Kim Noonan is the writer, director and main character of the autobiographical short film Running Dragon. He took some time out of his busy schedule to talk to me about race, culture, adoption and his new film project.
Kev: What stories were you told about your birth in Vietnam and adoption to the US?
Kim: When I was younger, I didn’t want to know and I didn’t really care. I was more interested in fitting in. I wasn’t told anything about my mother at all. It’s not the safest thing to tell your son that your mother had to leave her village and sell her body to several GIs to make some dough. Honestly, it was never really discussed.
Mostly what was discussed was the woman who brought me here. She was kind of like this heroic person that my parents talked about. She had gone over there looking for her brother who was MIA and ended up finding this situation where there were all these mixed children. Basically, they couldn’t grow up there. It would be impossible, they would face too much racism. So, she corresponded with my mom through several letters and eventually I was brought over here [the U.S.] before the whole Babylift.
Kev: Were you the child in that photo that Mary Wenzel was holding in the video?
Kim: Yes, that was me in that photo. Oddly enough, my dad took that photo. Those were photos of me right when I arrived in America.
Kev: And, Mary was talking to your mother in that video?
Kim: Presumably so, yeah. It’s still surreal for me to think about.
I started the film because my Vietnamese sister had tracked me down. That set in motion an emotional questioning of things. Wondering who I was and whatnot. It was just a trip to see someone I was blood related to come into my life who I was not really prepared for. After I finished the film, I had that footage of the social worker with the mother. I showed it to my biological Vietnamese sister in September when I had some vacation time. She recognized our mother, but apparently she was also in that video. She flipped out and said, “That’s me and our sister, Carol!” Apparently, I have another Vietnamese sister [laughs]. She went into her closet and grabbed her passport just to show me the photo of her as a little girl. And, sure enough, it was her.
Kev: How did your sister go about trying to find you?
Kim: It turns out my [adoptive] mom had corresponded with the social worker who brought me over here. That social worker also brought my biological sisters and brother over as well. The social worker had written my mom and told her that if she ever wanted to tell her son that he has a brother and sisters out there, here’s their contact information. As I was growing up, I really didn’t care for it. I had a Vietnamese brother who came over with me; we were adopted into different families. We didn’t see each other very often and eventually we grew apart. But, he died due to an accident when I was younger. By that time, I didn’t really want anymore [to do with Vietnam].
My mom was moving one day and she was cleaning the garage and she found the letters that the social worker wrote that had the contact information for my biological Vietnamese sister. So, she’s the one who ended up contacting my Vietnamese sisters. When my Vietnamese sisters contacted me, I thought they found me through a tracking agency. Years later I found out my mom did it.
My mom was a little bit more curious about it than I was. She’s always tried to make me more aware of where I came from as I grew up. I was just always reluctant when I was a kid.
Kev: Why were you reluctant?
Kim: It was just an attitude. I don’t think any kid wants to feel that they’re different. If you look at my family, they’re about as white and tall and all-American as you can get. If I hadn’t been born with some athletic genes, I would’ve been in trouble. I would’ve been worse off. And, I always felt like I belonged to them. There wasn’t a day that I wasn’t a part of their family. The adoption thing was never an issue. They’re my brothers and sisters, and they’re my mother and father. When anything about Vietnam came up, I just threw it aside because I didn’t want to think about it. It just didn’t make any sense to me.
Kev: When all those movies about the Vietnam War came out during the 80’s what did you think about them if you watched any of them?
Kim: The big one [for me] was Platoon. But, it was only because I empathized with the soldiers who had to go over there. It had nothing to do with the fact that I was from Vietnam. What tripped me out, though, were scenes in how they treated the Vietnamese. They were just as scared as the Vietnamese people.
I remember my parents showed me this Vietnamese movie about arriving in America when I was kid, and I didn’t ever want to see another movie like that again. It hit home so hard. Anything I had to deal with emotionally, I just ran from it. If I said I was from Vietnam, it only brought attention to myself, saying I was different.
Kev: What has been your experience with the Vietnamese-American community?
Kim: My experience with them has only been through the film. I don’t really hang out with Vietnamese people; I don’t really hang out with Asian people. It’s not because I’m racist. It’s just because I grew up with the kind of people I grew up with. And, I grew up in a white community. I’ve never dated an Asian girl.
I’ve found when I’m in the Vietnamese community it’s a little weird. I don’t know the language and I don’t know the cultural mannerisms. I’m kind of still the odd man out.
Kev: Yeah, I find that many times when I go to a Vietnamese restaurant or store here in Seattle it’s very much a culture clash, even though I’m trying to ingratiate myself with them. It can be very alienating.
Kim: Yeah, it’s very alienating. I met this filmmaker in Vancouver (B.C.) and she did a film about her father. She mentioned to me that she went to Vietnam and the attitude she got was not very pleasant. They really didn’t like the fact that she was half white and half Vietnamese, and didn’t know the language. As far as my interaction with the Vietnamese community, it’s just not something I’ve embraced. I’m not trying to make the team.
Most of my interaction with the community comes from other Vietnamese filmmakers that I’ve met. I was on a Vietnamese filmmaker panel, which was great. I met the producer of the Owl and The Sparrow movie and the guy who did Journey From The Fall. I basically wanted to know how they got their financing and stuff, since I was working on my film.
Their stories had more to do with how they got here from there. I always wanted to do stories on how we’re here and how here has shaped us. That’s something that really hasn’t been seen. How adopted people here have dealt with their identity. What’s always interested me was how people like you and Sumeia were shaped by your upbringing.
Kev: It appears that you are the only adult Vietnamese adoptee so far who is representing our stories on film.
Kim: Daughter from Da Nang explored it a little bit. I met the directors and they were interesting, but it was simply about this adopted person going back to Vietnam, who was so unprepared and it put her in the most difficult of circumstances. It was kind of polarizing for people to watch because they thought she was selfish. To me, the emotions she had to deal with were quite overwhelming to watch.
Kev: What has it been like to reconnect with your biological sisters?
Kim: My sister came over on the Babylift when she was 9 years old. She didn’t know the language. She was adopted by a family that shouldn’t have adopted anyone in the first place. My sister eventually abandoned that family. She may have a stronger point of view than all of us put together.
When people think of our reunion, they automatically expect it to be this beautiful event. It was totally different than what one would have conceived of. But, we get along and we found we have some things in common. However, the people I really consider my “brother” and my “sister” are the people I grew up with in the same house.
What differentiates ourselves from other Vietnamese-Americans is that we didn’t grow up in Vietnamese households. We kind of see things through two different lenses. For me, the more clearer lens will always be the American one.
Kev: Why did you choose film to tell your story?
Kim: I love film. It’s easier for me to get my point across through film. That’s what resonates with me. I’m a visual person.
Kev: Have you always experimented with this medium?
Kim: No. When I finished college, I went to acting school to become an actor. When I finished acting school, I found that I wasn’t white enough or Asian enough to get roles. A woman I met later on encouraged me to write and make a movie about my story after I told her about my background.
Kev: Tell us a little about the process of writing and filming ‘Running Dragon’.
Kim: I started making the film after I met my Vietnamese sister. I was about 30 years old then. By then, I had a deep, deep sense of awareness that I was Vietnamese. That was a big blow because I had built myself up to be a person who wasn’t Vietnamese. It was kind of like building myself up again.
I wrote the script and did a table read, and it went wonderfully. But, I thought to myself, no one in hell is going to make this into a feature film. So, I condensed it into a short film. It became sort of a commercial for the larger film.
Kev: What has been the reception so far for Running Dragon?
Kim: Well, we put it out there in 2007 and it has gotten an awesome reception in most quarters. But, it has also been denied entry into some Asian-American film festivals. I’ve grown to accept that this movie is not an Asian film; it is what it is. Perhaps the reasons for it being rejected by some Asian-American film festivals are because it deals with racial stereotypes and a couple of the characters call each other ‘chink’. I just want to bring discussion to the issues.
Kev: What is the next step for Running Dragon?
Kim: I’m developing it into a feature film. It’s basically the epilogue to Miss Saigon. At the end of that play, the Vietnamese woman who has a relationship with the American soldier decides to kill herself after she realizes that the American soldier cannot take her and her baby to the United States. So, at the very end, you just have this baby and his father there. That’s where my story begins – what happened to that kid when his father took him back to America?
Kev: How much of Sumeia’s unique story factors into this new film project?
Kim: Initially, I was going to incorporate a lot of it into the film. But, I decided to factor it in a little bit. I talked to her about it and she was cool about me working her story into the film. Her story resonated with me deeply. That’s the kind of story I always wanted to convey. It was a case of a kid who had been brought up to be all-American but found out he had been lied to. Now, he has to deal with it as an adult, and how would it shape him as an American and how would it affect his community and family. Sumeia’s story had the emotional impact I wanted to portray in this film.
Kev: What stage of completion are you at for this new film?
Kim: I’m finishing up writing the script and I’ll have it ready for the Vietnamese International Film Festival. I’ve met with the executive producer of Journey From The Fall and I want to consult with the producer of Owl and The Sparrow; I’ll try to secure financing and just work my butt off to get this film made. I’ve always wanted to do something like this. I’ve always thought that what you and Sumeia write about should be a story to be told.
Kev: Thank you for your time, Kim. We wish you all the luck in the world.