1. 10 April 1985: The AIDS virus is discovered in Singapore

In 1981, five young gay men in Los Angeles contracted a rare lung infection. The root cause was soon found to be a virus which attacked their immune systems, and was transmitted via sexual contact. The infected were rendered vulnerable to and would succumb to opportunistic diseases like infections. The virus was soon reported in many other gay men, and hence named Gay-Related Immune Deficiency (GRID).

But by 1982, almost half of the infected population were non-homosexual. It was also found that the virus could be transmitted through intravenous injections and blood transfusions too. The mysterious disease was soon given a new name – Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome or AIDS. In the next few years, the AIDS epidemic spread rapidly across major US cities, and, due to air travel, across the world. In 1985, three male sex workers in Singapore were found to have AIDS.

“The disclosure that three local homosexual prostitutes had been discovered with the AIDS virus has spread alarm among the gay community. Heterosexuals also were concerned that they might pick up the dreaded virus in public places… Several homosexuals, or “gays”, said fear of the disease had impelled them to change their lifestyles. Many said they believed the virus existed in Singapore even before the three cases came to light last week.”

Source: Fear and uncertainty hit the gay community by Frieda Koh. In Singapore Monitor (14 Apr 1985), https://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/newspapers/Digitised/Article/singmonitor19850414-1.2.5

2. 10 October 1985: Bugis Street closes for redevelopment

Following a study by the Ministry of National Development and the Singapore Tourist Promotion Board, the government made the decision to move out the tenants and redevelop the area to improve sewage, clear pollution, and make way for a train station.

Bugis Street officially closed in early October 1985, with bulldozers moving in to demolish buildings on 11 October. The redevelopment completely wiped out Bugis Street’s vibrant street food scene, and its infamous transgender sex trade.

“The trans-sexuals give character to Bugis Street. It was not uncommon during it heyday to find 30 to 40 trans-sexuals gathered there on any one night. But since 1980, the authorities came down hard on trans-sexuals after a spate of robberies and street brawls. They were not allowed into Bugis Street… Today, only three or four can be seen after midnight, dressed in tightly-cut clothes, often with their cleavages showing.”

Source: The street that wouldn't sleep. In Straits Times (11 Oct 1985), https://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/newspapers/Digitised/Article/straitstimes19851011-1.2.23.34

3. September 1993: Police entrapment of gay men at Tanjong Rhu

In a week-long operation, police officers baited and arrested 12 gay men in Tanjong Rhu. The area where the operation took place sat on reclaimed land that had been left to settle. This remote seaside location was popular among gay men cruising for sex.

The arrested men were pictured and named in newspapers and tabloids. They were tried in court and received jail-time ranging between two and six months, as well as strokes of the cane.

“…plainclothes policemen from the Geylang Police Division Headquarters posed as decoys. They would identify themselves when contact was made before back-up officers moved in to help round up the alleged offenders.”

12 men nabbed in anti-gay operations at Tanjong Rhu. In Straits Times (23 Nov 1993).

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The Vault: Desert Blooms is a lecture-performance tracing the history of Singapore theatre from 1985 to 1995 through a queer lens. Desert Blooms was created by Ng Yi-Sheng, directed by Tan Shou Chen, and performed by Rebekah Sangeetha Dorai, Yap Yi Kai and Izzul Irfan . Find our more here.

With original English-language plays by the likes of Lim Chor Pee and Goh Poh Seng in the 1960s, it seemed like Singapore theatre was off to a promising start. But just a decade into Singapore’s independence, it was Goh that made the above statement calling time on the local theatre scene.

Perhaps rumours of Singapore theatre’s death in the 1970s had been greatly exaggerated. It’s only with the benefit of hindsight that arts writers like Clarissa Oon can call the decade as Singapore theatre “in transition”, especially with the “first golden age of Singapore theatre” just around the corner in the 80’s.

Here is a glimpse into how Singapore theatre was alive and kicking in the 1970s through three key trends of the decade.

• 1. A hardy (but amateur) lot
• 2. A lack of good local full-length plays
• 3. State interventions

• Contrary to expectations and predictions, interest in drama did not collapse.Violet Oon

  Early in the 1970s, the withdrawal of the British troops from Singapore spelt doom for a largely amateur and expatriate theatre scene. Stage clubs in military bases like Tengah and Nee Soon wound up as its British members and audiences left the island. In 1971, the Singapore Herald reported that local theatre enthusiasts were predicting Singapore theatre would “die a natural death in a year’s time”. Nancy Byramji for the Straits Times painted a mournful picture of “empty seats” in theatre houses.

  But all was not lost. A year later, New Nation’s Violet Oon jauntily wrote, “Contrary to expectations and predictions, interest in drama did not collapse.” Oon pointed out that the void left behind by the British groups was in actual fact space for newer players to emerge, albeit inexperienced.

  Active amateur theatre groups of the decade included the Stage Club and The Young Musician’s Society, alongside collectives started in the local university, like Experimental Theatre Club, University of Singapore Society and University of Singapore Drama Society. But while the 1970s in Singapore was marked by high economic growth rates and a newfound prosperity for the fledgling nation, these local theatre groups didn’t seem to be part of the success story, struggling for money, audiences, members, and even space.

  Former members of these groups painted a bleak picture. In the Singapore theatre history publication Theatre Life!, Kate James said that Experimental Theatre Club could be performing to an audience of just 20 people, and Lim Kay Tong declared “there was no theatre scene” because productions were far and few between. “Turnover of membership is very high. Our problem is to get a core of members who will be there to keep the interest going,” said D. Murugan, president of the Experimental Theatre Club. Murugan also bemoaned the lack of rehearsal space, with his club wandering from one home of a “kind host” to another.

  All these problems were pegged to an absent professional theatre industry. Donald Moore writing for New Nation was harsh in his critique of the Singapore English-language theatre scene at the time: “The Western theatre is the prisoner of its own inevitably amateur status, incapable of producing anything but mediocrity. With the best will in the world, little is possible in the theatre without long and arduous training, professionalism, and a modicum of genius.”

  Yet, for all these problems, the amateur theatre groups of the 70’s soldiered on. Amy Chua for the Straits Times called these groups a “hardy lot” who were “self-supporting”, continuing the stage productions year on year out of passion for theatre.

   

• As you write a play, you feel justice will not be done to your work – so you fight shy of writing it.Goh Poh Seng

  Local theatre groups in the 1970s preferred to stage Western plays in the belief that local play-writing was both scarce and of low quality. This wasn’t an entirely grim situation. Clarissa Oon wrote, “Although the reliance on foreign plays set back the development of a Singaporean voice, the fact that these [Western] scripts tended to be well-crafted allowed homegrown directing and acting talent to shine.”

  Still, a good full-length original Singapore play was an extreme rarity in this decade. Some locally-written short plays did make it to the stage during the decade, and on one occasion in 1972 were described as “show[ing] some promise”. But from the 70’s, only two stand-out full-length Singapore plays emerged.

  The first was Robert Yeo’s Are You There, Singapore?, about a group of Singaporean students studying in London. Yeo was then a published poet and a first-time playwright. Are You There, Singapore? was staged by the University of Singapore Society in 1974 to full houses of local audiences. Reviewing Are You There, Singapore? for New Nation, Violet Oon was effulsive in her praise for the original work: “[I]t convinced me more than ever that Singaporeans should act in plays written by our own people because then we can identify with the ideas, moods and nuances. Double meanings can be understood and appreciated. This feeling seems to be shared by other people because it is about the best-attended play I’ve seen.”

  Three years later, chemist Li Lien Fung would pen The Sword Has Two Edges based on The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, which, like Yeo, was her first full-length English script. Li’s play was staged by the Experimental Theatre Club in 1977 and achieved similar box office success. Oon called The Sword Has Two Edges “undoubtedly the best local play I’ve seen produced so far.”

  These two works proved that there was an appetite for Singaporean plays. So why weren’t more full-length local works written during the decade? While Goh Poh Seng admitted that local writing wasn’t up to par, but he also pinned the blame on the amateur groups. “The frustrating thing is that there are no theatre groups in Singapore of any standing or standards at all,” he wrote in New Nation in 1976. “As you write a play, you feel justice will not be done to your work – so you fight shy of writing it. One is always accepting limitations – bad actors, amateur directors, no decent lighting and stage facilities, and so on.” Which should come first – good plays or good theatre groups? “It’s a vicious cycle,” declared Goh.

• In 1977, the Ministry of Culture convened an advisory committee on drama comprising a number of theatremakers and chaired by Robert Yeo. A number of initiatives emerged from the recommendations of the committee to boost Singapore theatre-making and -going.

  One of these initiatives was the Drama Promotion Scheme, a $2,000 grant for theatre groups to stage productions. The Business Times in January 1978 reported that the scheme carried two conditions: all profits from the production would go back to the Ministry, and ticket prices had to be kept low to encourage public attendance.

  The advisory committee’s recommendations also spawned a nation-wide playwriting competition, as well as an annual Drama Festival. The inaugural Drama Festival was a two-week affair in August 1978 at the Victoria Theatre with 15 stage performances. The Ministry of Culture, which organised the festival, intended for the event to “raise the standard of drama performance and encourage appreciation of drama among Singaporean”. The Ministry later described the first Drama Festival as a “reasonable success [with] attendances averaging 60 per cent and above at most performances”.

  Also of note was the first Singapore Festival of the Arts in 1977 – a precursor of today’s Singapore International Festival of Arts – organised by The Young Musicans’ Society. (The running of subsequent editions was taken over by the Ministry of Culture and its successors.) The Singapore Festival of the Arts provided yet another platform for theatre groups to create and stage work for local audiences.

  But the 1970s was also a chilling time to be in theatre with cultural policing by the State. Some of it was relatively benign, like national policies barring foreign men with long hair from entering the country. Other measures were more restrictive – Ministry of Culture regulated and censored material for public consumption, including play scripts. For example, the University of Singapore Drama Society was banned from staging Yukio Mishima’s Madame de Sade in 1972 because the Ministry had deemed the script “unacceptable”. A performance permit for Yeo’s sophomore play One Year Back Home was also held back for over a year until sufficient revisions had been made to its overtly political content; the play was eventually permitted to be performed in 1980.

  Perhaps most severe of all government interventions in the decade was the crackdown on political dissidents suspected of pro-communist activities. In the mid-1970s, alleged enemies of the state were detained without trial, including many local practitioners of Chinese theatre, which at the time was producing socially and politically charged works. Among the Chinese theatre practitioners detained were dramatist Kuo Pao Kun and his wife Goh Lay Kuan, founders of the Practice Theatre School (now The Theatre Practice). Koh and Goh were detained in 1976 and held for four-and-a-half years and six months respectively.

By Daniel Teo
Published on 19 April 2019

References

Business Times. (1978, January 23). Upturn for local drama. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Byramji, N. (1971, April 11). The empty seats that wait for the young ones to grow up. In Straits Times. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Chua, A. (1976, December 16). The cultural desert. In Straits Times. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Goh, P. S. (1976, October 1). Playwrights don’t use ordinary speech – that’s why they are a failure. In New Nation. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Lam, D. (1978, August 28). Ministry: First Drama Festival a success. In Straits Times. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Loon, R. (2016). Singapore English Theatre: Dynamic and diverse. In Singapore Chronicles: Theatre (pp. 17-41). Singapore: Institute of Policy Studies & Straits Times Press.
Moore, D. (1971, July 24). The state of the arts in Singapore. In New Nation. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
New Nation. (1978, May 28). Focus on stage. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Oon, C. (2001). Theatre Life!: A history of English-language theatre in Singapore through The Straits Times (1958-2000). Singapore: Singapore Press Holdings.
Oon, V. (1972, January 8). A not-too-drastic drop in standards. In New Nation. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Oon, V. (1972, April 28). Local plays show some promise. In New Nation. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Oon. V. (1974, July 26). Bob’s play goes off like a shot. In New Nation. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Oon. V. (1977, August 26). Breathes life into history. In New Nation. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Singapore Herald. (1971, January 29). Local drama groups inactive. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Straits Times. (1972, December 9). Govt bans play to be staged by University Drama Society. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.
Straits Times. (1978, September 26). High turnover impeding steady growth of drama. Downloaded from NewspaperSG.

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The Vault: Gossip, Symphony & Other Matters features three performance responses to Robert Yeo’s One Year Back Home. The three performance responses are created by the graduating students of the NUS Theatre Studies Theatre Lab, engaging with and responding to the ideas, dramaturgy and theatricalities in One Year Back Home. Gossip, Symphony & Other Matters is presented by Centre 42 and NUS Theatre Studies. Find our more here.

At the time, Singapore was emerging as a new economic powerhouse, and a young generation of English-educated Singaporeans were ready to create and consume theatre. This was the decade when many of the seeds for today’s scene were planted.

By the 1980s, the country was experiencing high levels of economic growth thanks to an export oriented economic strategy. The blip of the 1985 recession nonwithstanding, Singaporeans enjoyed material affluence and, as the fruit of meticulous state-centered planning, a middle class began to emerge by the mid 1980s. Accompanying this emergence were the emotional stirrings over larger questions of national identity and culture. The English-educated middle class was searching for its soul. It was against the backdrop of these emotional stirrings over national identity that a Singapore English-language theatre was born in the mid-late 1980s.

The Theatre and the State in Singapore: Orthodoxy and resistance by Terence Chong. Routledge, 2011 (p.4).

Here are three trends which defined the 80’s in Singapore theatre.

• 1. The Search for a Singapore Theatre
• 2. Proliferation and Professionalisation of Theatre Groups
• 3. State Support for the Arts

• 1. The Search for a Singapore Theatre

  The turning point of Singapore English theatre which heralded this unprecedented activity in 1985 – at a time of economic recession previously unknown in modern Singapore and reducing company sponsorship of the main festival in Singapore – is not something that can be pinned down to one particular event. But chief amongst the many factors must be, I would suggest, an increasing recognition that writers, directors, actors and audiences required there to be a phenomenon recognisable as Singapore theatre.

  Singapore English Drama: A Historical Overview by David Birch. In 9 Lives: 10 Years of Singapore Theatre 1987 – 1997 (pp.41-42).

  Early in the decade, there was an insistent call for original Singaporean plays. Part of the demand was State-led, with annual play-writing competitions organised by the Ministry of Culture and the Singapore Cultural Foundation beginning in the late 70’s. On the ground, theatre practitioners and academics like Max le Blond were leading the charge for the creation of more Singaporean dramatic texts.

  Some of the material available for staging is, in fact, pretty ghastly stuff, totally lacking, even on the most generous of estimates, in the barest essentials of theatrical validity.

  On the other hand, there have been local scripts which have amply proved themselves in performance in recent years – demonstrating their capacity to fill the house for a two-night or three-night run.

  Year of the local playwright? By Max le Blond. In Straits Times (24 January 1982), https://tinyurl.com/y9rorexe

  By house-filling scripts, le Blond, a university lecturer and theatre practitioner, was referring to The Sword Has Two Edges by Li Lienfung, staged in 1977, and One Year Back Home by Robert Yeo, staged in 1980.

  But the problem wasn’t entirely a lack of good home-grown plays. Local plays were not often staged in early 80’s, as theatre academic David Birch points out in 1984:

  If you attended the several hundred English plays that have been staged here since 1959, you would have seen a total of 19 English plays or adaptations written by Singaporeans (excluding schools plays).

  […]

  Is it because there aren’t any writers of English plays here? Hardly. In the 1983 national playwriting competition, half of the 224 entries were in English. That hardly suggests a death of playwrights in English.

  Why are local English plays so rarely staged? By David Birch. In Straits Times (23 September 1984), https://tinyurl.com/y7tlhjpt

  The biennial Singapore Festival of Arts was taking incremental steps to help develop and showcase Singapore theatre. In 1982, it commissioned the musical Samsung and the Chettiar’s Daughter, a local adaptation of the British classic The Beggar’s Opera. It featured an all-local cast, and was directed by Australian Tasker. In 1984, the festival mounted Bumboat!, a showcase of local play-writing and performers. American Tzi Ma was flown in to direct the production alongside Singaporean Lim Siauw Chong.

  In a review of the 1984 Singapore Festival of Arts, theatre doyen Kuo Pao Kun criticised the festival’s tepid attempts at creating opportunities to forge a local theatre created and performed solely by local theatremakers, without any foreign involvement.

  Given the due recognition for Bumboat!’s present success, can we envisage what could have happened to the exercise if it were left entirely to the local talent?

  Two things would have happened:

  Firstly, the development of the indigenous English-stream theatre would have taken a much more advanced step; we would have had a total integration of our writing, directing, acting and staging resources.

  Secondly, the play would have decidedly more indigenous in substance. Theatrically, it could have been a better production, or it could have been one not as good. But it would have been unmistakably more Singaporean.

  …

  From Samseng [and the Chettiar’s Daughter] to Bumboat!, there was a discernible conservative mentality over-shadowing the English-stream which failed to allow the indigenous talents to have a free hand to take over the entire stage and initiate their very own theatre, imprinting a stamp wholesomely theirs.

  Setting the stage for indigenous English-stream theatre here by Kuo Pao Kun. In Singapore Monitor (13 July 1984)., https://tinyurl.com/ybmdsdgc

  The latter half of the 80’s saw some of Singapore theatre’s most iconic works being staged by Singapore theatremakers. These were runaway successes at home and aboard, including – to name a few – Stella Kon’s Emily of Emerald Hill, staged at the 1985 Drama Festival; Kuo Pao Kun’s monologues The Coffin Is Too Big For the Hole and No Parking on Odd Days, premiered in English in 1985 and 1986 respectively; and Michael Chiang and Dick Lee’s musical Beauty World, staged at the 1988 Singapore Festival of Arts.

• 2. Proliferation and Professionalisation of Theatre Groups

  The 80’s was also marked by emergence of many English-language theatre groups. Former Straits Times theatre critic Clarissa Oon attributes this surge in local amateur theatremaking to the English-language education policies implemented in the preceding decades.

  …the 1980s was a time when a Singapore English-language theatre took shape, fed by a groundswell of stage talent and audiences. Education policies of the 1960s and 1970s are key to understanding the shift in the status of English drama from a minority concern to a mainstream activity. As the government decided to promote the use of English for economic development, Chinese-, Malay- and Tamil-medium schools saw dwindling enrolment before ceasing to be viable.

  […]

  The effect of these education policies was swift and significant. Young English-speaking Singaporeans formed their own theatre groups in the 1980s, and English-speaking audiences – increasingly affluent and searching for an identity – were converging at the theatre. At the same time, the supple of talent and audiences to the theatres of the other language streams dropped dramatically.

  Theatre Life!: A History of English-language Theatre in Singapore through The Straits Times (1958-2000) by Clarrisa Oon. Singapore Press Holdings, 2001 (pp. 99-101).

  Amateur theatre groups born in the decade tended to emerge from schools and universities, groups like Third Stage, The Necessary Stage and Action Theatre. The latter two groups would later go on to become professional theatre companies. Third Stage, however, with its focus on original works about Singaporean issues, operated for only four years in the 80’s as its members were detained without trial under charges of anti-government conspiracy in 1987.

  Other notable amateur groups during the decade included William Teo’s Asia-in-Theatre Research Circus, and Christina Sergeant and Shirley Smith’s Actor’s Theatre Circle.

  In the past year or so, many new and talented young drama groups, actors, directors and playwrights have emerged into the public spotlight.

  Most shone in the Drama Festival ’87, held from August to September, and if they develop as well as their debuts promise, should keep local theatre exciting at least until the 1990s.

  The groups range in age from Necessary Stage and Arts & Acts, formed last year, to the barely month-old Play-Acts Productions of Siglap Community Centre.

  […]

  All seem to share common emotions – a fearless, non-academic, “real-life” approach to drama, and a need for self-expression through theatre.

  Dramatic developments by John de Souza. In Straits Times (30 December 1987), https://tinyurl.com/yajhvdcd

  Amongst the first theatre groups to go professional was TheatreWorks, founded in 1985 by Lim Kay Tong, Justin Hill, and Lim Siauw Chong.

  The first professional theatre company for adults has been quietly launched.

  Sixty-seven people showed up last weekend to join TheatreWorks.

  […]

  The TheatreWorks personnel were relaxed and businesslike. The venture has just been registered as a private limited company, so the essential business of compiling files and contacts, taking photographs, holding interviews (average time per candidate was 14 minutes) and the subsequent evaluation of data was conducted cheerfully and meticulously.

  Justin Hill, project manager of the company, fronted an explain-the-aims session – to put on plays of particular relevance to Singaporeans; to entertain; to reject artistic xenophobia; to nurture local plays; to develop potential; to consolidate theatrical talent; to attain high standards in theatre, and, ultimately (“in four or five years”), to have people earning a living in Singapore theatre.

  Launch of play group by Kate James. In Straits Times (9 March 1985), https://tinyurl.com/yalncq9e

  Theatre academic Robin Loon concludes that the 80’s was a time of the “start-ups”, seeding explosive growth in the English-language theatre scene in Singapore in the following decade.

  This period can be best summarised as a foundational period. As much as the audience was looking to theatre in search of its identity, so were these companies and groups. It was in the next five years that all the groups would come into their own, creating a specialised segment and focus in the scene for themselves.

  Singapore English Theatre: Dynamic and Diverse by Robin Loon. In Singapore Chronicles: Theatre, 2016 (pp.31-32).

• 3. State Support for the Arts

  The 80’s was a time when present-day State support structures for the arts were taking shape. National platforms like the Singapore Festival of the Arts (a precursor of the Singapore International Festival of the Art) and the Drama Festival functioned, in part, as commissioning bodies for local theatrical works. Annual national play-writing competitions, beginning in the late 70’s, were organised by the Ministry of Culture and Singapore Cultural Foundation, with cash rewards for prize-winning scripts. The latter organisation also disbursed grants for arts production and scholarship.

  Max le Blond, lecturer at the National University of Singapore and theatre director, was quoted as saying:

  Government support for local theatre is increasing and we have much to be grateful for, but more can be done. No theatre, no matter how eminent and powerful, can survive in a context such as ours without governmental support.

  How we can encourage the birth of a Singapore theatre by Sunny Goh. In New Nation (8 May 1981), https://tinyurl.com/ydbvyr8o

  One of the most impactful and enduring State-driven initiatives to emerge from the decade was the Arts Housing Scheme. It was the brainchild of Juliana Lim, then with the Ministry of Community Development, for disused state-owned heritage properties to be rented out to arts groups who lacked headquarters and rehearsal spaces.

  In 1983 and 1985, we conducted surveys on the housing arrangements for arts groups and found that except for groups which were aligned to clan associations or churches, the majority were “nomadic” in nature.  They held their rehearsals in the homes of Committee members, at the now demolished Drama Centre’s “Practice Rooms A & B” (where the new Annexe of the National Museum now stands), in school halls and community centres, as and when they were available and the groups could afford it.

  […]

  In 1985, I was sent to West Berlin to attend a Seminar on Cultural Administration organized by the Goethe Institut.  There, I saw a railway station and other old buildings converted into arts spaces.  This was also the case in Australia which I toured in 1988 – Gormon House in Canberra, Victoria Meat Market in Melbourne, Gertrude Street in Sydney and many others.

  Every quarter, the Land Office circulated a list of disused Government buildings, mostly disused schools to all ministries. The organisations which normally responded to the offer were the charitable service organizations.  It dawned on me that the arts were as needy as these charitable groups but not knowing whether our requests would be well received, I invited a Mr Rajaratnam of the Land Office for a chat. He was kind enough to come over to my office at City Hall and after sharing with him about “Cultural Vision 1999”, our conversation went something like this (truly!):  Juliana: “Mr Raja, we desperately need buildings for the arts”. Mr Raja: “No one ever told me this before”.  Juliana: “I’m letting you know now!” From that day onwards, Mr Raja became my best ally for arts development. He sent us a seemingly endless supply of buildings.

  The first property to be rented out to arts groups was a former school building that was to become Telok Ayer Performing Arts Centre. Five arts groups moved into the premises in 1986, among which was amateur theatre group Third Stage.

  The school bell no longer sounds at Telok Ayer Primary School in Cecil Street. Passers-by are more likely to hear the sound of Chinese musical instruments, Broadway songs and the shuffle and tap of dancers in rehearsal.

  The classrooms where teachers often used to have sort throats because they had to shout to be heard by students is now home to five cultural groups. And more disused government buildings may be put to similar use in future.

  […]

  Since October, the Telok Ayer school’s 39 classrooms have been let out at a nominal monthly rental of $10 a room by the Ministry of Community Development, which took over the building from the Land Office in September.

  5 cultural bodies move into Telok Ayer school by Irene Hoe. In Straits Times (1 January 1986), https://tinyurl.com/ycezqb8q

Further Reading

Theatre Life!: A History of English-language Theatre in Singapore through The Straits Times (1958-2000) by Clarrisa Oon. Singapore Press Holdings, 2001.
The Theatre and the State in Singapore: Orthodoxy and resistance by Terence Chong. Routledge, 2011 .
Singapore Chronicles: Theatre. Institute of Policy Studies & Singapore Press Holdings, 2016.
Singapore Arts Manager 1980’s/90’s: Memories & Musings by Juliana Lim.

By Daniel Teo
Published on 15 June 2018

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The Vault: Sau(dara) is a contemporary response to Leow Puay Tin’s Three Children. Created by Bhumi Collective, Sau(dara) is an homage to the 1988 production of Three Children which draws from the original text and the performers’ childhood memories, is based on play and traditional Indonesian Pakarena dance, and features newly-composed music. Find out more here.

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The Vault: @thisisemeraldgirl is an adaptation of Stella Kon’s much-loved play Emily of Emerald Hill. Created by Eugene Koh and Lee Shu Yu, and performed by Brenda Tan, @thisisemeraldgirl combines new writing, multimedia, and Stella Kon’s original text in a monologue exploring family and social life in a social media age. Find out more here.
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Left: Aerial photograph of Pasir Panjang in 1949. (Image credit: National Archives of Singapore)
Right: Satellite image of Pasir Panjang in 2017. (Image credit: Google Maps)
Neo Pee Teck Lane is highlighted in yellow in both images.

Singapore’s fast-changing landscape has always been rich fodder for the work of local theatremakers. There was Stella Kon’s landmark monologue Emily of Emerald Hill (1984), in which an aged Emily Gan laments the new apartment blocks surrounding her mansion on Emerald Hill. There was also Drama Box’s It Won’t Be Too Long (2015), a two-part work about spaces in Singapore, comprising The Lesson, a forum theatre piece charging audiences with selecting a fictional site to be torn down for a new MRT station, and The Cemetery, one-part movement work and one-part verbatim theatre based on the demolition of Bukit Brown Cemetery. And most recently, there was Haresh Sharma’s musical Tropicana (2017) based on the infamous cabaret and night spot in Orchard Road which closed in 1989 and was subsequently demolished. Our relationship with our ever-shifting physical environment has spawned such dramatic works and more that deal with themes like memory, loss, politics and governance.

For Neo Kim Seng, My Grandfather’s Road was a chance to consolidate memories of his childhood on Neo Pee Teck Lane. Present-day Pasir Panjang, the area where Neo Pee Teck Lane is located in, has changed much since Kim Seng was a child. The beach, in particular, used to be a stone’s throw away from his house. In fact, Pasir Panjang means ‘long beach’ in Malay.

My favourite seaside activity was walking barefoot, rubber slippers in hand, on the black-greyish muddy seabed at low tide, running after the small crabs on the soft sandy shore and overturning the rocks to see the small colourful fishes hiding underneath.

Source: My Grandfather’s Road by Neo Kim Seng (p.37).

But just a few years into Singapore’s independence, land reclamation projects had already begun on the East Coast of Singapore, changing the very shape of the island and driving the sea further away from inland. And there was talk of similar projects in the southwest of the island.

The Minister for Law and National Development, Mr. E. W. Barker, told Parliament today that in future land might have to be reclaimed from the sea along Pasir Panjang to provide a warehouse zone.

Source: Reclamation along Pasir Panjang in future. In The Straits Times (8 September 1967), http://tinyurl.com/y7ygstqs

For Pasir Panjang residents, the threat of land reclamation was looming over their seafront existence.

This fear [of reclamation] may be unfounded,” said executive Mr. Tan Heng Kee, 33. “But a lot of people wonder if we’ll lose our precious seafront.”

“It’s bad enough that the increasing sea traffic and offshore oil refineries have polluted our part of the sea with oil…

“But there are strong rumours that when the Government is finished with its East Coast project it will turn in our direction. It’ll break our hearts.”

Problem No. 1 on the western front by Lawrence Basapa. In The Straits Times (4 August 1970), http://tinyurl.com/ydbcrpxf

In 1971, their fears came to pass when the government announced that the coast along Pasir Panjang would be reclaimed to create new land for warehouses. Land reclamation works were to be undertaken by the Port of Singapore Authority. The residents were unable to stem the tide of progress.

The House gave its approval to the reclamation of 91 acres of the Pasir Panjang foreshore for ware-house development.

In seeking approval for this reclamation scheme, Minister for Law and National Development Mr. E. W. Barker said: “As a result of industrialisation and expansion of trade, the need for warehousing facilities has become acute.”

He said the reclamation would cost $20 million and would take two years to complete.

Land to be reclaimed for warehouses. In The Straits Times (31 July 1971), http://tinyurl.com/ybov8pnd

In the years to come, tons of sand and soil would be dumped along the Pasir Panjang coast, driving the sea back over four kilometres away. The new land remained barren in the years following the land reclamation as well, to allow the soil to settle and stabilise enough for construction and development.

Those of us living along Pasir Panjang Road have been hoping for quite some time that something will be done to obviate the need for us to keep our windows closed from dawn to dusk because of the lorries carrying earth for land reclamation in this area.

Dawn to dusk dust problem. In New Nation (5 October 1971), http://tinyurl.com/y8563hdj

But for a young Kim Seng, the beach of his childhood would forever disappear.

…When the sea was being reclaimed, I would walk up the dunes of sand in the seabed, but it never felt the same without the seawater and sea creatures.

I can’t remember exactly how I felt. Maybe a little sad, as I was also moving out from Grandfather’s road soon. I was too young to remember. Maybe it was better that way. It must have been quite an ugly sight as more of the sea was reclaimed. But my beautiful seabed always remained in my heart.

Source: My Grandfather’s Road by Neo Kim Seng (p.37).

By Daniel Teo
Published on 22 Nov 2017

The Vault: My Grandfather’s Road sees independent theatre-maker Neo Kim Seng revisiting his 2015 work My Grandfather’s Road. Kim Seng refreshes his original English text with translations into Singaporean and Malaysian Cantonese in an exploration of regional variations within the language. The Vault: My Grandfather’s Road is presented 23 -25 November 2017 at Centre 42 Black Box. Find out more here.

…over six-sevenths of the native population are unable to decipher [English] street signs and advertisements and even, in most cases, to read the names of the street.

Source: The Babel of Tongues in Singapore. In Malaya Tribune (17 October 1935), http://tinyurl.com/yavgn9f7

However, among the three largest ethnic groups in Singapore, the Indian population led the way in English literacy. The same 1931 census report found that 14.3% of the Indian population were literate in English, compared to 10.6% and 7.0% of their Chinese and Malay counterparts respectively.

While English literacy can refer to learning English as a second language in a vernacular school as well as receiving an education where the main language of instruction was English, Indian children in early twentieth century Singapore were more likely to go to an English school than an Indian vernacular school, especially among the Tamil-majority.

Tamil education in Singapore began with the arrival of Sir Stamford Raffles who needed English-educated Indians with the knowledge of Tamil. This led to the formation of Anglo-Tamil schools where Tamil was the medium of instruction and English was also taught.

In later years, however, interest in learning Tamil as a first language declined as English-educated parents preferred to send their children to English-medium schools.

As early as 1957 there were ten times as many Indian children in English schools as in Tamil schools. This showed that the Indian population valued English education, more than education in Tamil as the first language.

Source: Importance of learning one’s mother tongue. In The Straits Times (27 August 1982), http://tinyurl.com/yaeaytmp

The Indians are, it is regrettable to have to say, perhaps the community here who have not taken any interest in their national languages. The Penang Indians are more keen on this subject, as evidenced by the fact that they have already over thirty Tamil schools in that Settlement. Singapore Indians are lagging far behind. Maybe they are of opinion that English is enough for their children.

Source: Indian Education in Singapore. In Malaya Tribune (22 January 1934), http://tinyurl.com/ybg75yv8

Popular accounts of this phenomenon tended to cite a very pragmatic reason for the Indian population choosing English over their mother tongues – there were simply better job opportunities if you had received an English education than if you had graduated from a vernacular school.

This attitude of the Indian population was understandable as prospects in the employment field were better for the English-educated school leavers than for those who came out of Tamil schools.

Source: Importance of learning one’s mother tongue. In The Straits Times (27 August 1982), http://tinyurl.com/yaeaytmp

I am a Tamil with a [sic] little knowledge of my mother tongue. There are many Tamil parents here who have not taken much interest in seeing that their children study the language. This is a great pity, and is unjust to the children. When I compare other communities with mine, I have to admit that the Tamils are at the bottom of the list. There is no other community in the world that despises its own mother tongue as does mine in this place…

It is plain that Tamils are sending their children to English Schools only for the purpose of obtaining jobs in the Government, or in firms, or anywhere, and not to obtain knowledge…

Source: The Tamil Language. In Malaya Tribune (17 February 1930), http://tinyurl.com/yb347h6v

An English education in colonial times did indeed have its advantages – more Indians were able to occupy higher-ranking positions in schools, hospitals and even government.

Historically, Indians were the first non-white population in Singapore to acquire a high standard of English. Many Indian families have used English exclusively as the home language for more than a generation. In the top ranks of the civil service and the professions (doctors, schoolteachers and principals), in the years immediately after independence, Indians were over-represented.

Source: Multiculturalism in Singapore: an instrument of social control by Chua Beng Huat, http://tinyurl.com/y8brh2jr

The promotion of English as a language to unite the various ethnic groups existed even during colonial times. But it was the People’s Action Party, which came into power in 1959, that fervently pursued the idea of a bilingual nation and English as lingua franca. Subsequent national policy decisions cemented English as a first language of the nation and the language of instruction in all schools.

English literacy rates in all three major ethnic groups rose steadily as all children in Singapore had to receive an education in English, with a mother tongue as a second language. The 2010 population census found that among Singaporeans aged 15 years and over, English literacy rates were 87.1%, 77.4% and 86.9% among the Indian, Chinese and Malay resident populations respectively.

If the adoption of English minoritises non-English speaking Chinese, it has also simultaneously eliminated the privileges of Indians prevalent during colonial days….once English-language education was available to all through the national education system, the over-representation of Indians in the civil service and professions disappeared. By the sheer statistical weight of making up over 75 per cent of the population, top civil servants were almost all ethnic Chinese within twenty years.

Source: Multiculturalism in Singapore: an instrument of social control by Chua Beng Huat, http://tinyurl.com/y8brh2jr

With all ethnic groups receiving education in English, the local Indian population no longer had the linguistic advantage it once had during colonial times.

By Daniel Teo
Published on 26 Oct 2017

The Vault: Absence Makes the Heart… traces the presence and absence of Indian roles in Singapore English-language theatre. Written by Aswani Aswath and dramaturged by Alfian Sa’at, and featuring the actors Rebekah Sangeetha Dorai, Sivakumar Palakrishnan and Grace Kalaiselvi. Find out more here.

When Singapore separated from Malaysia in 1965, the various racial groups were unsure of their standing in the newly-minted nation. The Chinese Chamber of Commerce, in particular, campaigned for Mandarin to be declared an official language:

Moving the resolution to submit the memorandum, the Chamber’s treasurer, Mr. Kheng Chin Hock, stressed the fact that Chinese was being used by more than 80 per cent of the population in Singapore.

Source: Chinese as one of the official languages. In Straits Times (1 October 1965), http://tinyurl.com/zg52pju

To defuse racial tensions, then-Prime Minster Lee Kuan Yew was quick to respond by declaring all four major languages – Malay, Mandarin, Tamil and English – as official and equal.

Mr. Lee ruled out all possibilities of changing the language positions. The new Constitution would simply re-state the status quo of the four official languages, with Malay as the common and national language.

Any attempt by a few people to exaggerate the Chinese majority to justify their agitation would jeopardise the struggle of the Chinese in Malaysia for a fair place for their language, Mr. Lee warned.

Source: Lee’s warning to language agitators. In Straits Times (2 October 1965), http://tinyurl.com/h8x4zu6

And so it was written in the Singapore Constitution.

But there was more for the languages in Singapore. PM Lee envisioned Singaporeans speaking two languages – English, and their ‘mother tongue’.

A people fluent in English thus in step with the world of science and technology – but also steeped in Asian values of thrift, discipline and industry that come with knowledge of their mother tongue.

Source: Lee’s Ideal Singaporean by Leslie Fong, Ngiam Tong Hai & Lee Kim Chew. In The Straits Times (12 February 1978), http://tinyurl.com/zbjhswm

PM Lee was adamant that the Chinese population be bilingual in English and Mandarin, as envinced by his impassioned words:

From my observation, the monolingualist is more likely to be a language chauvinist and a bigot.

He only sees the world through one eye. He does not have binocular vision to see the world in depth, to realise that there are as rich, if not richer, worlds of human experience and knowledge, all expressed in beautiful words, elegantly, vividly and fluently in other languages.

Bilingualism gives a more balanced and rounded view of the world. The Chinese who reads and speaks Chinese has only a sketchy view of the reals history of the world outside China.

[…]

If we are to modernise and industrialise, we must be bilingual.

Source: Bilingual policy will be fairly and equally implemented by Lee Kuan Yew. In The Straits Times (2 June 1978), http://tinyurl.com/zlm3h3v

The new government revamped the education system, introducing mandatory bilingual education for students in Singapore. Students had to learn English, as well as a ‘mother tongue’, a policy which is still in place today.

Our Mother Tongue Language (MTL) policy requires all students who are Singaporeans or Singapore Permanent Residents to study their respective official MTL: Chinese, Malay and Tamil.

Source: Mother Tongue Language Policy. Ministry of Education Singapore (18 April 2016), http://tinyurl.com/zsvj54a

For schooling children from the various Chinese dialect groups in Singapore, this meant that they all had to take up Mandarin.

But for the first two decades, the bilingual education policy saw little success as Chinese students struggled to learn two new languages. In a 1979 Report on the Ministry of Education, the study team, chaired by then-Deputy Prime Minister Goh Keng Swee, found that English and Mandarin were not used at home by 85% of schooling children, who continued to use dialect to communicate with family members.

In addition to revisions to the education system to help Chinese students learn Mandarin at various proficiencies, Mandarin was actively promoted among the Chinese population. In 1979, PM Lee launched the “Promote the Use of Mandarin” campaign.

[The campaign] is in response to recent government statements that the use of dialects, instead of Mandarin, is hampering the Republic’s bilingual educational policy for the Chinese, and overburdens the learning process of the young.

[…]

Some of the slogans include “Make Mandarin the Common Tongue of Our Chinese Community” and “Speak Mandarin Instead of Dialects”.

Source: Lee to launch use Mandarin campaign. In Straits Times (7 September 1979), http://tinyurl.com/gnzvv4o

The Speak Mandarin campaign continues till this day as an annual event.

In over three decades of campaigning, and five decades since the introduction of bilingual education, dialect use among the Singapore Chinese population has fallen from 81.4% in 1980, to 12.2% in 2015.

By Daniel Teo
Published on 15 July 2016

The Vault: Dialects and Dialectics revisits two monologues by the late local theatre doyen Kuo Pao Kun: No Parking On Odd Days and The Coffin Is Too Big For The Hole. Nine Years Theatre’s artistic director Nelson Chia explores the cultural sentiments and grassroots sensibilities of these plays by staging them in Cantonese and Teochew respectively. Find out more here.

The Vault: Leng-Geh-Mng is a revisit of the first martial arts production in Singapore theatre of the same title by theatre-maker Zelda Tatiana Ng. Under her direction and alongside some of the original cast members, Leng-Geh-Mng is retold in the format of a radio play refreshed with the use of Chinese dialects. Find out more here.

Here are 4 things to note about the Singapore theatre in the 1990s, based on the commentary of practitioners, experts and industry observers.

• 1. Growth in Local Theatre
• 2. Cultural Development Policies
• 3. The State and Artists
• 4. The Esplanade and The Substation

• The 1990s was a time of growth and experimentation in Singapore theatre. Homegrown theatre companies like The Necessary Stage and TheatreWorks were focused on creating local dramatic texts as well as staging them. These were plays that were written by Singaporeans, focusing on issues and topics that mattered to Singaporeans.

  The proliferation of local theatrical works was mainly led by young, English-educated artists, who, because of increasing international exposure and training overseas, were more open to experimenting with less conventional theatremaking methodologies.

  By the mid-1990s, original, intracultural, indigenous, and social theatre began to move into the margins, while plays that were influenced by postmodern traits and tendencies gained prominence… Broadly speaking, avant-garde and postmodern forms of theatre belong to the same category: both refer to theatre ahead of its time. Such theatre pieces challenge traditional theatre precepts in many different ways. They give much more importance and attention to interpretation and performance than to the written text on which performance is based. They position the audience – and not the playwright or director – as the ‘author’ or meaning-maker. They are opposed to giving the literary author, playwright, or director of a theatre piece the controlling perspective for an audience to discover; instead, the audience’s perspective is just as, if not more, important. Inevitably, avant-garde and postmodern forms of theatre are opposed quite profoundly to authoritarianism.Source: Theatres and Cultures: Globalizing strategies by Alvin Tan. In Renaissance Singapore? Economy, Culture, and Politics, edited by Kenneth Paul Tan (p.185-6).

  The three companies [The Theatre Practice, The Necessary Stage, and TheatreWorks] created adventurous productions, often formally bold (many of the plays were “devised,” with the scripts created in a workshop setting) and dealing with issues of memory, ethnicity, and other identity issues. These were artistic reactions against the singular and sometimes strident top-down disciplinary modernization of Singapore since the 1960s, which had allowed little space for reflection on cultural or historical issues. What was notable about the theatre of the late 1980s and mid-1990s was that “difficult” theatre – even if text based – formed the mainstream of the more important theatre groups; devised theatre coexisted within companies with fledgling, indigenized Broadway-style musicals. Gender issues were noticeable by the early 1990s. All in all, these were invigorating years.

  Source: Creating High Culture in the Globalized “Cultural Desert” of Singapore by CJ.W.-L. Wee. In The Drama Review, 47(4), p.85.

  …by the early 1990s, the local theatre community had matured significantly to produce numerous landmark plays, thus making it possible to speak of a recognizable local cultural production. Crucially, this community was led largely by young English-educated Singaporeans who were constantly pushing boundaries of censorship and was supported by the broadening Singapore middle class who now possessed the disposal income to consume leisure activities and desire to reflect on home-made stories and narratives.

  Source: The Theatre and the State in Singapore: Orthodoxy and Resistance by Terence Chong.

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• The 1990s was when the Singapore government, for the first time, pursued the development of the arts in its policymaking. In lieu of the 1985 economic recession, the government was looking for other avenues to sustain growth and development. This led to the 1989 Report of the Advisory Council on Culture and the Arts (ACCA), chaired by the then 2nd Deputy Prime Minister Ong Teng Cheong.

  Recommendations from the report steered the cultural-policy direction of the 1990s, which included outcomes such as the establishment of the National Arts Council (NAC) in 1991, a surge in public funding for the arts, the construction of the Esplanade, and the introduction of arts education in schools.

  In 1992, the government began to promote a policy to make the city-state not just a Global City, but, indeed, a Global City for the Arts. Unfortunately, if predictably, an overall instrumentalist attitude predominated. Some leading politicos had discovered that to become a “serious” Global City capable of attracting and retaining the “foreign talent” of senior business executives who could further “globalize” the city-state, we needed Western metropolitan-style cultural infra- and superstructures that would enable Singapore to become a sort of “London of the East.”

  As is often the case in Singapore, an it-needs-to-happen-tomorrow social engineering imperative and paradigm were adopted for the new cultural policy. The entrenched position of this paradigm gave rise to the central tension between the professed wish for a dynamic creativity and the existing instrumentalizing and rationalist mental set. Arts funding increased and theatre, as the most visible art form of the 1980s, was a major beneficiary. The pretentiously entitled Renaissance City Report: Culture and the Arts in Renaissance Singapore (2000) advocated for even more funding to be made available (some S$50 million—nearly U.S.$30 million—over five years), and these funds have started to have an impact on the cultural scene. Source: Creating High Culture in the Globalized “Cultural Desert” of Singapore by CJ.W.-L. Wee. In The Drama Review, 47(4), p.87.

  With the setting up of MITA [Ministry of Information and the Arts] in November 1990, followed by the creation of the National Arts Council (NAC) in 1991, the government, for the first time, entered the cultural arena in a big and systematic way. The council’s impact can be seen from the dramatic increase in the total amount of grants awarded to the arts group and artists, from $1.02 million in 1991 to $7.5 million in 2000… At the end of the decade, MITA’s landmark Renaissance City Report would provide an additional $50 million in arts funding over the next five years. It would also serve as a statement of cultural policy, building on the 1989 Report of the Advisory Council on Culture and the Arts which said that the arts would: “(a) enrich us as persons; (b) enhance our quality of life; (c) help us in nation building; and (d) contribute to the tourist and entertainment sectors”. Source: Theatre Life!: A History of English-language Theatre in Singapore through The Straits Times by Clarissa Oon, pp. 138-140.

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• There was a tense relationship between the state and artists at the time. This was not a new situation by any means, but the key difference in the 1990s was that the government had stepped in to become a key driver behind the local arts scene, albeit chiefly with economic intentions rather than artistic ones. At the same time, practitioners were experimenting and pushing the boundaries of theatre and art, all in the search for a Singapore theatre.

  The combination made for anxious times in the local theatre scene, with government officials and theatre practitioners never quite knowing if a work was crossing the proverbial line. Artists were also bothered by the heavy-handedness of the State when it came to cultural development and regulation.

  The situation calmed down thereafter, until another government crackdown in late 1993—this time specifically on the arts. A 21-year-old performance and visual artist, Josef Ng, who did a performance protesting the police entrapment of working-class homosexual men, and TNS, which practiced Augusto Boal-style Forum Theatre, were accused, respectively, of obscenity and having a “Marxist” orientation. The latter charge, with the collapse of the Berlin Wall, could only sound absurd. Performance art remains officially in a position of limbo, and cannot receive National Arts Council funding (NAC). Despite these obstacles, the state’s desire for a commodified theatre and visual arts scene has persisted. Source: Creating High Culture in the Globalized “Cultural Desert” of Singapore by CJ.W.-L. Wee. In The Drama Review, 47(4), p.87.

  However, while [NAC’s] role was to help the arts to grow, it was also to see that artists were not out of step with the moral majority; a Drama Review Committee comprising academics, community leaders and the like was formed by the council in 1993 to advise on the licensing of potentially controversial plays. Source: Theatre Life!: A History of English-language Theatre in Singapore through The Straits Times by Clarissa Oon, pp. 138-140.

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• Part of the government’s plans to turn Singapore into a “global city of the arts” was the development of arts infrastructure. At the top of the to-do list was the construction of a dedicated “world-class” performing arts centre. Boasting a concert hall and a theatre that can seat thousands, the design for the Esplanade – Theatre on the Bay was first unveiled to the public in 1994. Ground broke in 1998 and construction was completed in 2001 at a cost of S$600 million.

  The development of the Esplanade perturbed some local arts practitioners and commentators, who believed a multi-million dollar performing arts centre, designed for large, big-budget productions, would not be a conducive space for nurturing local art.

  Critics of the Esplanade pitted it against smaller “alternative” arts spaces, perhaps best epitomised by The Substation. Established in 1990 from a disused power station, The Substation emerged from late theatre doyen Kuo Pao Kun’s vision for a space for artists to experiment and grow. The Substation houses multiple studio, gallery and performance spaces, including a 120-seat theatre and a garden courtyard for outdoor performances.

  The crowning infrastructural achievement was the October 2002 opening of the S$600 million (U.S.$345 million) “Esplanade—Theatres on the Bay” arts complex, built specifically for “world-class” foreign acts—a statist attempt to create a commercial Cult of the Beautiful. It remains to be seen how this will affect theatre development, given that the Esplanade has no medium-size theatre space: its major theatre auditorium seats some 1,800 persons—a number that both the older and newer theatre companies would find daunting to fill.Source: Creating High Culture in the Globalized “Cultural Desert” of Singapore by CJ.W.-L. Wee. In The Drama Review, 47(4), p.87.

  And it is precisely because art has always been about power that we are going to build for ourselves an Arts Centre. It is not an accident that the state’s involvement in the arts has taken the form of a commitment to build a monument to art. For it is not as though the state here is imposing a particular model on art; the state can do so because art – a kind of art – has always made itself available to such appropriations…
  The moment The Substation leaves The Substation for the Singapore Arts Centre [former name of the Esplanade], all that The Substation represents will die – not literally, but symbolically. This is inevitable. For the Singapore Arts Centre is designed as a monument. By definition, monuments commemorate the dead. And there is a kind of reciprocal structure at work here: when you stand before a monument, you not only commemorate the dead, you are struck dumb, silenced. Monuments are designed to work that way – they can’t help it. They are designed to speak on your behalf; and in doing so, they require your symbolic death. That is the general effect of the relationship between the state and art in which both are complicitous.Source: Is art necessary? by Janadas Devan. In Art vs Art: Conflict & Convergence (1995).

  The various attempts to make Singapore a regional hub for the arts have been further enhanced by a huge injection of funds by the state to the tune of S$1 billion to develop new and upgrade old cultural facilities. In particular, a new Singapore Arts Centre (SAC, named the Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay) is being constructed by 2001, with a complex of four theatres, a concert hall and studios…
  Why do practitioners hold this negative view of state initiatives which ostensibly will serve the arts well? As David [pseudonym] (playwright) articulates, it is because with such heavy financial investment in the Esplanade, there is a need to “go for surefire successes” which will cover the cost of renting the spaces and eventually recovering the investment…
  Given the clear signals from the state, practitioners and critics have sought to negotiate their preferred socio-cultural agendas within the constraints of the state’s economic agenda in a number of ways. First, and probably the most effective strategy, is the deliberate but difficult process of developing “alternative arts spaces” in Singapore. Chief among these is the Substation, an arts centre established in 1990…Source: Cultural policy in Singapore: Negotiating economic and social-cultural agendas by Lily Kong. In Geoforums, Vol. 31(4).

  In the first five years of The Substation’s history, under the visionary artistic direction of founder Kuo Pao Kun, The Substation was a pioneer arts space in Singapore. It played a key part in almost every arts event or development of significance. The Substation’s founding coincided with a burst of activity in Singapore such as the emergence of professional theatre companies, new writing in theatre, and a new generation of visual artists inspired by new practices and ideas promoted by artists and groups such as the Artists Village. Experimentation, across all the art forms, was the order of the day. These artists found a congenial home in The Substation which encouraged them to experiment, to try, and most importantly, to fail – and to continue.Source: The history of The Substation by Audrey Wong, http://www.substation.org/about-us/history/

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By Daniel Teo
Published on 20 November 2015

The Vault: 汐/Sea revisits Haresh Sharma’s Sea and refreshes it with a Chinese translation and memories of the 1997 production. Performed by Serene Chen and Zelda Tatiana Ng, in collaboration with Robin Loon and Casey Lim, on 23 November 2015, 8pm at Centre 42 Black Box. Admission is free. Find out more here.

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Various views about the Merger:

A recording of Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew’s address, in Mandarin and English, on the Agreement to set up Malaysia by 31 August 1963 signed in London. The recording was done a day after PM Lee Kuan Yew signed the Agreement. Listen to the audio recording.

New Year Message by Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew (1 Jan 1964). View

“1963 will probably go down in history as the most eventful year in our lives. Had Malaysia been formed in 1957 at the time when the Federation was proclaimed independent, our emergence as a nation would have been welcomed by the whole world, including our immediate neighbours. But seven years later, the mood had changed, and Malaysia’s neighbours grudged her the territorial integration and economic success they desired for themselves. So from a “confrontation” of propaganda and villification commenced at the beginning of the old year, they ended up with an economic boycott and military pressure by the beginning of the new year.

“…let us resolve to make 1964 a year of consolidation. If we are realistic and practical, we can hold our ground internationally and thoroughly expose the hollowness of the neo-colonialist line. If we the States within Malaysia are united and prepared to help each other, we adjust our economy and make good any losses. If at the end of 1964 we are stronger internationally and internally than at the beginning, the prospects for a permanent settlement will be bright.”

An interview with Dr. Lim Hock Siew, politician. View

“…our main objective of anti-colonial struggle in Singapore at that time was to reunite Singapore with mainland Malaya. To bring the people of Singapore back to the Pan Malayan political struggle, for a united socialist Malaya. That was our main objective and we resisted all temptations to deviate from this objective, we resisted all temptations to play political optimism in calling for independence to Singapore, to pretend to be more anti-colonial than the PAP and so on. Because we felt that the long term aims, the long term objectives of our anti-colonial struggle could only be achieved with Singapore being genuinely merged with the Malayan nation. And that the struggle of the people of Singapore is part and parcel of the struggle of the whole Malayan nation.”

An interview with David Marshall, politician. View

“[The merger] was premature. That’s the danger. It has set it back. I said we should go our separate ways and build bridges until there had grown up sufficient feelings of mutual respect for a real marriage to take place instead of a shot-gun marriage to protect the PAP. But it might have been valuable from the point of view that it preserved the PAP Government.”

An interview with Mr. Pathmananban Selvadurai, former PAP MP for Bukit Panjang. View

“I was not confident in the kind of – our politics could match with the Malaysian style of politics. Their politics was frankly communal and racists and it is Malay dominated and which is something that I do not accept at all. Whereas in Singapore – was under the British – it was entirely different. Singapore was a community apart, compared to what Malaya was at that time. Everytime – quite apart from politics – during school holidays when I used to go to Malaya – you could see the atmosphere was so very different. It was very Malay; it was not cosmopolitan like Singapore was. There was greater interaction between various communities in Singapore than in Malaysia – Malaya at that time and when that was expressed in political terms and it was all Malay, Malay, Malay and nothing else and their nationalism was defined in Malay terms and the Chinese were more interested in making money, they were not looking at it in political terms – the thinking was not done politically.”

Photograph of the Merger. The poster at City Hall during the Malaysia Day celebrations in Singapore, with the words “Majulah Singapura” (Onward Singapore). The formation of Malaysia was officially proclaimed on 16 September 1963. View

Tension from outside Singapore: THE KONFRONTASI

In 1964, Singapore was in the midst of the Konfrontasi, a hostile Indonesian response to the formation of the Federation of Malaysia marked by intermittent armed attacks and bombings, including the 1965 Macdonald House bomb explosion which killed 3 and injured 33. Read more about the Konfrontasi.

Sinnathamby Rajaratnam speaking to journalists on Feb. 20, 1964. View

“Today, some 15 years after the Indonesian revolution it is quite clear that Indonesia far from becoming the Big Brother of South East Asia is becoming the Big Bully of this region…”

“When Dr. Subandrio and his colleagues bitterly complain that we do not seek Indonesia’s advice; that we do not look to Bung Karno for inspiration and leadership it is not because we do not want to. As a small country we are fully conscious that we cannot stand alone in this modern world. We need friends, we need protectors and we need help and guidance.”

At least 10 bombs exploded in Singapore (April 17, 1964). View

“Another Indonesian bomb – 10th since the beginning of this year – blasted a telephone booth to smithereens and damaged several houses tonight at Kampong Melayu, off Jalan Eunos.”

Tension from within: RACIAL RIOTS IN 1964

Appeal for calm. (The Straits Times, 22 July 1964). View

“A provision shop near Lorong 3, Geylang, was burnt and an attap hut in Lorong Turi, in the Jalan Eunos area, was on fire.’
“At 6.45 p.m., Straits Times reporter Sia Cheong Yew, in a car moving along North Bridge Road, saw at the junction of Arab Street two large groups of people.”
“One man was seen grabbing a big kanda stick and chasing another.”
“At this point dustbins flew into the air from both sides of the road and all traffic came to a standstill.”
“Further down the road, smaller groups of men armed with sticks and chairs were assembled along five-foot paths.”

A broadcasted speech by Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew (21 July 1964). View

“…We can and we will sort these things out later on. But right now our business is to stop this stupidity. The vast majority of our people want to live in peace with each other…”

“Regrettably, there have been a few deaths both among Chinese and Malays and a few persons injured. Some lorries, cars and scooters have been burnt. But do not take the law into your own hands and try to mete out justice on your own. That is the business of the government. Do not make things worse by yourself trying to act as policemen. To relieve parents of any anxiety for their children all schools will be closed tomorrow, but business will go on as usual tomorrow. Workers will go to work as usual. You should do your duty by staying at home tonight while the Police and the army will see that all this madness is checked and stopped. What has happened cannot be undone. What will happen depends upon what you and the government do. We shall make it clear that lawlessness does not pay. But more important, harmony between our communities must be preserved. This you can help me do.

Photograph of street after curfew (23 July 1964). View

Photograph of roadblock set up (24 July 24 1964). View

Photograph of burnt taxi from riots (25 July 25, 1964). View

Documentary Clip from CNA on racial riots. View

These documentaries provide a summary of the tense, eventful period in 1960s Singapore:

“Diary of a Nation”, a 1988 Singapore Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) documentary on the merger and separation, including the racial riots. View

“1960s Singapore”, a Channel NewsAsia (CNA) documentary on Singapore’s independence. View

By Daniel Teo
Published on 22 September 2014

The Vault 1.1 – Nineteen Sixty-Four revisits When Smiles Are Done and A White Rose at Midnight, refreshes and retells the stories in them through the eyes of four artist-collaborators on 22 September 2014, 8pm at Centre 42 Black Box. Admission is free.

Find out more here.

The Crescendos (pop band)

Naomi and the Boys (pop band)

The Checkmates (guitar band)

The Quests (guitar band)

1960s: The Golden Age of Singapore Music. View

“It all started, he said, with a performance by Cliff Richard and The Shadows in November 1961. “That concert made pop music seem big and glamorous,” [Joseph Pereira] told LOUD. “The people watching wanted to emulate those five sharply-dressed men in suits.” Emulate them they did: Bands in the mould of Cliff Richard and The Shadows mushroomed all over the island. Prominent recording companies, Philips International and EMI, took advantage of this sudden enthusiasm.”

“The scene waned towards the end of the decade, due to what Mr Pereira called “a hardening of attitudes” towards local music. The British military withdrawal from Singapore saw a drop in demand for gigs and performances, and a government ban on tea dances and live music in clubs contributed to the end of this golden era.”

Apache Over Singapore: The Story of Singapore Sixties Music – Vol.  (Book written by Pereira Joseph C.)

Synopsis: “The Cliff Richard and the Shadows concert in November 1961 opened the floodgates for Singapore pop music. It and subsequent pop music developments made for a very exciting pop scene in Singapore as there were releases to look forward to every week from EMI, Philips, Decca and other record companies, including local labels. With shows almost nightly and tea dances to welcome the week it was pop heaven. This book examines why it was so. Individual profiles of the bigger acts study their careers in details and trends like rhythm and blues, the blues movement and psychedelia are examined. The attitudes of officialdom to this phenomenon in Singapore as well as other factors like the infrastructure that helped the sixties pop music movement are also discussed.”

This book is available for purchase from our Select Books Catalogue. Browse

 Beyond the Tea Dance: The Story of Singapore Sixties Music – Vol. (Book written by Pereira Joseph C.)

Synopsis: “This is the second volume of Joseph Pereira’s comprehensive survey of the Singapore pop music scene in the 1960s. The second half of the sixties saw seismic shifts in the global music scene. In Singapore, newer breed of bands was coming to the fore, many with outlandish names. Tea dances became increasingly popular. Discotheques started sprouting up to cater to a new hip crowd. Pop Yeh Yeh, which had always been active alongside the mainstream pop music scene, came into its own with many releases. Singapore bands were very active playing the British services circuit and in Vietnam. But, as the decade drew to a close, several pivotal events signaled the end of this glorious era for Singapore pop music. Beyond the Tea Dance examines in rich detail all the major bands and singers in this turbulent period.”

This book is available for purchase from our Select Books Catalogue. Browse

Outside of Singapore, 1964 was also the year the world discovered “Beatlemania”.

1964: Beatlemania (The Atlantic, 29 May 2014) View

“John Lennon, Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney and George Harrison set off on a series of tours in 1964, starting in Europe, later visiting the United States, Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand. Beatles fans were so excited and determined to see the band that police sometimes resorted to using fire hoses to hold them back. Their first televised concert in the U.S. was on the Ed Sullivan Show, on February 9, 1964. 73 million viewers watched that performance — 34 percent of the American population.”

On July 2, 1964, The Beatles made a stopover in Singapore for all of 55 minutes:

The Beatles arriving in Singapore. (The Straits Times, 1 July 1964) View

“As soon as the plane touches down, a special van will drive up to the aircraft and take the Beatles to the VIP suite at the end of the departures block of the new passenger terminal.”

Hysterical S’pore teenagers in Beatle battle. (The Straits Times, 2 July 1964) View

“THEY BREAK THROUGH AIRPORT GATES AND CLIMB WALLS | Nearly 3,000 Beatle-struck teenagers screamed hysterically at Singapore Airport tonight for Britain’s top pop-singing group, when they flew in for a 55-minute stopover on their way home…”

The Quests beat Beatles to reach top of Hit Parade (The Straits Times, 20 Nov 1964) View

“Making a debut with their disc “Shanty” a composition of their own, they were at the top of the Singapore Hit Parade Chart shortly after its release – beating to second place a Beatles recording.”

By Daniel Teo
Published on 19 September 2014

The Vault 1.1 – Nineteen Sixty-Four revisits When Smiles Are Done and A White Rose at Midnight, refreshes and retells the stories in them through the eyes of four artist-collaborators on 22 September 2014, 8pm at Centre 42 Black Box. Admission is free.

Find out more here.

There were the three “Worlds” which lit up Singapore’s nightlife in the ’50s and ’60s:

New World Park. View

“New World was famous for its cabarets, Chinese and Malay opera halls, shops, restaurants, open-air cinemas, boxing arenas, and shooting galleries. … New World’s cabarets were so raved about that it was said to have occasionally wooed the late Sultan Ibrahim of Johor and his large entourage. Men would pay a dollar to dance three foxtrots or waltzes with cheogsam-clad taxi-dancers.

Malay men were drawn to New World by Bunga Tanjong which hosted bands playing Malay tunes to the beat of ronggeng  or asli  interspersed with cha-cha or rumba. On some nights, they would also threw in the twist and the rock ‘n roll. Men could buy a 50 cent ticket for a dance with the ladies. The early birds would secure the best dancers or their favourite ones and also got seats nearest to the dancing girls.  On some nights Bunga Tanjong could pack up to 500 people. The popularity of Bunga Tanjong inspired acclaimed playwright A.Samad Said to write a well-received play on the life of a cabaret girl, entitled Lantai T. Pinkie (T. Pinkie’s floor).”

Gay World. View

“Patrons at Happy World were kept enthralled by an east-meets-west mix of entertainment; cabaret, ronggeng, bangsawan, wayangs, movies, gaming, sport matches, stunts, circus and shopping. The fees to these recreations were affordable, even to youths.”

Great World Amusement Park. View

“Other mainstays of the park were cabaret, housed by the Flamingo Nite-Club, and theatres namely Canton, Atlantic, Sky and Globe, which screened both Chinese and English films.”

With the opening of Tropicana Theatre Restaurant and Niteclub in 1968, Singapore’s nightlife received an additional boost:

Singapore’s nightlife comes of age (The Straits Times, 20 March 1968). View

“The opening of the unique multi-million dollar Tropicana Entertainment Building this afternoon by the Chairman of the Singapore Tourist Promotion Board, Mr. P. H. Meadows, heralds the beginning of a new era in the night life and entertainment field in Singapore.”

Tropicana View

“Besides revues and pop singers, Tropicana also featured keroncong (a musical form from Indonesia) ensembles, fashion shows, Sunday tea dances, acrobats, magicians, dagger and fire jugglers, beauty pageants and comedy acts. The house bands which performed at Tropicana included a 12-piece Tropicana orchestra conducted by Aris Salvador, Romy Katindig and the Hi-Chords, Jose Daroya and the Gay Blades and Vittorio’s Blue Six.”

“Tropicana had been fully booked each night for its first three years, but the novelty of its shows began to wear off as competing nightclubs like the Neptune and Golden Million started their own topless revues.”

Iconic to the local entertainment and nightlife scene were the Cabaret Girls:

Singapore Cabaret Girls Association. Annual general meeting election announcement. (The Straits Times, 26 November 1948). View

‘Cabaret girl’ is ‘too degrading’ (The Straits Times, 11 June 1950). View

“Singapore’s cabaret girls think that name too degrading – so they have changed it with official approval. Henceforth, the “Singapore Cabaret Girls’ Association” will be known as the “Singapore Dance Hostesses’ Association”.

[Miss Nancy Ho, president] explained that the association considered the name “cabaret girls” “impolite“ and “discourteous”.”

Dance hostesses celebrate an anniversary (The Singapore Free Press, 29 October 1955) View

“There was plenty of fun and laughter last Tuesday night when Singapore dance hostesses took a night off to celebrate the 17th anniversary of their association.

Concert items included songs in Mandarin, Cantonese and Hokien [sic], a demonstration of the art of Chinese art of self-defence, a fan dance and two Mandarin plays, entitled, “Debts” and “The Oppressed”. Messrs. Pai Yen and Kwan Sin Yi directed the plays.”

[Pictures by Johnny Quek accompany the article]

Cabaret girls now work in bars as well for extra money (The Singapore Free Press, 15 July 1960). View

“A number of cabaret girls are now working as waitresses in bars to supplement their fallen income.”

“Our life is expensive. We should look chic and pretty and it costs money”, she [Maria] said.”

By Daniel Teo
Published on 18 September 2014

The Vault 1.1 – Nineteen Sixty-Four revisits When Smiles Are Done and A White Rose at Midnight, refreshes and retells the stories in them through the eyes of four artist-collaborators on 22 September 2014, 8pm at Centre 42 Black Box. Admission is free.

Find out more here.