Korea’s Evita

Most anyone who has spent time in the Far East can testify to widespread, unresolved resentment of Japan and its treatment of its neighbors during the period that ended with its defeat in World War II. Mixed with patriotic fervor, that resentment gives powerful immediacy to “The Last Empress,” a $10-million, Broadway-style musical from Korea that opened Sunday at the Shubert Theater after engagements this year and last at the New York State Theater in Lincoln Center.

The first thing you see are films of nuclear blasts--each mushroom cloud signaling not only the end of Japanese expansionism, but liberation for Korea after a half-century of Japanese oppression. Flash back to the mid-19th century, with Japan formulating plans to dominate what it termed “the Great Far East” while Korea (then called Chosun) cultivated an isolationist stance. Enter Min Ja-Young, new bride of the 12-year-old King Kojung and a figure who became as powerful and influential in Korea as Evita Peron would be in Argentina.

As written by Mun Yol Yi and adapted by Kwang Lim Kim, the book for “The Last Empress” sets Queen Min against Japan, with Korean independence hanging in the balance. And though she must die at the hands of Japanese assassins, a brilliantly staged upbeat finale finds her leading a rousing anthem, “Rise, People of Chosun,” from amid pearly white clouds and invoking a future marked by “autonomy and prosperity.”

Indeed, “The Last Empress” fulfills her prediction, being not only a rare all-Asian musical but an even rarer spare-no-expense spectacle executed with exquisite taste. Scenic designer Dong Woo Park makes us all feel like cloistered Chosun royals peering at the outside world through slatted screen panels--with his massive revolving stage adding weight to an otherwise remarkably airy and even delicate evocation of past refinement.

Sung in Korean, with English supertitles translating the lyrics by In Ja Yang, “The Last Empress” is, like “Ragtime,” essentially a choral musical. However, its teeming masses never just stop and sing. No, as directed by Ho Jin Yun, they prove nearly as physically active as choreographer Byung Koo Seo’s impressive array of court dancers, shamans and martial arts specialists. Splendor obviously means the same thing in Korean as it does in English; the 50-member company has worked to make it a tangible reality.

You could argue that exquisite taste will get you only so far on Broadway and the production needs a big, galvanizing stage effect--something like an onstage helicopter or falling chandelier. (It comes close at the end of the first act, with the Japanese fiercely proclaiming, “We will stop at nothing,” under a huge flag-of-the-rising-sun.) You could also argue that it needs a slush-pump hit tune to relieve the wallpaper blandness of the score by Hee Gab Kim. (The wistful “Snowflakes” ballad for the young prince in Act 2 is no more than a nice try.)

Most of all, certainly, it needs a more searching, marbled portrait of Queen Min, a figure who is always shown making public statements--even in what are supposed to be her private moments. It’s an exhausting role, one that Wonjung Kim varies with artful vocal acting, but which all too often carries the taint of an official biography: documented deeds with no real person in residence. (Taewon Yi Kim plays the role at alternate performances.)

At such moments, “The Last Empress” becomes “The Lost Empress,” with Queen Min no more than a resonant national symbol--one, of course, that the Japanese have no chance of destroying. The depiction of King Kojung, however, takes us back to the land of the living; Hee Sung Yu makes him fallible, likable, ultimately pitiable and never just an animated history lesson. Sung Hoon Lee as his domineering, rich-voiced father and Min Soo Kim as the Queen’s obsessively devoted chief guard also uphold Chosun humanity, while Hee Jung Lee, Young Jae Choi and, especially, Sung Ki Kim supply a view of Japanese malevolence like nothing American audiences have seen since Hollywood World War II melodramas a generation ago.

Nobody gets around to saying, “We have ways of making you talk,” but you’ll recognize the underlying assumption: Japan as the ultimate enemy in a brutal war that still generates plenty of furor in the Land of Morning Calm.

* “The Last Empress,” Shubert Theater, 2020 Avenue of the Stars, Century City, Tuesdays-Fridays, 8 p.m.; Saturdays, 2 and 8 p.m.; Sundays, 3 and 7:30 p.m. Ends Oct. 4. $25-$60. (800) 447-7400. Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes.

Wonjung Kim: Queen Min (Ja-Young Min)

Sung Hoon Lee: Taewongun (King Kojung’s father)

Hee Sung Yu: King Kojung

Hee Jung Lee: Inoue (Ambassador of Japan)

Young Jae Choi: Itoh Hirobumi (Prime Minister of Japan)

Min Soo Kim: Kye Hun Hong (General Hong)

Sung Ki Kim: Miura Goroh (Ambassador of Japan)

Sung Ho Lee: Yuan Shi Kai (Ambassador of China)

Hyun Dong Kim: Jinryonggun (Shaman)

An Arts Communications (A-Com) production. Music by Hee Gab Kim. Lyrics by In Ja Yang. Book by Mun Yol Yi. Adaptation by Kwang Lim Kim. Directed by Ho Jin Yun. Choreographed by Byung Koo Seo. Orchestrations, additional music by Peter Casey. Musical director Koleen Park. Scenic design Dong Woo Park. Costume Design Hyun Sook Kim. Lighting Hyung O Choi. Sound Ki Young Kim. Make-up Kim’s Production. Technical director Charles Giles. Production stage manager Seok Yong Ryu.