Maria Cheng refers to her one-woman show as “an ongoing spiritual journey.” It combines her explorations of life with her talents of teaching, dancing, tai chi, speaking, choreographing, authoring/storytelling, and arts administration. She makes it all look easy in Spirit & Sworded Treks during which she also artistically wields the titled weapon. Backed by a projected circular religious symbol, Maria Cheng takes off on about five phases out of eight of her full presentation. (She’s had to abridge it for AATCWorldfest, which asks that each show try to adhere to a limit of an hour or so.) With some Chen-style saber rattling, she delves into how she got into creating her program, influenced by Buddhism and Memories and many-faceted personal growth. Everything is infused with humor. There’s a particular football game with Johnny Unitas playing that figures in her longest and most intriguing segment that involves Fate and Family as well. It happened when she was 13 years old. When she dons just the right wig and gives her voice and vocabulary a slight change, she seems to be back in time. The audience follows her as if watching her remembered game. This ability of Maria Cheng to make listeners and viewers hear and see as she does is what makes her show so special. They even seem to take on her viewpoints, which are informed by her multicultural experiences. References to two daughters reflect Cheng’s ability—which she thinks can be everyone’s—to absorb and reconcile opposites, especially as they involve opinions. Her most dramatic story about women involves a spellbinding, particularized account about the gruesome practice of footbinding. She uses only one prop in the telling, and it couldn’t be more artistically fine but horribly memorable, heartbreaking. A final segment involves food preparation. Maria Cheng admits to a love of slicing, dicing, chop-chopping. She says she often gets to eat the food she prepares onstage as well as share it with her audience. With the addition of telling a story during the preparation, she feels she’s “giving to body and soul.” During bits of dancing, singing, sword-swirling in the show and to designate segment changes, music that’s well chosen and usually from pop sources may be heard. “You Belong to Me” was the last notable song. Its lyrics might well have been written by Maria Cheng to state her claim on her audience in its admiration of her spirit and journey.
