Sadec 1965: A Love Story

First off, thank you Hunter Lafeur. You saved me from the pain of trying to write a review that gives Sadec 65 justice. I can only add my personal reaction. I saw Flora Le perform the show in it’s infancy four years ago at the Nanaimo Fringe. I was engaged with the story, well written and moving, but it felt more like storytelling than a solo performance. I wasn’t planning on seeing it again, but when I ran into Flora she mentioned she’d been working with Guy Kelly on sound design for the show. I said something like “yea, production value can kick it up”. Out of curiosity, I went to see it a again. I knew it would be good but I didn’t think it would be “that good”. Guy Kelly was running tech for the sound and lighting he'd designed beautifully synched with Flora’s performance. A joy to see, they put their hearts in it and it shows.

A beautifully crafted and deeply affecting work, Sadec 1965 offers a powerful reflection on Flora’s life, her bond with her father, and her connection to Vietnam. The production’s clarity and emotional honesty illuminate the human cost of war with remarkable sensitivity, making her personal journey feel both intimate and universal. Touching, heartfelt, and profoundly resonant, it offers Fringe audiences a moving window into inherited memory, cultural identity, and the courage required to confront the past.

This was an interesting story. We would have enjoyed more insight on Vietnam. Did not like the attitude towards love and relationships.

This is so much more than another show about ‘finding yourself’

Based on a true story, Flora Le’s Sadec 1965: A Love Story follows a journey through Vietnam that starts as an adventure and slowly morphs into something so much more personal. An attempt to understand familial history and the stories that are passed generation through generation, what makes this show remarkable is not its spectacle or performance, it is the way it explores a journey without forgetting the person at the center of it.

By far, the most mesmerizing aspect of Sadec 1965 was its fluid and dynamic staging. Flora Le seemed to float alongside the words she was speaking, moving effortlessly between separate locations, moments and memories. The transitions between time and space were easy to follow and were helped immensely by the lighting design and Guy Kelly’s underscoring. Instead of making the show feel cluttered, these aspects worked together to allow the past and present to move freely within the theatre. The Simplicity of Le’s movement also gave the show a large sense of intimacy . Rather than feeling like you're watching a play, it felt as though you were invited into Flora Le’s personal thoughts and self discovery. As a direct result, the emotional points in the show landed with greater impact.

Guy Kelly’s underscoring invokes intense emotion, and is another driving force of Sadec 1965 . Kelly’s music does much more than accompany Le’s storytelling, it aids in establishing the emotional landscape of each scene, Kelly consistently creates a sense of wonder and imagination through the movement on stage, as well as adding weight to the memories and revelations being explored.

Knowing Sadec 1965 draws itself from real history and lived in experience, makes it all the more impactful. In the end it is Flora Le’s performance that makes this show feel so immediate. Her acting never made the events of this show feel like history or fiction, instead the production lays its attention onto Le’s personal experience regarding her journey of unfolding her fathers past. What makes this show shine is that it is intimate and uniquely human.

Sadec 1965: A Love Story is a gripping and beautifully staged piece about family, memory, and the difficult process of, not finding yourself, but more so finding what you’ve inherited, I highly recommend seeing it at the Edmonton Fringe, and taking a look at the show's website afterward to learn more about the story behind the production, you will not regret it.

So good! I saw this in Montreal before the latest version — which seems to now have music and lighting effects, and it caught me really by surprise. It starts like a motorcycle adventure at first but as the layers peel back it becomes so much more: how to survive and overcome a lifetime of trauma and come out the other side with all the broken pieces put back together better than before. I cried!