For a title so titillating, the delivery of this provocative piece of writing is suprising bland.
3 young men and the girl from 881 starred in this production. Butt-checks peeking out from the beige body-suit, provocative sexual positions..with whips, ropes, a pistol, cybersex, hokkien vulgarities, sexual innunedos in every other sentence… In a show that juices the rating for all it is worth, it is abhorrent that I was bored, but I was.
Gay boys, confused boys, sexual boys screaming vulgarities at one another, picking fights, taking drugs, indulging in sex.. this is a generation where the boundaries of one’s sexual identity bulges. With a lot more freedom in a society that maintains moral elasticity behind a pious and stiff facade, i feel that i am taken on a joyride into the physically and emotionally landscape of the pink legion. When the play draws a boundary between the boys’ psyche and the society at large, the setting became mellow, indulgent and audience members are given a visual treat of boys’ secret lives. When the outer world crashes into this psychedelic fantasy world where body fluids flow in abundance, such as the police intrusion, the mother’s witnessing her son engaging in homosexual acts, this world of crumbles.
What I find somewhat offensive is the play’s use of the Buddhist’s Heart Sutra so callously, its function incidental without attempting to explain or dwell deeper into the religious juxtaposition with the world of the ’sinners’. The play would hardly be very different without this religious element.
In the end, this play only serves to reinforces the stereotype that homosexuals are sexually depraved. The element of the wandering spirit who is unwilling to forgive his mother even in his death appears to cement the playwright’s conviction that the 2 worlds should remain parallel to be functional.
Audrey is one of the first to be married, Eileen one of the last TS wedding I reckon I will be attending. Many of them will either embrace singlehood or will have to wait until Section 377A of the Penal Code is abolished.
Others not in the picture are Callie Wong and Tiffany Wee
My TS classmates! Rajee Subramaniam (now Rajee Henderson) resides in Australia, Audrey Tok (now Audrey Pang) is my neighbour, Bavani Shanmuganathen resides in Sudan and Loretta Tan (sister of Chen Zicai) was my neighbour! Pict taken in the ladies room in Hilton.
Of cos we made too much noise! We ‘bumped’ into one another in the toilet, already fashionably late. Stories and pleasantries were exchanged while I snapped away.
The food is fantastic, though I wouldnt choose a venue where the floor is shared by 2 weddings. Plenty of alcohol, laughters and food esp with the girls disappearing too often for smoke breaks. Gone were the days in college where I used to contemplate life with one in hand.
The lovely couple had all their good friends on stage for speeches, basically it was sweetness all around, including my favourite dessert at the end of the dinner.
Marriage love shouldnt be burdened with too much expectations, in my opinion. We cross our fingers, becoming legally entangled having given our hearts away and have the rings on the fourth finger constantly to remind us of our promises. A dessert too sweet leaves one thirsty, a wedding too blithe leaves one feeling blight. But that’s just me.
‘It’s about a psychotic breakdown and what happens to a person’s mind when the barriers which distinguish between reality and different forms of imagination completely disappeared, so that you no longer know the difference between your waking life and your dream life. And also you no longer know where you stop, and the world starts.‘ (Sarah Kane)
In every aspect, this is a difficult play to do. The text is deep, sanity and madness follows in tandem; and the spurs of humour, black. The subject matter, the most obvious being suicide is a taboo to talk about, much less to dwell into and to analyse. How does one stage a play penned by a woman who killed herself? How does one do it justice, without either sensationalising it with bleakness or to overcompensate by overemphasising on the pockets of hopefulness? One who walks into such a production cannot expect to be entertained. It never plans to amuse, nor is it made for enjoyment.
Many a times, I cant feel the connection with the character in the script as i felt Jing trying to steep herself in madness, is feebly trying. Trained in physical theatre, emoting a woman in pain on her face and in her voice falls short at times, creating a distance, a gulf that removes the audience from the apt black box setting. Lighting creates an ominous mood that syncs well. The sound effects however appears too jarring. Seeking an experience into psychosis is not an easy ride. I wince, I flinch, I edge deeper into my seats and dig my fingers into the fabrics of the seats and wish for it to end, not that I didnt like the performance but there are moments so real I was convinced I am seeing Jing in her most wretched self. I cannot look away.
Despite parts that are simply inaccessible, I find it impossible not to applaud the genuine effort and craft of the performance. This is a rare piece of literary work that lays bare one’s wound for the world to scrutinise.
Be kind.
By The Theatre Practice
Performed by Kuo Jing Hong in the Drama Centre Black Box
16-26 July 2009
everytime we drive by, there is always a long queue for the famous PUNGGOL NASI LEMAK so we decide to try it
There is even a yellow box on the floor
The Nasi Lemak costs $6.70, a tad expensive. I prefer the version sold at Golden Shoe Carpark.
and we wash it down with durians (3 costing $40).
They are absolutely scrumptious! The flesh is milky and thick, with a hint of bitter in the sweet, the kind you can tear the flesh off the seed and be sent right off to food ecstasy…
cool RED chandeliers on level two leading to Film and Wayang Gallery
Love Tank by S Teddy D (Indonesia)
“Most people spend their lives living in dreary, beige conformity, mortally afraid of using colours. The main purpose of my work is to provoke people into using their imagination and make their surroundings more exciting.” - Verner Panton
i almost never can go to a museum in the day time, that is the time slot for tourists.
The verner panton exhibit is an eye opener, an assault of bright psychedelic colours that works so well there must be science behind it. I enjoy the almost fully enclosed environment called the visiona. It is a playground for adults where one will be totally enveloped. You can jump around, climb up and down or merely take a shut-eye at a corner of your favourite colour. You cant help but feel safe, yet it is anything but boring reminding me of a Stanley Kubrick movie.
was chatting with physicist friend Rajesh about life and chances, serendipity and coincidences. is it organic or are we all part of a larger well-oiled vehicle at play- why some of us are lecturers, some firemen, bakers, investment bankers and so on. Are we part of a meaningful cosmic scheme? Is meditation and yoga a well-lit path to understanding the neon lights of enlightenment that mere superficial mortal beings with neantherdal needs and whims cant fanthom much less see?
rajesh elaborated on the highers states of awareness that deep meditation brings him. His yoga mates have claimed to feel a certain energy coming out from him. He believes that there aint a personal God like an Aunt Agony figure. He believes that God has created the world and has given us brains and we are supposed to settle our own problems, to put it aptly.
I believe in a larger scheme of things, movies are useful this way.
I mentioned the movie ’sliding door’ to him, where two possibilities are played out- one when the protagonist managed to catch the train and caught her boyfriend cheating on her and the other when she didnt and she lives in happy oblivion. Which is a happier outcome? Is honesty more important than earthy happiness? Ultimately she came to the same end suggesting that thou the paths can be altered, the labyrinth can only lead to the same destination.
later that day i watched the film adaptationIan of Ian McEwan’s Atonment, novel par excellent. told through the eyes of a jealous young girl Briony, guility of scotoma, she accused an innocent young man Robbie of a hedious crime, thus killing his chance of becoming a doctor and becoming his sister, Cecilia’s boyfriend. Not having understood the passion she has witnessed, she mistook it for violence. Her inquisitive, overly imaginative mind bends the truth and twisted facts to fit it into a novel she will eventually write as an act of penance. In the end, the pen of the writer has the power to construt on paper what mortals have no power to change.
“So, my sister and Robbie were never able to have the time together they both so longed for… and deserved. Which ever since I’ve… ever since I’ve always felt I prevented. But what sense of hope or satisfaction could a reader derive from an ending like that? So in the book, I wanted to give Robbie and Cecilia what they lost out on in life. I’d like to think this isn’t weakness or… evasion… but a final act of kindness. I gave them their happiness. “
i am not much of a bargain hunter but like all women, i know a good deal when i see one. Earlier, I have bought Wally Lamb’s THE HOUR I FIRST BELIEVED (soft cover), having read one of his previous books which i adored, I bought a copy at BORDERS for $20+. When I saw the same book, hard cover going at $8 at the MPH expo sale, i know I have to practice the law of averaging.
The book cover is slightly torn at the top but it is far from being tattered. Plus I really love the cover picture, reminds me of Ong Ken Seng’s ‘Yang Family’.
Merely 8 bucks!
The books are going for $8 a piece or $35 for 5 so naturally i have no problem buying more books. I ended up the proud owner of Milan Kundera’s immortality, this Wally Lamb’s book, one book on body art, a picture book titled china chic and Lonely Planet’s A year of Festivals.
I also chance upon ESPRIT sale that was part of the ROBINSONS warehouse sale. Naturally i couldnt just walk away.
A GOOD BUY= GLOAT= RETAIL THERAPY
wonder if miu miu will ever offer such deep discounts…
I caught the film years back and liked it so much that I climbed the Coit Tower in San Francisco to view the mural art by Diego Rivera, her much older, socialist, cheating husband.
The film starring Salma Hayek playing her painful but artful life was on TV last Sunday on filmart, and i catch the last scene with a quote written by her before her/her painting combusts, with her lying serene in bed.
‘I hope the leaving is joyful; and i hope never to return.’
A lone figure stands tall, slightly slouching. This civilian stands in front a line of military tanks. He is like Superman, without the cape, without the superhuman ability to bend the turret at will or to fly away. The year is 1989. The place is Tiananmen Square. This man, this unknown person armed only with two plastic bags struts to the front of the firing line and his courage (or is it desperation) momentarily disarmed the military prowess of the Chinese Communist Party.
For a moment the commander of the tank hesitated and a vacuum of silence is created. This poignant silence engulfed the world watching, waiting for the seemingly inevitable. And his hesitation broke the silence of the everyman.
In the substation Guinness Theatre:
The video installation of this highly charged piece of history ‘forget2forget’ demands participation. A pile of red plastic bags lie on the floor in front of the screen, beckoning audience members to grab two bags, jump in and do the tango. The instructor leading the tango wears a grave expression on his face, juxtaposing the severity of the issue with simple dance steps, as if saying anyone can do this… but do what?
Is it possible hence to remember, just so that we dont forget?
