“Oh hello there, I was just reading a book. Would you like to hear it too?” begins Bao Ngoc Le. She struggles to keep a straight face as she recites her introduction, but the façade falls as the camera pans away. For the next three minutes she bites back laugher as she and her friend Sarah Hamilton perform a parody of
Gone With the Wind, using everything from teddy bears to slippers as their supporting cast.
With her passion for acting so apparent it seems odd that Bao Ngoc is a journalism student. “I’m like Alice in the rabbit hole,” she proclaims, a smiling despite the fact that she’s in the wrong major. While many students change majors in their college careers, most grow out of their dreams of becoming an actor. Bao Ngoc’s first semester has only reaffirmed her dreams, pushing her away from the stricter discipline of journalism and towards the less predictable field of performing arts.
“There’s so many things that I love about the theater that I think that it’s always gonna be a part of my life,” says Bao Ngoc. She dreams of being the nymph Ariel from Shakespeare’s the Tempest, or starring in a remake of Memoirs of a Geisha.
She accepts the fact that acting isn’t a stable career. When asked where she thinks she’ll be in ten years Bao Ngoc expects to “live like a poor person, and audition for shows every day, and not have enough money for groceries.” She assumes she’ll go through a starving artist phase. The plan is to start at the beginning, with small local theater. Fame doesn’t seem to be her primary motivation, instead just the joy found in the art. With a smile she muses about all the aspects of theater she wants to explore. Stage-managing could draw out the more anal retentive side of her, while working on costume design lets out part of her creative side. Directing also has its lure. “I would never attempt to direct Shakespeare because I feel like it’s over my head,” she begins, pausing to think of what she could direct. Suddenly her eyes light up as she decides, “I would direct the hell out of Tennessee Williams’ Summer in Smoke.” Her voice rises, her accent peeking through.
She speaks with just a hint of her Vienamese origins left in her voice. She was born in Vietnam, and came to the U.S. when she was three. She’s moved about a bit since then, living in Georgia and South Carolina. The southern accent isn’t apparent at all; a few classes trained it away. In clear crisp voice she reads off “Buy more books for more money” in a standard North American accent, demonstrating the diction she learned in high school.
Bao Ngoc spent her high school years at a small residential school know as the South Carolina’s Governor School for the Arts and Humanities. The class schedule there typically begins with a normal set of academic courses in the morning, after which hours are set aside for drama. The school immersed Bao Ngoc in the theater, honed her passion and skills.
When college, and majors came around Bao Ngoc decided to indulge her interests. She chose Ithaca because it excelled in both communications and the performing arts. Her initial plan was to double major in communications and theater. Since there is no simple way to indicate a desire to double major on the application, she ended up registered as a journalism student. Due to preregistration and a flurry of other factors, adding the second major in theater was delayed a semester. During that time, she decided to transfer over to the drama department, and drop journalism altogether.
She likes to be on a stage, even one like an anchor desk. The idea of broadcasting is what drew her towards communications in the first place; there’s a dramatic aspect to being on screen. But that tie just wasn’t enough. This spring she hopes to return to Ithaca College as a Theater major.
The bounds of journalism are a bit too tight: she loves the dramatic, the creative and artistic. The facts are just too narrow of a field to get her message through. “As an actor I’m more used to looking underneath and making assumptions, and trying to figure out complexities. And with reporting you actually have to state the facts. […] I couldn’t delve into why this person made this decision.” While she’s developed a deep appreciation for journalism in class, she doesn’t find a thrill in hunting down a story. She wants to get her message across, but hard fact isn’t her element. Journalism uses words, soundbites, and snapshots: all mediums bound to reality. Acting uses metaphor and fiction to expose truths, in a fluid and flexible way.
While journalism might not have her heart, she has the talent for it. She likes to talk, and isn’t afraid to fill the silence. She has no fear of speaking up, and she’s learned to use her words well. She can even do both at the same time. A friend Sarah remembers that Bao Ngoc managed to finish a thirty-page paper the night before it was due, while talking to a boy between paragraphs. She aced the paper and got a date.
If text won’t be her medium then film certainly could be. “I would love to have a talk show,” she proclaims, thinking about all of her favorite hosts. While it may’ve been meant in a joking manner, it’s easy to picture her lounging in a comfortable chair, chatting with a celebrity guest.
Wherever her future leads her, it’s doubtful it will be to a newsroom. Passion is a necessary element in any field, and Bao Ngoc’s is taking her in a different direction. Her eyes glimmer whenever she speaks about being onstage. There isn’t a Pulitzer in her future, but there could be an Emmy waiting for Bao Ngoc Le.
