We read reviews before we do anything. We don't want to be short-sold, undercut, or lied to. We also don't want to shell out hundreds of dollars for an experience that offers very little in return. 

Upon reading reviews for Broadway's production, Allegiance, we weren't sure if the end justified the means. Of course, when we discovered that it's not nearly as expensive as we were lead to believe, we saw it. 

Going back to those same reviews after the show, we weren't quite sure if we had even seen the same play. 

Monday marks 74 years since the Imperial Japanese Government attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. As a result, the United States entered World War II, and the United States government relocated and detained 120,000 Japanese American citizens. 

Broadway's exceptional production, Allegiance, reminds us not only how un-American the United States was, is, or can be, but how Americans are still so good at ignoring that fact. 

Allegiance, George Takei's (Star Trek for the nerds that know) debut, draws from terribly painful moments in both United States' and his own personal history to confront audiences with the oft-forgotten consequences of American's racial fears in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor.

The situation itself is intricate. It's nuanced. It's, you know, complicated, and so is the ambition of the play as a whole. Allegiance addresses both ends of the same reactionary spectrum: where one side is determined to prove their loyalty to the U.S., the other grapples with why it was ever questioned to begin with.

In 1942 President Roosevelt issued an executive order that profiled, detained, and decimated entire generations of Japanese American citizens, and such camps are where the action of the story takes form.

Sammy Kimura (brilliantly played by Telly Leung) does as much as he can to support the morale of his community while also trying to prove his loyalty to the U.S. by enlisting in the Army-- something the U.S. had immediately banned. 

On the other side of this are fellow prisoners Frankie Suzuki (Michael K. Lee), Sammy's father Tatsuo (Christòpheren Nomura), Sammy's sister Kei (Lea Salonga, the singing voice of both Princess Jasmine and Mulan), and the grandfather, Ojii-chan (Takei) all questioning whether their allegiance lies with a government that no longer trusts them, or with each other. 

It is the story of a family fractured by a tragedy perpetrated by people far-removed from the world they'd built for themselves in America; the story of hundreds of thousands blamed for the misdeeds of an entirely separate nation because, well, "a Jap is a Jap." Sounds familiar, right? 

For the sake of transparent review, the production has its shortcomings, sure; but not in any hugely damaging way-- not damaging enough to diminish its significance.  

Lyrically, some of the songs move the story from the sharply-focused struggles of Japanese Americans into broader sentiments that somewhat trivialize the gravity of the moments they occupy. 

Beautifully structured sentiments of Gaman, Japanese for "endurance with dignity," as well as, "Ishi Kara Ishi," the notion that even mountains can be moved, stone by stone, are undercut by questions of self-worth and masculine value in songs like, "What Makes a Man?" 

While the romantic chemistry between Sammy and Nurse Hannah (an absolutely delightful performance from Katie Rose Clarke) is a welcome addition to the sheer weight of solemn hopelessness the show adopts at times, its beginnings stumble in tone with the number, "I Oughta Go."

Finally, even if the sentiment is nearly redundant by the time of the song, or the epiphany of its message unearned, "Stronger Than Before" is an absolutely beautiful number with the range and talents of Salonga and Clarke on full display. 

Every creative misstep is vindicated by the show's end.

A painful omission in reviews by both Variety and The New York Times is the gravity of the situation that it successfully communicates without assigning blame. 

Allegiance is not simply an attempt to "humanize complex issues" by "refracting them through the experiences of a small, representative group." 

By definition, a human issue is complex. 

As long as that small, representative group is human (which, to be clear, they are), this idea of "humanizing complex issues" is an oxymoron.

It's not simply a musical history lesson, and to treat it as nothing more than that completely misses the point.  

Reviews that even step so far as to call the lyrics or their sentiments "banal" add nothing of value to the conversation of the play's meaning in the larger context with which we must all engage.

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So let's back up, and be very clear: Japanese Americans were imprisoned because they looked Japanese and lived in America. 

Roosevelt's executive order in 1942 openly declared Japanese Americans as less than American citizens, and by relocating them to camps with inhumane conditions, declared them less than human.

Of course, carefully walking around that "human" side of the conversation is exactly how history, repeats itself, and at the heart of it, Allegiance, in its final song, "Still a Chance," relays a profoundly timely message of hope; this plea that we not allow history to repeat itself in this way again. 

Allegiance is a deeply emotional experience that has the power to re-contextualize the conversation we're having about race relations in America. 

Not just because of George Takei's truth, the phenomenal talent that is Lea Salonga, or the show-stopping numbers at the end of the first act (both "Higher" and "Our Time Now" are brilliant). 

Not because of what history, and the way we have told it, has allowed us to forget: that 120,000 Japanese American citizens were incarcerated and banned from enlisting in the U.S. armed forces; that the 442nd Regimental Combat Team-- the eventual, albeit segregated, concession for allowing these law-abiding citizens to serve their country --is one of the most decorated units in U.S. Army history. 

On August 6th, 1945, we were the first and last country in the history of the world to drop an atomic bomb on another country; and on August 9th we would follow our bombing of Hiroshima with another on Nagasaki. Allegiance does not let us forget this, but it does not hate us for it. 

This is not a reminder for the sake of memory. This is not a history lesson, musical or otherwise. The painful omission other reviews made is that Allegiance does not shy away from any of this. It reminds us, but it does so with a humanity that we ourselves could not show in that time. 

Like Sammy Kimura, the play does not hold onto the despicable or grotesque. The United States was at its very worst in this time, and the play does not attribute blame. It does not linger on the mistakes. It is a production that has already forgiven us for our errors. 

So why is Allegiance important? Why should you see it? Why should you care about it at all? The United States government, as both perpetrator and bystander, has this awful knack of repeating travesties just like it, and we're better off remembering that before we allow it to happen ever again.  

It is a reminder that this is not the first time the U.S. has not only ignored any question of whether some lives matter (not more than others, but at all), but it has also denied its people any dialogue at all; one that, thankfully, we are having now. 

Yes, Allegiance is a reminder. Yes, we are supposed to remember the past. No, we cannot correct our errors or mistakes (such, as Takei's character Sam learns, is impossible). 

We hold onto the past because we must always question the road we are on.

The show's finale, "Still a Chance," is that plea for introspection on both a national and personal level; that we accept the consequences of Japanese American Internment with the weight that they deserve. 

It asks that we recognize that our government has been, still is, and can be grotesquely un-American.

With the recent attacks of Islamic extremists like ISIS and those who identify with its values, the danger of us making the same mistake is more prevalent than ever. 

We, unlike our government, cannot assign blame to an entire race or ethnicity for the actions of a few. Of course, this first requires that we not use a religion to identify an ethnicity (Muslim is not a race of people; it refers to those who practice Islam), but that might be a little nit-picky. 

Allegiance, no different from any other piece of transcendent artwork, doesn't offer an alternative to this. It doesn't need to. It asks that we remember, and that we move forward. It stands as a long-overdue contribution to a conversation we must continue having. 

We are better for seeing it because we are better in remembering how we must hold ourselves, our communities, and our governments accountable for these crimes. 

We are better for seeing it because what we talk about when we talk about race often omits the historical perspective required to have a conversation with meaning. 

We are better for remembering how quickly our American values warp in times of fear; remembering that we shook the foundations of an entire race of people, both domestic and abroad, with fear, incarceration, intimidation, and nuclear warfare. 

We are better for this, not for the sake of reparations, but to better inform the promise that we cannot allow such to pass again. 

Despite its creative miscues, Allegiance brings an untold story to life with unexpected brilliance. It is a story we need told at a time we need it heard. Get your tickets here.

Check out 13 Incredible Events Going Down This December in NYC. 

[Feature Image Courtesy AsAmNews]