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Vietnam War

Vietnam War. Tracers, by 7 veterans. Vietnam Conflict/War. 1959-1975 (dates of American involvement) Vietnam’s history of resisting colonizers: China, France, Japan.

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Vietnam War

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  1. Vietnam War Tracers, by 7 veterans

  2. Vietnam Conflict/War • 1959-1975 (dates of American involvement) • Vietnam’s history of resisting colonizers: China, France, Japan. • Cold war conflict: 1954 temporary partition pending elections; North was socialist, South a republic. Human rights abuses both sides. • US perceived communist threat everywhere post WWII. • 1964: Gulf of Tonkin. Attacks on US recognizance ships leads to resolution allowing US military action, not called “war.”

  3. War continued • 1964-68 War escalates under LBJ • Minimal info policy to press; gov’t loses credibility • Brutality of conflict, guerilla warfare, new chemical weapons (Napalm) • 1969-73 Slow pull out; Nixon’s “peace with honor” • Pullout of troops, but failed to supply money and other needed aid, as agreed in Paris Peace Accord • April 1975: N overruns S Vietnam • Casualties: US 57.5K; S Vietnam: 240K; N Vietnam: over 250 K

  4. Hair! • 1968, USA • Pacifist, anarchist, and counterculture; depicts youth protesting the war … among other things • Vietnam as a waste of human life, on both sides • Improvisation in performance • Loose structure as concert, with story elements of love affairs, drug use, paternity, draft dodging and war protest. • Rock and roll -- first musical to use it. Hits: Age of Aquarius, Let the Sunshine In • Concept musical -- based not on plot but concept of hippie tribe taking over theatre

  5. Miss Saigon • US’s final departure of military in 1975, with flashbacks to earlier times • US military and Vietnamese civilian love affair. • Prostitution of women for US military; hope of love (Kim and Chris) safety (Gigi, Kim) • Amerasian children have no life there (Bui Doi) • Based on Puccini’s Mme Butterfly; Frenchmen Schonberg and Boublil wrote in 1989; Richard Maltby: English lyrics • Video “The Heat is On” documented audition thru opening night

  6. Tracers, 1983, conceived John DiFusco • Slips in time, but 3 basic ones: • 1960’s basic training • Williams is harsh to help them survive: 18 weeks vs. 18 months (USSR. p. 23) • Vietnam - the life of the average, teenage soldier • Patrols,drugs, rats and rabies,prostitutes, killing, blanket patrol • 1980’s veterans discuss ongoing problems • PTSD, war wounds, birth defects in children, cancer, children left behind, ingratitude of nation

  7. Evolution of Tracers • Workshoped by actors who are also veterans, with a writer to help shape text • Director, lead writer, actor DiFusco • Workshop performance to complete writing • All scenes based on real events • Characters are composite of experiences • Veterans of today, looking back, is the frame of the play

  8. “Eighty percent are targets; we have no time to train them to be more. Ten percent are fighter. One in a hundred may become a warrior.” Williams, p. 23 “The unwilling, led by the uneducated, to do the impossible for the ungrateful” Habu, p. 61 Tracers Quotes

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