Passion!!!

Well, what is so great about this play? Let me see... Although some might say that the play was boring and waste of money....I still saw the relevance of watching. Spending RM20 to watch an hour play was surely not a waste of time. INSPIRED by Carlos Saura’s award-winning film Tango passion brings together two of the most respected artistes in the performing arts — director Joe Hasham and choreographer Judimar Hernandez. With Datuk Faridah Merican as the executive producer, Hasham as director and Hernandez as choreographer, Passion stars Aris Kadir, Amy Len, Steve Goh, Loi Chin Yu, Elaine Pedley, Nell Ng, Thou Chun, Dalili Azahari and Joseph Gonzales. Unlike the film which pays homage to the tango dance form, Passion will be brought to life through rich, contemporary dance. However, the essence of the tango will not be lost. The audience can look forward to experience the sensuality and intrigue inherent in the tango but woven into a fresh, new set of movements by Hernandez. It goes beyond the simple love triangle. Under Hasham’s distinct direction, the narrative thread which ties together the whole performance becomes a powerful reflection of the human condition. Set to the music from the film, Hasham’s vision coupled with Hernandez’ exquisite choreography guarantees an intense performance that is both aesthetically appealing and deeply moving. I expected a play with dialogues and it turned out that the only dialogue in the play was “Life is so strange. I loved her for four years and she betrayed me. Life is so strange.” These are the only utterances that the play “Passion” offered. Then, you might wonder what is so great about watching this play. Well, in order to substitute the absence of dialogues, the actors had to convey their feelings, their thoughts-the passion through their facial expression. Compared to other plays that I have watched, this plays offers more of the music and lightings. This is because the music and the lighting increase in the amount when the tension in the play increases. The director brilliantly controls these two variables in order to attract and sustain the audiences’ attention. Thus, I believe we surely should watch more plays by different playwrights and directors in order to appreciate drama better.

Thirty days...A Review

This is a play about love and betrayal, 'Thirty Days of September' treats the sensitive and generally taboo issue of child sexual abuse. It endeavors to lift the veil of silence which surrounds child sexual abuse and addresses the issue unflinchingly. It builds on the trauma of Mala who lives with the haunting memories of her abused past. Her abuser - her uncle subconsciously lives with her all the time, as part of her dirty reflections. He damages her natural growth, deters her from pursuing her love interests beyond the ominous 30-day period and scars her soul every now and then. As Mala withers under the psychological pressure extorted on her by the abuser; her mother watches silently, living her own pain - suffering mutely. Exploring the painful problem, Mahesh Dattani raises valid concerns and structures a world of optimism where the wrongs can stand corrected and resurrection of brutalized faith is possible. But none of this happens without another man's willingness to help the two women bury their traumatic past and find ways of rejuvenating their present. Deepak, Mala's boyfriend, becomes the agent of change here. He dares to unmask the evil, even at the cost of his love. He hits the women hard until they hit the rock bottom. Finally, there is no way but to come up - face the wrongs and dare to correct them, notwithstanding the challenges the process of correction entails. By marking a daring departure from norm, the play ensures that we, as a society, no longer take comfort in the routine of uttering word "incest" in gutless undertones. The play also brings us closer to the reality of abused children -pleasure does form a part of their pain, but finally the consequence of dangerous games can only be dangerous. Our only way to fight danger is to recognize it and crush with generous doses of brutality lest we are ready to condemn innocence to lifelong death.

Check it out-mahesh dattani's profile!!!

Mahesh Dattani, born in Bangalore on 7 August 1958, studied in Baldwin’s High School and St. Joseph’s College of Arts and Science, Bangalore.He has worked as a copywriter in an advertising firm and subsequently with his father in the family business. His theatre group Playpen was formed in 1984, and he has directed several plays for them, ranging from classical Greek to contemporary works. In 1986, he wrote his first full-length play, Where There’s a Will, and from 1995, he has been workingfull-time in theatre. His major plays are Dance Like a Man, 30 Days in September, Bravely Fought theQueen,Final Solutions,Tara, On a Muggy Night in Mumbai.Dattani is also a film-maker and his films have been screened in India and abroad to critical and public acclaim. His film Dance Like a Man has won the award for the Best Picture in English awarded by the National Panorama.In 1998, Dattani won the Sahitya Akademi award for his book of plays Final Solutions and Other Plays, published by East–West Books Chennai, thus becoming the first English language playwright to win the award. Dattani teaches theatre courses at the summer sessions programme of Portland State University, Oregon, USA, and conducts workshops regularly at his studio and elsewhere. He also writes plays for BBC Radio 4.‘[Dattani’s work] probes tangled attitudes in contemporary India towards communal differences, consumerism and gender… a brilliant contribution to Indian drama in English.’—Sahitya Akademi award.

Teaching- A Great Experience???

Some think that teaching might not seem to be a problem for me as I am currently undertaking a teaching course and I am a teacher in making. This might seem ironic but sometimes teaching does make you live in hell. Well, at least that’s how I felt before presenting my set induction for Dr. Edwin’s tutorials. Unusually, my anxiety level shoots not up but down and I was able to present extraordinarily well. Thanks to my tutor Miss Siti who was very supportive and she surely made my day. After Miss Siti announced to the class that she wants us to do the set induction for a theme in the play, “Oedipus Rex”, I was on the quest of finding an interesting set induction which could not only trigger the schemata of my “students” but also sustain their attention throughout the lesson. I was on a wild goose hunt as I was unable to crack my head and thus, I searched for a few pictures to be used in the set induction stage. Later, on the eve of the presentation day, while having my dinner, suddenly an idea struck my head-why don’t I use a game that I used when I was a facilitator in a leadership camp? In order to introduce the theme, ‘blindness’ to students, it would indeed be a good activity. Thus, on the day when my name was called out, I went to the front and told the class that we would be playing a game and I needed two volunteers and wanted them to act as the “Grammy” and “Golden Globe” award-winners. The rest of the class acted as if they were journalists and they were supposed to interview these actresses by interrogating them about their hobbies. These two volunteers-Linda and Joyce were brought out of the class and they told me that their hobbies were listening to music and shopping. The main thrill in this activity is that these so-called journalists were made to believe that Linda’s hobby is peeping and Joyce’s digging nose. Thus, the whole class was very eager to throw questions to these actresses and these actresses confidently answered all the questions without knowing that their hobbies were told differently to the class. Thus, when later the truth is revealed, both of the actresses blushed and the class broke into laughter. Later, I thanked both the volunteers and start to ask feedbacks from them. Later, I tried to relate the position that Linda and Joyce were in with the main character of the play; Oedipus. I was able to tap the required information from them as they were able to relate this activity with the theme; “blindness”. I was not just praised by my friends but Miss Siti also complimented on my activity and said that although it was a little bit long but it managed to indulge all the students. Then, I realised that it was on the shoulders of the teacher whether to make the activity enjoyable or not. Wow...a great day indeed...can’t wait for my simulated teaching...

All about Teiresias...check it out!!!

"I have crossed between the poles, for me there's no mystery.
Once a man, like the sea, I raged.
Once a woman, like the earth, I gave.
But there is in fact more earth than sea."
-Teiresias

Teiresias....wow what can I say about him...when Dr. Edwin asked us to do our own research about him, I thought that he would be a boring guy to look up for and what do you expect from a blind prophet in Greek myth. But after my research I did find a lot of interesting things...really interesting (believe me).Tiresias was a prophet of Zeus. Different stories were told of the cause of his blindness, the most direct being that he was simply blinded by the gods for revealing their secrets. An alternate story told by the poet Pherecydes was followed in Callimachus' poem "The Bathing of Pallas"; in it, Tiresias was blinded by Athena after he stumbled onto her bathing naked. His mother,Chariclo, a nymph of Athena, begged her to undo her curse, but Athena could not; instead, she cleaned his ears, giving him the ability to understand birdsong, thus the gift of augury.
Well, that is not all that I found, I actually got to know that he was a woman for seven years and shock me to the maximum. This happened when Tiresias came upon a pair of copulating snakes, he hit the pair a smart blow with his stick. Hera was not pleased, and she punished Tiresias by transforming him into a woman. As a woman, Tiresias became a priestess of Hera, married and had children, including Manto, who also possessed the gift of prophecy. According to some versions of the tale, Lady Tiresias was a prostitute of great renown. After seven years as a woman, Tiresias again found mating snakes; depending on the myth, either she made sure to leave the snakes alone this time, or, according to Hyginus, trampled on them. As a result, Tiresias was released from his sentence and permitted to regain his masculinity.

In a separate episode, Tiresias was drawn into an argument between Hera and her husband Zeus, on the theme of who has more pleasure in sex: the man, as Hera claimed; or, as Zeus claimed, the woman, as Tiresias had experienced both. Tiresias revealed woman's greatest secret: that she receives the greater pleasure: "Often parts a man enjoys one only." Hera instantly struck him blind for his impiety. Zeus could do nothing to stop her, but he did give Tiresias the gift of foresight and a lifespan of seven lives. Tiresias's background, fully male and then fully female, was important, both for his prophecy and his experiences. Also, prophecy was a gift given only to the priests and priestesses. Therefore, Tiresias offered Zeus and Hera evidence and gained the gift of male and female priestly prophecy. How he obtained his information varied: sometimes, like the oracles, he would receive visions; other times he would listen for the songs of birds, or ask for a description of visions and pictures appearing within the smoke of burnt offerings, and so interpret them. Thus, I was able to comprehend how powerful Teiresias was in the Greek mythology, and could relate it better to his existence in the play, “Oedipus Rex”.

The development of the homosapiens...

The development of human has always attracted many parties. From Stone Age to the era of Darwin, there have been many theories debated on the human evolution. This is applies to the literature field also. Many writers have actually included the stages of development in human life in their masterpieces. To illustrate, Shakespeare in his play, “As You Like It”, gives a significant metaphor to compare the whole life of man-the stage. He uses the character Jaques in his play to talk about the seven stages in human life in a soliloquy. On the other hand, Sophocles in his play; “Oedipus Rex” created a creature called the Sphinx which tortures the people of Thebes and it can be defeated by solving a riddle. The riddle goes on to talk about the four different stages in human life. Be it as many stages as it can be, personally I think life is a vicious cycle and think the finishing line is always at the place we start of. Thus, rises and falls becomes part and parcel of it.

Start! Camera! Action!

There was this activity in class last week where we are supposed to act out a scene from the play “Bingo” by Edward Bond. Not knowing who the characters were, we were supposed to recreate the scene using our own creativity. Our task was to deduce how many characters were there in the scene and what is the relationship between them. Although we knew that there were at least two characters speaking but we were unable to guess any other relevant information about the scene. When asked to act out the play in groups of two and three, we went “blank”. There were too much room for guessing I say. Thus, it struck our mind that this script is an open one and besides being the actors, we were also the directors of it. My group was the first to be called out, of course due to our nervousness, we actually forgot to act out the drinking part...Later on, two more groups presented and personally, I was impressed with Iskandar’s group, when they were not only being able to act out the scene perfectly but they created a setting that none of us could guess-the kindergarten. Later, when Dr. Edwin told us that the speakers of this play were Shakespeare and Jonson, I got more serious on the ‘expect the unexpected’ element... Well, this surely proves that imagination has lot more to offer when given ample space.