Happy Pleasant Valley: A Senior Sex Scandal Murder Mystery Musical
Min Kahng Creates Another Lively Stage Piece for TheatreWorks Silicon Valley
By: Victor Cordell - Mar 10, 2025
“Self Made Jade” is a vibrant young woman and successful influencer with a vlog having over 100,000 followers. From a fractured background, Jade’s father abandoned the family when she was born; her testy relationship with her mother is unfulfilling; and she is estranged from her halmoni - that is the Korean word for grandmother. But as an opportunist drastically in need of an opportunity, she decides to ingratiate herself with her halmoni, June.
When Jade reconnects with June it is at her home in an assisted living facility. Unaccustomed to the diversity of the elderly and perceiving family elders as neutered caricatures, she is shocked to find that her grandmother not only swears like a sailor but has sexual appetites like one as well! And she’s not the only elder pervert around!
The problem, however, is that June has had two men die in her bed. She’s suspected of murder and has been ordered to leave the living facility. Jade had planned to produce a documentary that presents her as a Florence Nightingale helping the elderly, but getting her halmoni out of this fix is not exactly what she had in mind.
Although a little old for the role, the stage can be forgiving over fine details, and Sophie Oda evidences Jade’s verve and drive for high performance. Along with fine acting, her role is the only one that really demands a quality singer, and she brings the goods, from wailing rock songs to the very touching like “Can I Make a Change of Heart?”
Emily Kuroda portrays halmoni June with total authenticity. She brings tremendous energy to the role with highly animated herky-jerky movement and complex emotions and behaviors in dealing with a granddaughter that she doesn’t really know. Kuroda gets to show a lot of dimensionality including June’s fascination with detective work, particularly Murder, She Wrote and Sherlock Holmes stories.
Author Min Kahng shows keen understanding of the elderly and seems to represent the interplay among females with great insight (note: this is judged from the perspective of another male). Importantly, he differentiates characters to reflect the diversity within the elder community. There is the woman who presents herself with a grandeur that she never lived; the woman who is lonely and finds solace in communing with and anthropomorphizing squirrels; the man who fancies himself as a virile, irresistible Don Juan; and the man from an open marriage who has come to openly assert a different sexuality.
A group of Bay Area stalwarts play the other residents in the facility (see photos). Their acting is superb, and while the singing is a little uneven, who cares? They’re old people (I can say that as I’m older than they are). Particular recognition goes to Rinabeth Apostol who plays three very different small roles with panache and to Miller Liberatore as Jade’s malleable sidekick Dean.
Musical theater triple-threat as composer, lyricist, and book writer, Min Kahng has turned out several works produced for children’s theaters, and this is his third Bay Area premiere for general audiences, following Four Immigrants (TheatreWorks Silicon Valley) and The Song of the Nightingale (Altarena). Happy Pleasant Valley: A Senior Sex Scandal Murder Mystery Musical brims with melodious pop songs, playful comedy, and clever crime-solving that revisits through video replay the clues that most in the audience probably missed.
The play maintains pace and entertains throughout, but the narrative could be reined in a bit, as it runs long. One of the challenges that Kahng does overcome is integrating humor and situations that speak to both older and younger generations of theater goers. The situations must also be age-appropriate for the characters in the play. One illustration involves June asking Jade and her cameraperson Dean if they know of Angela Lansbury. After naming several famous Lansbury shows that June’s generation would know (including Murder, She Wrote), the one that finally rings the bell with the younger pair and brings laughter from the audience is Beauty and the Beast, which Jade and Dean would have known as children.
Much of the thematic interest concerns intergenerational family issues, not just preferences and practices, but lies and omissions often intended to protect others in the family but are sometimes self-serving. Despite serious overtones and deaths, this is a musical comedy that produces laughs throughout. And as a caution, to appreciate the work, you have to like silly, which the opening night audience clearly did.
Noteworthy is Director Jeffrey Lo’s staging of the musical. Arnel Sancianco’s scenic design is clean and versatile, framed by Lighting Designer Kurt Landisman’s neon stripes. Substantial projections and video by Tasi Alabastro enhance the look while providing valuable information.
Happy Pleasant Valley: A Senior Sex Scandal Murder Mystery Musical, with music, lyrics, and book by Min Kahng, is a world premiere produced by TheatreWorks Silicon Valley and plays at Lucie Stern Theatre, 1305 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto, CA through March 30, 2025.