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| Friday, February 27, 2004
Theatre > Poetry in the Flesh Jewel of the Nile - Poetry in the FleshPoetry in the Flesh was performed by STAGES and various artists. Reviewed by Charlene Lim. It was such a treat sitting through STAGES' outing at Singapore's first poetry festival Wordfeast, watching my own fellow men celebrating local poetry with so much finesse and passion. Putting movement to words, STAGES brought poetry to theatre with their physical interpretation of local poetry by big wigs such as Alfian Sa'at and Cyril Wong. Alfian Sa'at's poem Neighbours deserved mention as the definitive highpoint for that night. Displaying Singapore's varied ethnicity and languages in its full glory, it was a sharp observation about how we draw conclusions about other people without giving them the benefit of the doubt. Also can be reworded as 'things people talk about'. Neighbours gave permission for everyone in the cast to have a field day hurling insults, in almost every language and dialect spoken in Singapore, at the character of interest. A lady minding her own business, struggling to make ends meet in our terribly oppressed society, not gaining sympathy from her neighbours but judgment and gossip. I was smiling broadly in the dark hearing the cast as they alternated from Malay, to Hokkien to Cantonese, nodding my head in approval and almost falling off tickled by the delivery, spoken with immense flair. In quick succession was Leong Liew Geok's Farewell to Sumana that moved me to tears as I listened on a painful departure of a family's domestic help, related by her employer. Done in the similar fashion as Neighbours, Farewell had all the quirkiness of Singlish said with an identifiable sadness when our 'Florence' or 'Ida' goes home to get married. Therein lies a gem in the local arts scene: Singaporeans thrive on performing as themselves. What I mean by this is we sound best when we speak our own language and talk about our own issues. Why? Simply because we understand it and better able to say it emotively. Like the Irish Singaporeans have taken the English language and made it theirs. Many times in local theatre we hear a learned version of English that comes across flat and unnatural, simply because we are not used to speaking that way on a normal day. Therefore theatre sounds alien even though some very good plays are staged. This does not mean we should stop staging foreign plays. But it is particularly important for the local theatre to produce local work because this brings the audience closer to them. By luring them in with good Singaporean works that they can understand will build rapport and credibility for the local theatres and therefore a constant supportive audience. STAGES made a deliberate effort to involve their audience by planting the cast in the audience as they slouched and stretched over them while Jonathan Lim's "We should not have to sit in rows" was read. Complaining about the constraints of the formal arrangement of chairs Lim's poem urged the audience to throw away their set perceptions and get involved! I almost had a heart attack when the girl next to me suddenly placed her arms over my shoulder but then I quickly realised it was part of the act as actors at various points in the audience melted to the floor or propped their legs on chairs. This drew quite a lot of laughter and I am sure many of us appreciated the effort to loosen us up. Then came the proud reading of Ng Yi Sheng's award-winning piece "A loud poem" to be read to a very obliging audience by the entire cast as they marched, shouted and danced to this very enjoyable poem. It was also repeated throughout the entire evening, as a clever tool to segment the program. Mulling over love, relationships and identity were some memorable moments as Lim's "Maybe it's me and Maybe not me" displayed some very smart juxtaposition of words. Kudos to the actors that mirrored each other's movements to much comic delight! Kevin Murphy's delivery of Urban Remembrance was gripping. I see a starlet birthing in our midst. For those who are familiar with Chicken Rice War, our local market version of Romeo and Juliet, Murphy played Pierre Png's friend in love with DJ Utt. Following the trend of local theatre, issues about sex and homosexuality were not left out in the program. The complaint here is not the issue, rather the graphic presentation of sexual positions in After him by Jonathan Lim could be best left to the imagination. In contrast, when guest poet Martin Alexander read his work on a cannibal in love with a vegetarian, I felt more stirred when he said, 'If I could butter your knees and nibble on your spine' than seeing unfettered missionary on stage. Otherwise, STAGES is a local treasure waiting to grow and mature into a theatre company many will enjoy and look forward to seeing. May there be more companies following suit in their celebration of local work!
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