Last Saturday was Mid-Autumn Festival, and also the grand day for a team of people passionate for theatre. A team of people who went through many challenges, many rounds of rehearsals, many script tweaks over the past year. But they persevered and put up the performance. Yes, I am talking about Paparazzi 2009: The Concrete Skies.

Over the past year, there were times where Chicken Little’s “The sky is falling” would emerge (and it would go BAMMM, like I told Ash), but thankfully it didn’t happen.

I came, I watched, and I left feeling satisfied and proud for them.

Last Saturday was also my own curtain call—for an ad-hoc committee that I invested slightly more than half of my university life in.

In 2007, I was part of the sound and lights team for Paparazzi 2007: A Night of Madness with Christopher Durang. Fresh into university (and theatre), I didn’t have an idea of how things worked, and it was quite crazy as I jumped into the team late into production. 4 plays by Durang, 3 shows (including a matinee), over 2 days.

The Room Upstairs at Action Theatre (where we staged the play) was small and cosy, but the tech crew had to climb up a ladder to get to our consoles which were hoisted on a platform. It’s imaginable how many times we had knocked our heads on the low ceiling.

And up to now, three Paparazzis later, I still remember the first question I was posed when I first joined the team: “Do you know how to plot lights?” And it remains in my mind till now. Sadly, I didn’t know then, and up till know, I still haven’t clearly understood it despite the years spent in AVA and papa. =(

And I remember the assumption that all theatre sound systems have audio-out to computers—and I got screwed the day before dress rehearsal.

In the 2008 edition, I wanted to try something different—publicity—but Zak, who was Vice Pres for 15th CI Club then, put me back in Sound/Lights as part of the main committee.

We had a renowned playwright in our team, and it was looking optimistic and idealistic initially before a sudden pull-out happened—the playwright left, citing differences in ideologies—and we were left to fend for ourselves.

For the months after that, the team split in two—one half concentrating on raising funds, the other trying to write a script together, adapting from other plays we came across from various modules. But it was never easy.

Then came our saviours (yes I am exaggerating but it is true)—Sharlene (playwright/director) and later, Meredith, as assistant director. We adapted M. Butterfly and added a toss of Orientalism in the form of M. White Snake. The product:

“Perhaps where love is concerned, the truth doesn’t matter at all.”

I still remember, the moment when the dozen of us were having a meeting at the benches and we were wondering about our actors. We needed a European-looking male protagonist who had the craze over everything Asian. And Rikesh walked past.

“Hey, do you want to act for Papa?”

“Sure, why not?” (I couldn’t remember the exact words but that was about the mood)

And so we had Rikesh to be our Thomas Quince, an English lit teacher. And Pamy as Chen (I forgot the exact name), a Chinese teacher. They met after Chen performed Madame White Snake during a school assembly.

When these two characters meet and fall in love, they discover that love comes with its own set of rules and complications, one of which is the seemingly insurmountable barrier of their different languages. Speaking of Love attempts to merge the portions of the Western opera, Madame Butterfly, (as expounded in Hwang’s play, M. Butterfly) with the Chinese opera Madame White Snake, and in doing so, touch on the theme of cultural differences among people. As the play unfolds, as the characters take their turns to tell the audience their side of the story, the audience is left with a decision to make: which of the two is telling the truth? (from the Paparazzi 2008 blog)

It was probably the first year where we had a live band to perform with the cast – thanks to NTU Jazz and Blues band (and Jasmine Choe, who was also co-producer).

The Alliance Française Theatre environment was nice and I didn’t have to bang my head against the ceiling (lol).

We had two shows, and when the curtains came down on Sunday night, I had a mix of feelings—after so many challenges, it’s finally over (in a satisfied way definitely).

(And we made a small profit in the end.)

I was part of 16th CI Club and so naturally, I took on the position of ex-officio for Paparazzi 2009. I was way too busy on the initial bit and I had Lizzy (later Zed) to help me. Eventually as the crazy commitments tapered off, I decided to involve myself a bit more.

I probably did not help much in this edition, but stepping out from the “work” (of playing with the lights and sound) and looking from a broad-based view perhaps made me realise more that I have the love for theatre, however small, however out-of-the-industry I am. Attended a few of their meetings as observer, attended their rehearsals closer to productions.

Once, I stayed so late that my mum was furious—because dinner was turning cold. But on that instance, I gave some small advice here and there as they were running through their lines and stage positions. (Eldon with another dangling outstretched hand while trying to grab Audrey or something, their closing scene where they had issues trying to end off after Doc’s narrative…)

And Eldon was fabulous that night, because he suggested the spotlight on stage left-BAM-spotlight on stage right-BAM-spotlight on centrestage-BAM-all three stagelights on idea, even though we were all working on the rooftop in near darkness.

Yes, The Concrete Skies. A script from scratch (kudos Ash, I like it no matter how bad you think of it). Lights and sounds were great (though I had expected ACJC CPA theatre to have 100-to-0 lights rather than 100-to-5ish), great work Phil and Shi Hui! 🙂

Now that the baton has been passed on, Nuraini, please look after the new team well, and Syahidah, I look to your team for a splendid performance!

Credit roll time. Thanks Lady Gaga for the song Paparazzi. (If only if she emerged in the music industry in 2007. She’s queer, but she can really sing.)