“Skin Deep, But There’s Potential“

Reviewer: Isaac Tan
Performance: 3 February 2018

With this double bill, GenerAsia launches its Platform Series, which gives younger performers an opportunity to create and perform original works. In this inaugural showcase, Erwin Shah Ismail and Kimberly Chan blend personal aspects of their lives with fiction to create their respective monologues, Kulit on the Go and In Her Shoes.

Erwin takes his love for leathercrafting and creates three characters – the itinerant Malay leathercrafter, the Chinese tannery worker, and the Texan farmer – to explain the process of leather production and crafting. Along the way, Kulit on the Go raises issues about the value of things in life, love, and the environmental footprint of rearing cows.

Initially, the glacial pace of the show simulates the process of leathercrafting, which creates the expectation that we will eventually see how the disparate elements come together to form something beautiful.

Unfortunately, that did not come to pass. There is a sense that the show is groping for something, only to suddenly veer off into environmentalism, which does not quite fit with the rest of the show.

That said, Erwin proves to be a consummate performer as he moves between characters with absolute ease. He also has a keen ear for dialogue and successfully captures the idiosyncrasies of how English, Malay, Mandarin and Hokkien are spoken locally. He even overcomes the language barrier that some audience members may have by mixing languages or having his characters code switch.

While Erwin’s work is reaching for something, Kimberly Chan’s In Her Shoes is a grab bag of all that she loves about performing.

Largely structured as a revue, Chan lays out various shoes across the space. With every pair she tries on, she plays a different woman: sometimes herself, sometimes characters who are possibly inspired by true stories. Songs are then recontextualised to fit the various scenes.

While it starts off with a thoroughly entertaining interpretation of Stephen Sondheim’s “You Could Drive A Person Crazy” to express a daughter’s love-hate relationship with her mother, it soon feels as if she is including as many of her favourite tunes as she can.

In a scene where a girl grapples with a friend’s suicide, Chan delivers a poignant text about the what-ifs, only to be disrupted by her singing Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again”, which hardly adds anything.

Furthermore, not all shoes are given equal treatment. As she puts on her flamenco shoes, she talks about hating flamenco and Spanish dance at first, but they soon become something she loves. This is accompanied by an oddly dizzying choreography, in which flamenco and classical Spanish dance steps (yes, there is a difference) are paired with modern classical music. After receiving her applause, she swiftly moves on to the next segment, which makes it seem like the scene was only there to prove that she is a triple threat.

Rather than journeying in various pairs of shoes, the show is more akin to trying on and tossing aside shoes in a boutique.

What is most encouraging is that both performers are keenly aware that their pieces are works-in-progress. While there is still a long road ahead, I would happily watch another iteration of both pieces.

“Size does not matter”

Reviewer: Jeremiah Choy
Performance: 11 November 2016

Touted as a platform for three generations of theatre practitioners (Desmond Sim, Jeffrey Tan and Hang Qian Chou), Shrimps In Space has a revival this November under the guiding hands of GenerAsia’s Richard Tan (yet another generation).

The story itself (the growing pangs of a scrawny boy in the myriad of issues surrounding friendship, love and loss) mirrors the history of monologues in Singapore.

There was a time in Singapore where monologues rule theatre scene. Lean, mean, intimate and intimidating, the one-actor shows has delighted large audiences in the late 80s and 90s. In epic monologues like Emily of Emerald Hill, Lest the Demons Get to Me, The Coffin Is Too Big For The Hole, just to name a few.  These lone voices provide commentaries on society: the public and the personal.

As a monologue, Shrimps in Space does not disappoint. The audience goes on a roller coaster ride with Huat Bee/Hay Bee and Hin Kong/King Kong (played nimbly but not without flaws by Qian Chou). What is refreshing is that Sim’s quest into the story of growing up is not only about Hay Bee but it is also as much about King Kong, his best friend forever.

At first, I question the casting by director Jeffrey Tan – as a truly scrawny actor may more suitably play Hay Bee. But as the script unfolds, size does not really matter.

It is the metamorphosis of Hay Bee and King Kong in my mind that really counts. And Qian Chou creates the space for me to do so. The image of a once hunky ape-man King Kong dying driveled and bone thin in the arms of the big-hearted (and now larger than life) Hay Bee is powerful and moving.

Director Tan’s vision of staying true to the timeline of the script brings back good memories of the ’80s and the ’90s. For those who lived through that period of disco, school functions and tea parties, it is pure nostalgia.

However, one questions the relevance of Sim’s script today. Perhaps, a more up to date staging can bring in more (younger) audience to this production?

I am left also wondering: Does size matters really matters in theatre? There have not been any new noteworthy monologues (writing or staging) of late. Do we (the audience) only want to see the big sized King Kong and shun the skinny Hay Bee on stage?

There is something about lean mean productions that we often overlook. It provides a platform for art makers to find their voice. It is both intimate and intimidating for the audience. But that is why we go to the theatre. To be engaged.

So does size really matter?

“Evolution of friendship”

Reviewer: Isaac Lim
Performance: 12 November 2016

Lights on. We see Huat Bee on stage in a retro 1990s pose; sort of like a “Mambo” move. Huat Bee then proceeds to the blackboard with a chalk in hand to write down the word “Evolution”. He turns to the audience and explains what evolution is.

This is the life of Huat Bee, the story of a supposed skinny and scrawny guy, set against a larger-than-life world. It is because he is so small in size, as compared to his peers, that he is nicknamed “haebi” or dried shrimps. He studies in an all-boys school, and the choice extra-curricular activity in the said school is rugby. He doesn’t excel in rugby, but his best friend Hing Kong (a.k.a King Kong) does. And they develop a long withstanding friendship that is what this almost two-hour long monodrama is all about.

Not-that-scrawny actor Hang Qian Chou plays the role of Huat Bee in this iteration of Shrimps. It is the first time Hang takes on a monologue, and is the star of his own show. While he physically doesn’t seem to fit the role, he certainly fills the shoe all right.

Hang is charming as the slightly nerdy Huat Bee. He carries off a demeanor that brings people into his world through what he says. Hang is able to portray both the serious moments and the comedic moments with ease, and is simply a pleasure to watch.

The monologue by Desmond Sim was first written and performed in 1999. This version, directed by Jeffrey Tan, tries to keep to the 1990s vibes through the music and, to a lesser extent, the costumes.

Huat Bee is seen “growing up” on stage, through his teenage years until adulthood, as he changes his clothes on stage with the help of stage assistants. While initially awkward, the theme of “evolution” soon makes sense.

As the character grows up, we see his struggles with life; not so much due to his physique, but his beliefs. His friendship with Hing Kong, or King Kong, or later known as Norman, changes with time. The decay is told through Huat Bee, but it isn’t hard for the audience to imagine the actions because Hang narrates with such conviction.

The plot is perhaps a little too predictable and a tad too long. Many things happen on stage that Sim manages to link together (cause-and-effect) that could be cut altogether. The major twist towards the end felt a little overdramatic, and it’s something this play didn’t need to conclude. It is mired with too many stereotypes that even good acting could not salvage the datedness of the storyline.

As the lights come on towards the end, the atmosphere is heavy. We see Huat Bee losing a friend to terminal illness. Then again, we see the once-bullied person, who is really just an everyman like you and me, standing tall despite his (supposedly) petite frame, and understanding the importance of friendship. Now, that sense of nostalgia doesn’t seem that bad after all.