UNCLE ANT’S AGONY & ECSTASY COLUMN #1 (repost)

In early 2004 when the arts portal kakiseni.com had the infamous Pang Khee Teik as editor, we experimented briefly with an "artistic agony aunt" column that only ran for a few months before it fizzled out for lack of interest. Rummaging through my files, I found these obscure documents I felt were worth re-issuing for posterity.

The very first person to send a question to Uncle Ant's Agony & Ecstasy column happened to be the ever-popular actor/author/raconteur & restaurateur Patrick Teoh....

So much has been said about Malaysian English language theatre. Elitist... Incestuous... Self serving... Must not be entertaining or it will not be theatre... etc., etc. So my question is this: Which should fuel whom ah?


Stratford fuels West End? Broadway fuels 'serious' theatre? These theatre baargers talk too much and do too little. Sometimes I wish that they would just shut up and do their thing, whatever that may be, and let the paying public decide if they want more or not. Let's stop or at least pull back a little on this "hey we want to make you think, make a difference in your life and your community, etc, blablablahhhhhhhhhhhh"...

I buy a ticket, and they are getting really expensive these days, so make it fun for me first lah. Then if I get something out of it that will make a diff in my life OK that's a nice bonus. If not so what lah? Nowadays, first first already WAH must think about this and that, much fight with authorities, issues, issues issues... Wah theatre damn difficult to enjoy lah... let's buy ticket go to Tanjung Golden Village cinema lah.

I hope I am making some sense to you, my old friend. if not just delete this email and relegate me to that bunch of wankers above and I shall not bother you again lah :-)

Pax,
Patrick Teoh

AGONY ANT says...

Congratulations, Patrick, for being the very first to pose an "arty" question to Uncle Ant's all-new Agony Column on kakiseni.com! Can't think of a better way to kick this off than with the funny-serious question you raise - which actually opens up a complex of issues to which no straightforward answer could possibly apply. 


First of all, it prompts us to return to the foundation of all artistic endeavor and see if we can learn anything by excavating there. But let's keep our search focused on theater so this doesn't degenerate into a wordy tome. 


Theater has long been represented by a pair of masks - comic and tragic - showing the two sides of human experience, the light and the heavy. The mask as a symbol of personality goes back to prehistoric times when tribal shamans would trance out by donning a mask and robes while channeling an animal totem or the spirit of a powerful ancestor. This magical ritual was usually to bless a hunting expedition with success, or rescue a soul from the astral realms and return it safely to its physical vehicle, thereby curing any illness afllicting it. In Athens, theater served as social catharsis as well as moral education - with masked players personifying various attributes and tendencies like nobility, loyalty, courage, jealousy, greed, cruelty and deceit.

In general, tragedies were favored by the ruling elite who found solace in watching their own tragic flaws depicted on stage and were thus able to assuage their guilt a little and discharge a few sentimental tears (even tyrants enjoy a good cry, as exemplified by Hitler's S.S. officers who reportedly shed copious sentimental tears while listening to Wagnerian opera - after sending trainloads of unfortunates to the death camps).

Comedies were often a form of stress relief for the masses who could enjoy a public snicker or two at the foibles of the upper classes without having to risk their skins by openly rebelling against the power structure. Satire was, in effect, an important safety valve promoting social stability without actually threatening the status quo. 


Nevertheless, theater certainly contributed to radical shifts in the mass consciousness by triggering perceptual change from within, on the ethical and aesthetical levels. Those who desire to maintain tight control of public opinion are understandably wary of the potentially subversive power of artistic expression. Indeed, almost all major shifts in the mass psyche can be said to have been precipitated by specific literary and theatrical works. 

Scene from Tristan & Isolde

How about the visual arts? Well, they do inevitably exert their aesthetic influence, but they have traditionally been addressed more to the privileged classes than to the masses (cartoons and photography are interesting exceptions that warrant a whole separate study, which we won't delve into here).
 
So where does "entertainment" feature in all this? A play doesn't necessarily have to be funny to be entertaining. Any story told with great skill is entertaining in that it effectively engages the audience's attention. Millions enjoy following soap series on the boob tube in a multitude of languages and dialects. Tragic romances like Tristan und Isolde - the inspiration for Romeo and Juliet and West Side Story - have enchanted audiences for generations. In effect, it doesn't matter whether the subject matter is light or heavy - what's important is that the tale be masterfully told. 

There's nothing more deadly than a good joke badly told. A heart-wrenching tragedy, artistically rendered, can be life-affirming and uplifting. In short, giving theatre audiences their money's worth has little to do with actual content - but everything to do with the degree of skill, the intensity of commitment, the level of passion the performers manage to inject into the overall effort.

While those in theater are often accused of being there to gratify their enormous egos, the same can be said about every other human endeavor - including warmongering and empire-building. Perhaps it's our deeply-ingrained need to seize some species of immortality, spawned from an awareness of our pathetic mortality and vulnerability in the face of life's vicissitudes.

Returning to Patrick's question about whether our theater scene is "elitist, incestuous, self-serving, etc"... of course it is, old chum! Elitism vs Populism is an age-old issue. Elitism assumes that the hoi polloi is a dumb ass that needs to be thrown a stack of hay once in while (or at least a loaf of bread and a few circuses). 

Bread and circuses: another bad review

Populism believes the public is a dumb ass only because elites have rigged the game to keep it forever so. Each of us conducts within our own psyches a neverending argument between the Elitist and the Populist. The Elitist in us knows we are far superior to Most People. The Populist feels it's our sacred duty to disseminate our gifts and insights as far and wide as possible, in the hope that Most People will ultimately benefit - and, even if they don't, at least they'll be forking out hard-earned money to keep us in the business of having fun. 


The true Populist is shamelessly vulgar and watches only wrestling videos, 'Survivor' and late-night product promos - dismissing everything else as "one big self-indulgent wank." The true Populist came into his or her own during Mao's Cultural Revolution, when intellectuals and artists had a real rough time. I don't believe I've ever met a true Populist and I pray I never will!

Incest is how it all began and incest is how it all ends. Remember when there were only a handful of families on the planet - and they were all related? Brother-sister marriage was common practice amongst the ancient royals. Why, they learnt it from the gods among whom incest was not only prevalent, it was perfectly normal. 


Since theater people the world over are a great big fraternity (and sorority) - and since all of us are evolving into soul-brothers and sisters (or water-siblings if you prefer Robert A. Heinlein's terminology as presented in his seminal work of speculative anthropology, Stranger in a Strange Land)... how can any of us have any fun if we don't practise incest? Just answer me that, Bro.

Rafael Trujillo, dictator of the
Dominican Republic in the 1930s

If you argue that incest breeds stupidity... hey, do you think a smart species would go about destroying its own ecosystem and expending most of its energy on perpetual warfare? Maybe it's high time we invited a new crop of ETs to come and revitalize our Gene Pool?

Self-serving? Hey, show me someone who claims to be serving the "common good" or "public interest" - and I'll show you a politician or a creepy civil servant who just wants to get on the censorship board so he gets to see all the naughty bits everybody else can't. Never trust anyone who isn't serving his or her own interests, Patrick. They all grow up and become dictators and dickheads. 

Which brings us to the possibility of ENLIGHTENED self-interest, wherein we finally realize that our lives are all interconnected and interwoven in time and space - and that by guiltlessly fulfilling our own ego needs, we are actually playing a unique role in evolution. There's nothing more inspiring than a self-fulfilled individual, free to do his or her own thing, and in the process turning others on and firing synapses they never even knew existed.

As for your remark that theater tickets are “getting really expensive” – it’s all part of the yuppism that began in the mid-1980s. Remember when a cup of kopi-O cost only 50 cents (that was before the day of the sen)? Now you pay at least RM5 at the Coffee Bean (and it’s not even the tasty local stuff but some fancy imported variety that makes you think you’re in Europe). I couldn’t afford to see a single play if I didn’t get comps as a reviewer – yet I still see full houses at some productions, even the ones with RM100 tickets or more! Obviously there’s a new middle class that can afford a night or two out every week. They constitute the main support of English language theater in KL and Penang.

Theater is generally priced for the comfortable middle class no matter where you live. But now that we have affordable digital technology, there’s no reason why every major production can’t be professionally shot on high-grade digital video and packaged as DVDs and VCDs which can be sold at pirate prices or uploaded on YouTube, so those who can’t afford the luxury of a live performance can at least enjoy good theater at home. Indeed, it’s about time we introduced a cultural channel on TV that features televised plays, interviews with interesting personalities, intelligent discussions on current issues, documentaries on inspiring writers, actors, dancers, sculptors, composers, and so on.

To sum it all up, I'd say that despite the odds theater is alive and well in Malaysia and has actually come quite a long way. There is only one stumbling block as far as I can see: it's the "katak di bawah tempurung" (tempurungism, I call it) patriarchal-provincial mindset - the same that produced the Inquisition and the Taliban - still prevalent amongst our bureaucrats. The sort of bungling interference that has put City Hall in the limelight recently can be viewed as a sign that our theater scene is gaining influence, maturity and power - and therefore poses a threat to the status quo which must be nipped in the bud (not pinched in the butt). This presents us all with an opportunity to seriously question why City Hall has been charged with issuing entertainment licences - why do I need a licence to be entertaining? It's absolute crap.

Anyone know a professional abolitionist who can help abolish all primitive, irrelevant and suppressive laws? Methinks only an abolitionist can deal with those perverted abortionists of art that lurk in the corridors of officialdom.

Agony Ant
25 Feb 2004

UNCLE ANT'S AGONY & ECSTASY COLUMN #2

[First posted 16 January 2012, reposted 10 December 2015]

UNCLE ANT'S AGONY & ECSTASY COLUMN #4

Technical Tips for Bi-Lingual Teenage Playwrights

Jay, 17, is writing a play. He's got a few technical questions for Uncle Ant.

1. Is it ok for me to incorporate other languages in the script? There are just some things which cannot be said in proper English, won’t have the “mood”. Some things in Mandarin, we just can't find an English substitute. (English is my second language, I'm Chinese-ed.)

There are no hard and fast rules about incorporating a mix of languages in your script, Jay. Certain things cannot be taught, only learnt, and one of these things is a sharp artistic instinct that tells you what works and what doesn't. Experiment all you want. Read what you've written aloud and see how it sounds. Rework till it sounds just right. Bear in mind that if you insert too many Mandarin expressions, the non-Mandarin speakers in your audience may feel left out. Insert in such a way that the meaning can be inferred from the action. If you're not 100% comfortable writing in English, why not write a Mandarin play instead? If it's any good, someone else can translate it into English later.

2. How do you know why a person is acting in a certain way? I don’t know why the parents in my play are behaving like this. I think the father doesn’t want a confrontation with the mother, but she’s nagging him ... pushing his patience. Don’t know why the mother’s a nag tho. Do playwrights talk to their parents before writing such plays or what?

"Family Dynamics" by Elizabeth Seaver

You're not being very clear here, Jay. Playwrights are free to talk to their parents to glean some insight - but I'd say the main thing is to keenly observe the psychodynamics of family interactions and then stylize them into recognizable form. Just as an artist will study a landscape or figure intently - and then compress the data by extracting the ESSENCE and translating it into a few masterful strokes on canvas or paper. All art is founded on acute observation of the life around you.

3. Must it have a “positive message”, “nilai-nilai murni” or whatever?

The last thing you want is to deliberately include any kind of "message" whether positive or negative. Rather, just tell the story and allow the audience to draw their own conclusions.

That's where the "art" comes in. The artist's job is to select details from "real life" to be expressed in an artistic medium, whether as prose or poetry, painting or sketch, musical composition, dance movement or dramatic scene. The skill of the artist consists of his or her ability to evoke a range of emotional and aesthetic responses from the audience - whether amusement or indignation or anxiety or vicarious pain or pleasure.

4. The main character comes across as rather reluctant to talk esp when he’s intimidated ... either he’s sullen and rebellious, or he’s too scared cos he doesn’t want to say the wrong thing. So the people who’re talking to him at the time read like they’re doing a monologue. Is that ok, or should I write out that he’s refusing to respond, then let the person go on talking?

This is a basic technical problem which can be easily solved by inserting in brackets what the protagonist (main character) is thinking or feeling as the other characters are speaking. For example: [Protagonist shuffles around impatiently, not really listening, looking for a chance to escape the lecture.] These are playwright's notes addressed to the actor as a suggested response, e.g., [Protagonist maintains a false smile throughout, nodding every so often in feigned agreement.]

5. As I go on exploring the story, more characters appear. This started out as a simple 20 minute play for the inter-school English drama comp with only 4 characters, and it was mainly based in the main characters' home and there're a couple of scenes with extras acting as students going home from school. Now the school's involved too ... which means teachers, classmates ... and it's more complicated. One (or one and a half) hours sounds like a looooong time. Is is ok to have a few more characters? How many should a play have? Agak agak ...

A general rule of thumb: the more characters you introduce to a play, the more complicated the task of keeping them all credible and interacting smoothly. So if you're a novice playwright, best not to be overly ambitious and start writing a play with dozens of characters. Build up your confidence and skill by starting with just a few key characters. If it's your maiden play, it's okay to make it a short one - sort of a one-acter. There's no need to tackle a full-length production until you acquire some experience in the craft. Why put in a lot of useless padding just to fill out a 90-minute time slot when you're better off aiming for a really tight-paced 40-minute play?

6. When I wrote this play, it came out in patches ... How do I connect the dots?

You mean the patches? Use thread. Stories are like threads, and the playwright sews various lives together like a quiltwork using certain themes. If the scenes are isolated moments and don't require any form of linear flow to connect them, then a simple device to hold them - just as you use a basket to keep an assortment of beads or shells - will suffice. It could be a musical or lighting effect signalling the end of one scene and the start of another; or a multimedia interlude, or even the voice of an unseen narrator. Use your imagination!

If you mean the dots, use a pencil – and then ink over the lines when you’ve got a clear picture of what you want to convey. Good luck, Jay!

UNCLE ANT'S AGONY & ECSTASY COLUMN #3

Dear Uncle Ant, I'm a lazy sod so I'm posting my questions about the Malaysian arts scene here [on the kakiseni.com readers' feedback page].

1. What is Malaysian Culture?

2. What is Malaysian Arts?

3. What is Malaysian Heritage?

4. Are these compatible with tourism?

Dear Lazy Sod,

Talk about lazy questions, yours are in the same category as: Who Am I? What Am I Doing Here? What Does It Mean To Be Human? If I Find The Answers Will People Pay Top Money To Hear Them?

But our excitable editor is correct when he declares that Uncle Ant can answer any and all questions (if he feels like it, that is). Be warned, folks, that you may find the answers to Lazy Sod's questions totally unfunny - because our lack of Culture is certainly no laughing matter. Okay, folks... fasten your seat belts... now for some straight answers to Lazy Sod's 100 million ringgit questions!

Many years ago (28, to be precise) I wrote an article for a newspaper in which I compared "culture" to weaving a fine carpet - that is to say, "culture" means diddly-squat to someone who's sleeping on cardboard cartons under a flyover, or who lives in a leaky zinc-roofed shanty in the slums. But along with material gains and creature comforts comes a nice big house in the suburbs - and a professionally laid parquet or marble floor just waiting for a tasteful carpet to make home look a little cosier. Now that's what "culture" represents to most folks who have evolved beyond basic survival: a few original paintings on the walls, a Rhythm-In-Bronze CD playing in the background, and a selection of director-playwrights, soon-to-be-published novelists, or (ahem) theatre reviewers on your birthday party guest list.

In other words, being “cultured” essentially implies that one has developed an aesthetic sensibility or “good taste” – a prerequisite to acquiring even the rudiments of an ethical sense, without which we cannot govern ourselves and therefore will be governed by others on pain of punishment or through brute force. Can you imagine what life in the social matrix might be like if everyone - including candidates for the police force and the civil service - was exposed from infancy to good (read, uncensored) literature, music, films, theatre, paintings and sculptures?

How about the traditional culture you might find in, say, a Kelantanese fishing village, or a rice-growing community in Kedah, or a remote longhouse in Sarawak? Doesn't that qualify as "culture"? Well, folks, that's where culture begins. Man does not live on rice and tapioca alone. After a hearty meal, we want to relax with a couple of drinks and maybe hear someone with a stirring voice and a string instrument sing about the good old days, or watch the belles of the village do a fertility dance.

So there's pop culture and haute culture to consider. For instance, would you consider it a cultural experience to hang out at a karaoke lounge with your contractor buddies, 4 bottles of Martell, and 5 GROs (that’s Guest Relations Officer, for the uninitiated)? Well, in Korea and Japan, that's part of the Business Culture - nobody does actual business in boardrooms. And among affluent youth everywhere, culture means Friday night at Zouk with the gang and a good supply of "headshaking" pills. A few years ago, youth culture would have meant a spot of spontaneous breakdancing – and today some fierce skateboarding or rollerblading - outside some mall. In short, let's not get too precious over our definition of Culture.

But what is MALAYSIAN culture, you ask?

Huh? Is there such an animal? I know we have Melayu culture - you know, all the fun stuff banned by PAS, inspired by the Ramayana and whatnot - kite-flying, top-spinning, gong-beating, ketupat-steaming. We also have Chinese culture, especially around the Lunar New Year, you know, tong-tong-chang and red stuff all over the streets. And we have Indian culture - especially in conjunction with Hindu festivals when painted cement gods adorned with multicolored lights are dragged through the streets in their chariots, and folks in trance pierce their cheeks with stainless steel skewers, and lots of coconuts get smashed. Funky, vel vel. But as playwright Huzir Sulaiman astutely remarked in Notes on Life & Love & Painting:

It angers me when after hundreds of years of importing aspects of other people’s culture some politician in a 4,000-ringgit Italian suit complains about Western values and such-and-such a thing is not from our culture. Our culture is everybody else’s culture. We’ve never had our own. Deal with it and grow up.

Should we bother mentioning the OFFICIAL CULTURE designed and promoted by our tireless bureaucrats - you know, the candle, umbrella, and banana leaf dancers and the stylized silat choreography performed mainly for 65-year-old tourists? Well, that's really just a bowl of wax fruit sitting on the table as some sort of kitsch decoration (hey, don't attempt to eat the stuff, you'll gag and puke!). I wouldn't call THAT culture - but a definitive symptom of the acute lack thereof.

And yet... I can point to a few cultural icons and hold their work up as exquisitely representative of MALAYSIAN culture: the ever popular “Latok” Lat, for a start. And there’s my old friend Salleh Ben Joned the bilingual poet and essayist whose work transcends sterile notions of ethnicity while drawing heavily on ethnic elements. These are forerunners of a younger generation exemplified by the likes of Jit Murad, Huzir Sulaiman, Jo Kukathas and the Instant Café Theatre. What do they have in common? A balanced cosmopolitan sensibility that aesthethically merges the “native” and the “foreign” within their own psyches, putting a spicy spin on the rich stew (or should I say curry?) of derivative cultural elements that define being Malaysian.

Your next question is grammatically unsound and I have every right not to answer it. Nonetheless I’d define “Malaysian arts” as any form of cultural expression practised by anyone born in or residing long-term in Malaysia. (Now some of you, like our nose... I mean nit-picking editor, may be wondering why I described your question - What is Malaysian Arts? - as “grammatically unsound.” Arts is plural and your question addresses a singular issue. How would you define ‘Malaysian Arts’? Now that’s grammatically sound!)

What is Malaysian Heritage? Another grammatically shaky poser, Lazy Sod! But let’s not be too pedantic. Here’s a partial list of what I consider to be our Malaysian Heritage: ancient rainforests, aboriginal peoples, Cristao-speaking Portuguese Eurasians, the Stadthuys (you know, those stodgy red buildings in Malacca), written English and spoken Manglish, Ionic columns, guided democracy, cinema subtitles in 3 languages, Chinese satay sellers and Malay chee cheong fun stalls, not to mention Hakka-speaking Tamils in Kuala Kubu Bharu.

As for your final question: YES, of course, EVERYTHING is compatible with tourism - we need the foreign currency. In any case, your question comes too late: Tourism is now a separate ministry from Culture, Arts and Heritage. During the Mahathir Era, Arts and Culture were subsumed by Tourism, and artists were seen as entertainers, Guest Relations Officers, and court jesters. Before that, the arts were perceived as a means of keeping hormonally-charged youngsters out of trouble and so we had the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sports.

Let’s be grateful for small mercies. I feel the new Ministry of Culture, Arts and Heritage could be a healthy sign. At least it promises to revive the traditional arts suppressed by fundamentalists in Terengganu – and it may well lead to DBKL being relieved of its censorship duties on humanitarian grounds (poor, overworked City Hall already has enough on its hands, maintaining its fleet of lifeboats in anticipation of the next flash flood).

UNCLE ANT’S AGONY & ECSTASY COLUMN #2

Girlfriend Dumps You For Actor?

Agony Ant! My girlfriend leave me for an actor! Summore he only new actor but act damm big shot!! We go for the cars party and sudenly he comes and talk to her… the hole time I stands there he smile at me ONE time and never looks at me after dat… he make the stupid jokes about this actors and that actors….. he is more bitch than the American Idol guy! One week after dat she break up with me! What so special about actors all the girls go GAGA?? How can I win her back? Do I must learn to be more bitch? – Dump in Damansara

Dear DID – I'm not surprised she dumped ya, bud. If you talk the way you write, she would have felt embarrassed to be seen and heard with you in classy circles. Enter an articulate “new actor” with a deep, plummy voice. Hmmm. I suggest you seriously upgrade your English, bud. Anyway, I detect a note of disappointment that the actor only smiled at you “ONE time.” Would you have dumped your girlfriend for him? Be honest now.

Hey, bud, look on the bright side (I'm fond of saying)… she's now hanging out with the actor… but how do you know it isn't just a platonic fling? After all, not all male actors are interested in girls that way. (Bud, I know how it feels to be dumped. My last girlfriend left me for a full-on psychotic. Mildly neurotic wasn't rough enough a ride for her.)

If she can dump you once, she’ll dump you a dozen times – so why bother?

Dear Agony Ant,


What a timely column! I have some questions for you. I know the DBKL’s list of guidelines for approval of scripts is quite demoralising and oppressive. But what's with the silence at the theatres this year? Are there not creative ways to get around these guidelines? Are our playwrights just not creative enough or are they on a strike? – John

Beats me, John. This lull you report – don’t forget 2004 has barely begun (in fact, Baha’is and Druids mark the start of the new Solar Year as March 21) – could be due to shockwaves from the recent smash hit, Election Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Voter. Patrick Teoh and Edwin R. Sumun were illuminating as Poda and Puke. Takes a while to recover from a plot as obvious as that.

But let’s look on the bright side. Fewer shows means theatergoers end up with more cash to spend on other things, like fashion accessories. Good time to invest in lifestyle products and services. Besides, playwrights are like durian trees. They don't fruit all year round. I bet they’re scratching their heads and crotches right now in front of their computers, looking for ‘creative ways to get around those guidelines.’ Give them a break, John. They deserve it.

Dear Agoniser: Your answer to Patrick Teoh's question on ‘Are theatre people elitists?’ was fascinating, but too long, dude, too long. Can you summarise? Personally, I think musicians are even more elitists. The classical guys won’t hang with the pop guys, the pop guys won’t hang with the underground rock guys, and the underground rock guys just hate the world. What gives? – Pop Goes The Weasel

First of all, Pop, I don't answer to the name, ‘Dude.’

In any case, better too long than too short, I always say.

You want a summary? Absolutely. Yup, that’s it.

As far as I’m concerned, musicians are people too – and people can ‘hang’ with whoever they want, it’s really none of our business who they consort with and who they don’t.

Now I can see why your last name is Dweezil!

5 April 2004