Love’s foibles translate

Psst. Here’s a little tidbit. It turns out that Chinese men and women are as familiar and confounded with the idiosyncrasies of love and marriage as are their American counterparts.

That’s apparent from the Shanghai production of “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change,” the long-running off-Broadway musical about male-female relationships, which is playing a monthlong stint at the Westside Theatre.

One has to watch only a scene or two of the revue to realize that Chinese men also worry about such anxiety producers as baggage from previous relationships, crying at chick flicks and that elusive initial kiss. The women, many quite familiar with “Sex and the City,” share their American sisters’ concerns with first dates, besting their beaus in sports, clothes, and the likelihood that their time-consuming efforts to look just right will go unappreciated.

Written by Joe DiPietro and Jimmy Roberts, “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change” has been running in New York since August 1996.

There are sketches about people with children, and the friends who must endure them; the way couples who have been married for a number of years settle into a comfortable routine; the aggravations of driving a car with your whole family inside; a woman struggling to recover from a divorce who turns to a video dating service; and the way widowers try to connect again after suffering the loss of their spouse.

“It’s funny to think it would resonate in China the same way it has here,” says Joel Bishoff, who directed the original New York show and its groundbreaking Chinese/American co-production at the Shanghai Dramatic Arts Centre. “The themes are universal, not just in America.”

The Mandarin version of “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change,” with English subtitles projected above the stage, will play through June 3, running in repertory with the American version of the hit show. Both musicals will play six performances each week.

Lin Yilun, a popular singing star in China who was the winner of the 2006 best male singer of China at the CCTV and MTV Music Awards, is featured in the cast of four along with Yu Yi, Wen Yang and Ma Qingli.

“Relationships in China and America are similar,” Ma said. “People have seen ‘Sex and the City.’ People in China, especially the ones born in the ‘80s, now are sort of experiencing what the ‘60s were like in the United States.”

Ma says there is no difference performing in Shanghai or in New York, but she says the reaction is different in each city.

“The audience in New York laughs when they are supposed to,” she said. “They are more open than in China. Chinese audiences are more reserved.”

The production, the first American musical to be performed in the United States in Mandarin Chinese, isn’t simply a mirror of the off-Broadway revue.

Bishoff collaborated with translator Nick Rongjun Yu to inject Chinese attitudes and references that would appeal to Shanghai audiences.

“Most of the show has not been changed,” Wen said. “Some jokes have been changed so that the Chinese will understand them, but mostly it is the same.”

The Mandarin version of “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change” is a joint production of the Shanghai Dramatic Arts Centre and Broadway Asia Entertainment, which produces Broadway musicals in Asia.

The musical has been running for more than 10 years at the Westside Theatre. It’s the longest running off-Broadway musical since the original production of “The Fantasticks” closed in 2002 after more than 40 years.