On hearing that a play with such a provocative name was going to be staged, a Young Republic outing was planned for the day - appropriately enough, National Day, which happened also to be the opening day. The play was rated 'Adult themes: Suitable for 16 years and above'. At first, I thought that this was because it was subversive, but after watching it it's presumably because of the odd vulgarity/obscenity ("fucked", "almost had a hard-on") and a bedroom scene (no, kiddies, there're no tits - you probably see more on the beach, and there was no action since it was a post-coital scene).
Unfortunately, as a source informed me a few days ago, we got conned: "it's not about jeyaretnam!! i just found this out!! damn irritated! the "JBJ" is some other fictitious person!! DAMN IRRITATING HOR" Be that as it may, I suspected that there would be lots of deliberate conflation of these 2 JBJs, and I was right. Luckily, this conflation was stretched only as far as it could be without the gag getting tired (the first half), at least in my opinion.
The play was composed of a few elements:
- Conflating JBJ and WP ("Wildlife Preservation"), and making statements about the other JBJ which also apply to the one we all know and love
- Un-subtle cheap shots (which often worked, but which got tired after a while as the audience got desensitised to them)
- Lame jokes (eg Newater - it's been so long, it's not really funny anymore)
- Puerile jokes (eg Many jokes about ASS - Association of Students for Self-expression, having a policeman go on his knees, hide under the table and suck his thumb)
- Sometimes obscure references to current events/Singaporean history/personages/things that only the artistic circle would get/other context-dependent in-jokes ("A modern reinterpretation of rap lyrics as Japanese Noh")
As an example, one of the funnier bits had "New Age technology", where a woman named Crystal ("Crystal Jade"), dressed up as a mystic, recorded a Persistently Politically Correct Podcast (I hope I got the name right) and called her show "The Mrs Brown Show", despite having no claim to that nom de plume. She proudly proclaimed that to stay safe, her show did not have puns on governmental ministers' names (?) and did not use dialect. She also said that the secret to getting "tens of thousands of hits" was to do precisely those things. She also declared that "like all right-thinking people, we believe that the Internet must be managed". That scene ended with her saying, to the audience, "tur kwa".
During the interval, I was saying that this was annoying, but at least it was better than the alternative, which would be a pretentious show with large dollops of existential angst. Unfortunately, we did get an (un)healthy dose of generational/relationship angst in the second act, especially in scene 5 when it was so thick, you could slice it with a butter-knife, so in a sense we had the worst of both worlds; this felt like an obligatory theme grafted on to a framework of cheap shots and obscure references, but perhaps it was supposed to account for the protagonist's selling out and becoming a cog of the system, albeit a bitter one (I hope I read this bit correctly).
However, the second act was also more mature in that it toned down (somewhat) on the cheap shots, references and such, and had perhaps the best cheap shot of all - an old man with a cane standing in the shadows, adept at moving the levers of power, commenting on the hoi polloi: "They want us to take charge. Even when they don't admit it. Even when they pretend that they want to make up their own minds" (the last line might be a bit wrong)
The epilogue and ending didn't make much sense, with the protagonist reciting some lines undoubtedly intended to be meaningful and then dancing with a dead man (?).
Much of the play gave me the "school play" feeling; among other things, how the actors (especially Rodney) liked to look at the audience directly while delivering their monologues; Pam was better at addressing the audience without being direct to the extent of breaking the fourth wall. But then again, most of my theatre experience is limited to school plays.
In the first half of the play, Pam played the assorted parts while Rodney was the same character all the way. Meanwhile in the second, the reverse happened. This was fitting in a way and is probably some elaborate theatrical joke, but since the second half was darker and more angsty than the first, with themes of civil service intrigue, it might not have been all that appropriate.
The acting was generally great, and leagues ahead of Channel 8 (though this isn't saying much - I happened to see a few minutes of one episode a few days ago, and it's apparent that the acting has not improved in 2 decades). I especially admired the speed at which the actors changed their costumes and hair/wigs, and how well and fast they slipped into their various personas. A friend adds, though, that: "Rodney appeared to start off uncomfortable and one-note. he got better by the end. i couldn't feel the emotional arc of Daniel Lee in short. Rodney only came to life after he started to multi-task. pamela was better overall". Meanwhile, the soundtrack and background music also suited the purposes of the play very well.
All in all, the play was very parochial and would never succeed overseas. Or, indeed, outside of a small circle of intelligentsia with the knowledge, background and capability to catch all of the in-jokes and references.
Miscellaneous things I was amused by:
- jibes at NUS (about the new University Hall, built only a few years after the old new one)
- allegations of funny things going on within the police force (I thought it was illegal to include such innuendo, or use the police uniform for such purposes, yet the
- A civil servant on public chatter about government complicity in the murder of someone: "He was a University student for Gods' sake... We wouldn't stoop to murder. Exile, the occasional detention maybe"
At the end, I felt like heckling but didn't have any ideas about what to shout. nw.t suggested "Stick to Puccini!", but I was too polite to do so. One of the advantages of watching a show on the opening night is that you get to see the director and writer get lauded and make a speech. Given the nature of this play and for all its gahmen references, I couldn't help but feel that "This festival is about new voices... Speaking out" was just falling into a gahmen-dictated paradigm, speaking their vocabulary and playing with their rules.
As we were milling after the show, this lady with a British accent was trying to get us to fill in the feedback forms, but none of us was willing. I wanted to frame my thoughts properly, since they would be too long for the measly space allotted to us. Maybe I should CC this blog entry to them as my feedback.
Everyone who had something to say about the play was in accord about the general conclusion, so it wasn't just me. nw.t went around asking people: "When was your 'Fuck. Kill me now!' moment", and most recounted various points in the play when they had that sentiment. Several of us felt that the play was basically saying "look how clever I am [in being able to squeeze in so many references and in-jokes]!" nw.t commented that the only consolation was that we hadn't watched "that other meretricious piece of garbage - NDP". I pointed out that at least that was free.
Meanwhile, the programme was very pretentious, consisting of navel gazing and self-indulgent artistic masturbation in a vacuum, especially the part where they gushed about the role of art and how great artists (they?) were.
Maybe my expectations are too high, but as I always say about Malaysia Airlines - it's easy to go beyond expectations if you don't expect very much.
Miscellaneous notes not about the play:
In an act of cockitude, despite having $60 worth of Esplanade vouchers for buying 8 tickets, Jiekai forgot to present them before payment (he better not burn down my kitchen on Friday). Luckily nw.t asked if the final bill ($112 for 8 people) included the vouchers before signing the credit card slip. Luckily the staff were nice enough. Ichiban is nice and has very reasonable prices, but the sushi is much better than the a la carte non-sushi menu. It has many exotic types of sushi ("abalone salad" for $1.90 [right.] and turkey bacon handroll) Unfortunately, as one can tell, it is one of those places which has forsaken culinary principles in the pursuit of vulgar money.
In another act of cockitude, the Cock didn't zip his coin compartment and coins fell onto the floor. Later, in a clear case of the negative effects of Force Chain, nw.t didn't close his Clorets box, and Clorets fell onto the floor.