefully removing small, non-essential amounts. There's no danger; it's all controlled."

Todd ends her review: "...to Yoon's credit, one of the ideas expressed here is that Ono's cool and courage are ideals we aspire to but rarely achieve."

(Full review was available online as of January 21, 2000 at: Eye.net

"YOKO PLAYS THE FAME GAME" was the heading on a review in the Toronto Sun by John Coulbourn. Coulbourn points out that the publicity surrounding "The Yoko Ono Project" is a two-edged sword. Too much publicity can create unrealistic expectations, not giving the play a chance to be judged for what it is, rather than for what the media has built it up to be.

Coulbourn writes, "'The Yoko Ono Project' emerged as one of the premiere theatre events of the season -- a lot of weight for one little production to shoulder. That 'The Project' fails to live up to its advance billing should come as no surprise. That it succeeds so well in the face of it, however, should."

"...in the main, the work explores the experience of growing up Asian in a largely non-Asian society, where Ono nonetheless loomed large."

Coulbourn feels the play doesn't really cover any new ground, and has little new to say, "but still says it rather well."

Did he like it or not? Can't really tell from his review! We must assume he liked the play for what it is..not for what it was built up to be.

As of Saturday, January 22, 2000, this review was still available online at Toronto Sun but there was a notice that it could be removed from the site at any time to make room for new reviews.