The project
of Separation 40 appears rather grandiose: it reacts, as the
work of a binational cast, crew and creative team, to the fortieth anniversary
of the separation of Singapore and Malaysia. Playwrights Haresh Sharma
and Jit Murad write a series of scenes, set in different periods in
modern Singaporean/Malaysian history, to be performed by an ensemble,
toying with giant bamboo sets in a performance space where the audience
is symbolically split across opposite ends of the stage. All is set
for as grand a narrative as can be contained in a black box, reminiscent
of TNS's 2001 play on Sun Yat-Sen, 100
Years in Waiting.
However, in more conventional TNS style, national narratives were shrunk
down to a human scale as politics was deftly encapsulated within the
intimate spaces of everyday relationships. There was no indication of
this at the opening, as the audience watched an inspired vignette featuring
a dystopian parallel history where separation had never happened. Malaysia
and Singapore were equally parodied: veiled newscasters celebrated the
50th national day of the Islamic Republic of Malaya under the fundamentalist
rule of Jemaah Islamiyah, while cheongsamed Singaporean announcers hurrahed
the 5th anniversary of their takeover of Suzhou as an independent country.
The simultaneous decisions of a Malayan and a Singaporean newscaster
to migrate, however, come to the same result: they are informed on and
detained. The remaining MCs, standing on opposite scaffoldings, catch
a glimpse of each other, and stare as if in recognition. Such moments
of human connection in spite of national politics are the ultimate focus
of Separation 40.
Sadly, in spite of a hilarious premise and a competent cast, this first
scene set a slow pace for the play, with moments of redundancy such
as the use of the same national dance choreography three times for both
Singapore and Malaysia, to underscore the blindingly obvious point of
our commonality. This problem continued well into the next two scenes.
Thankfully, the tempo of the play soon recovered with a hysterical exchange
between a Singaporean man and a Malaysian woman flying Malaysian Airlines,
each condemning his own country and airline while praising the other's.
The chemistry between Chua Enlai and Soefira Jaafar was tangible as
they fed off their rapid-fire dialogue, the two disagreeing utterly
with one another, yet bonded in their alliance of self-blame. The lines
also gave a marvelously original perspective on cultural difference,
as in the Singaporean's comment: "Malaysian Airlines is like a kampong.
They want you to feel at home. So if you need anything, you just have
to take it for yourself. But Singapore Airlines is like a prison! Everyone
has to eat at the same time, sleep at the same time, watch movies at
the same time!"
It was also in this scene that we witnessed the playwrights' subtle
strategy of reflecting political history almost as an afterthought
in the midst of everyday human drama, illuminating the backdrop against
which the scenes took place. Both the Malaysian and Singaporean passengers
are frightened by turbulence into not criticising their countries,
reflecting the 1987 crackdowns on dissidents in Malaysia and Singapore.
A mother's conversation with her son on death row is eventually linked
to Singapore's winning of the Malaysia Cup in 1997, and a narrative
of friendship between a Malay boy and a Chinese boy, forged over model
jet fighters and birthday presents, is brought to a sudden halt by
Malaysia's racial riots of 1966. Here, both Chua and Syed Zalihafe
must be commended for their split-second shifts of character, as they
played not only the primary school-age protagonists, but their patrician
fathers and their adult selves, narrating the past.
It was only in the final scene that the characters grappled full-on
with history, as a Malay man spoke to his Chinese Singaporean friend
about moving to Malaysia on 9th August 1965. Politics was thus consistently
presented as an outside force that separates people, interfering with
their basic desire to unite and form bonds. By focusing on these bonds,
Separation 40 reminded us of the importance of sanity and individual
alliances of the heart over ideological mania.
Having praised the accomplishments of the play, it seems a shame to
nitpick at its lesser flaws, yet the devil is in the details, and without
their perfection, a production comes off looking unprofessional. The
actors flubbed their lines on more than one occasion, an event I cannot
recall at any previous TNS production. The decision to have the actors
move the colossal bamboo sets themselves left momentous gaps of silence
between scenes, and even when the actors stayed in character to fill
these scenes with dialogue, the sight of them towing scaffolding in
the midst of conversation felt contrived. Several similar problems emerged
during the three-part sequence about a Singaporean production team and
Malaysian creatives collaborating on a movie on colonial Malaya. Certain
inconsistencies rankled with this reviewer: the fact that a clear historical
period was not assigned to the film - pre-war or post-war - and that
the two romances between the Malaysian and Singaporean teams popped
into being without foreshadowing in the final scene. It was certainly
enlivening in the last scene to witness the actors transforming history
into an eclectic musical montage, yet the excuse that was brought in
to explain this (that the boss's daughter was a very persuasive experimental
musicologist) simply failed to ring true to my ears. Audiences can expect
dramatic performance to be wild and strange, and apology for your actions
simply undermines confidence in the dramatic vision.
With only one weekend's run in Singapore and another in KL, a play
like this may not have the time to develop itself into something more
polished. Nonetheless, as it stands, Separation 40 is a commendable
project of cross-border collaboration and cultural sharing, as well
as being simply a good play, though not really venturing into greatness.
And on the un-epic human scale which is what the play directs us to
attend to, perhaps it is not such a bad thing to be less than great. |
"Separation 40 is a commendable project of cross-border
collaboration and cultural sharing, as well as being simply a good play"
Credits
Written by Haresh Sharma and Jit Murad
Directed by Alvin Tan and Zahim Albakri
Lighting by Mac Chan
Set Designer by Vincent Lim
Cast: Chua Enlai, Soefira Jaafar, Aidli 'Alin' Mosbit,
Yeo Yann Yann and Syed Zalihafe
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