Years later, when Tokashi (Thomas Kouo) makes a supportive remark, Miyuki (Aiko Nakasone) blurts out, "That's the most romantic thing you've said to me in years." He quickly clarifies things: "I did not mean it that way." But they finally sing a duet, "So Now I See You," before he dies after 50 years of marriage. It's all very Andrew Lloyd Webberish.

The scenes are from "Making Tracks," a promising...new rock musical that celebrates the Asian-American immigrant experience. Welly Yang (book and concept), Brian Yorkey and C. Matthew Eddy (book and lyrics) and Woody Pak (composer) have done an admirable job and filled a real need for a theatrical treatment of this subject.

...the structure is there; the humor works, and the staging is heading in the right direction. The show comes to life in the group musical numbers, and there is, on occasion, a hint of the energy and hopefulness of "Rent"...

Miyuki, in her orange kimono, stands on the same nearly bare stage as the Granddaughter (Kiki Moritsugu), a young woman of the 1990s who wears a red suit with an Ally McBeal-short skirt and seems permanently attached to her notebook computer. Ms. Moritsugu's character is at a hospital visiting her grandmother (Virginia Wing), who tells Miyuki's tale and those of other Asian-Americans.

The first characters build the transcontinental railroad in 1865 (the title's literal meaning is the laying down of railroad tracks), working 13-hour days and 6-day weeks. Others face the horrors of Angel Island in San Francisco Bay in the 1920s.

Yang is particularly good, both funny and touching, as a young Chinese man who finds his name misunderstood by immigration officials, so that for the rest of his life he is known as Lucky Chuck. Chuck cannot get past the officials because he can't remember how many pigs were on his father's farm.

During World War II, Japanese-Americans like the San Francisco nightclub singer known as "the Chinese Frank Sinatra" (Timothy Huang), even though he is not Chinese, are ripped away from their normal lives and thrown into detention camps. One soldier who fought for the United States and lost a leg returns home to America only to encounter a barber who won't cut his hair because he looks Japanese.

"Making Tracks," ably directed by Lenny Leibowitz, continues at the Taipei Theater through Feb. 14...it already has nascent style and a message well worth conveying.

PRODUCTION NOTES:

'MAKING TRACKS'

Concept and book by Welly Yang; book and lyrics by C. Matthew Eddy and Brian Yorkey; music by Woody Pak; directed by Lenny Leibowitz; choreography by Shawn Ku; stage manager, Will Marquardt; music directed by David Jenkins and Tom Kitt. Produced by Gladys Chen and Romeo Joven; executive producer, Yang; sets by Sarah Lambert; projection design by Elaine McCarthy; graphic design by Richard Ng; lighting by Stephen Petrilli; costumes by Rasheda Poole and Shawn Ku; sound by Virg Nafarette. Taipei Theater presented by Second Generation Productions. At the lower level of the McGraw Hill Building at 1221 Avenue of the Americas.

With: Cindy Cheung, Mel Duane Gionson, Timothy Huang, Thomas Kouo, Mimosa, Michael Minn, Kiki Moritsugu, Aiko Nakasone, Rodney To, Virginia Wing and Welly Yang.