Q

So. We did it.

Everything is still incredibly surreal.

From three days to show with all our barang, to backstage, to right now.

WE DID IT, GUYS.

Where do I even start?

Some of us have known each other since we were 7, most since we were 13. Have gone through Drama classes for four years together, if not at least watched each other grow in our performances.
Had dreams like any other group of friends – ambitious ones: “Let’s put up a play! A musical! Self-directed! Self-written!” Did I believe we’ll actually do it one day? I did. Did I expect it to be anything like this? No.

I’m sorry if at any point I get over indulgent with self-lauding, but right now, i’m just incredibly proud of us all.

To Gloria and Cleo, for their insane courage and amazing ideals. Without which this play would either a) not have taken place or b) taken place in a void deck. For their leadership and vision and sometimes unbearable workouts.

To Naddy, whom half of us only just met a couple months ago but now love so incredibly much. Thank you for being so strong – physically, emotionally, holding the (often crazyass and uncontrollable) group together with your calm and your insight.

To Celine, for your broken tooth and fractured foot, but also for bringing what is an important sense of realness into the play.

To Xinyi, our baby – director turned actor for your ability to be carried around and manipulated like a rag doll. Also for your house, your food, your witty asides.

To Becky, for being such a powerful performer (and I don’t think you even realize how much so).

To Cathleen, Rei-En and Dhimas – the best three-man crew anyone can ask for: for their nimble fingers and fleet feet, and basically doing everything for us.

And to me, for being a bright spark of brilliance as always.

How many teenagers (and thank God, this is my last year as a -teen) can say they self-devised and performed in a play they can truly call their own? Every scene is so much a product of everyone’s that when someone asks, Oh, who came up with this? I truly cannot answer them. It’s that extreme sense of accomplishment, of having DONE something you’re always always be proud of, and it being fully yours – some people spend their lives waiting for this. We’re very lucky.

Better yet, how many of us can say we’ve done this not just alone – but with people you have already known and loved for years? And who share your passion strongly, and are capable and driven enough to take action? We’re lucky also because we have each other.

People. People. We put up a show. In a real theater. Left to our own devices entirely.

None of us are trained dancers, or have had much experience with physical theater. But we did it.

Two sold-out shows.

Happy audience.

Happy us.

Two months. (And now it’s over. The withdrawal symptoms will be terrifying.)

I’ll briefly describe our rehearsal process right up to the play, with lots of people to thanks throughout!

For this we have our producers G and Cleo to thank – they organized all the logistics before roping us in (a cast of seven: G, Cleo, Celine, Me, Becky, Cathleen, Naddy. And Xin as our director). About mid-December we met up to discuss, it’s still crazy thinking back. At Pastamania where we were literally directionless, had no idea what we’d be putting up.)

Our time at Hong Wen School’s dance studio (courtesy of Xinyi’s VP mom THANK YOU SO MUCH). In the beginning we were all track pants and seriousness, but later it degenerated to (honestly) pajamas and slippers. Hours and hours we spent in there devising, scraping, experimenting.

Xinyi was roped in after (and we all became directors), but Cathleen unfortunately had golf commitments and dropped out (but came often to shower us with food). Later on we also bumped into the Goodman Arts Center (with a FRIDGE – we were ecstatic).

The play went through so many stages, and had grown so much in just a month.

Come to think of it, some may see these past two months as tough. Rehearsals every other day for long hours, and rehearsals are non stop experimenting and practicing (which means we are constantly moving – by that I mean running, jumping, lifting). But I don’t think I’ve ever felt grudging or reluctant. Sure, there’s always that few seconds where you wake up at 8am and think “What the hell. I could have been sleeping.” But once we’re in it, it’s actually… fun.

It helps that we’ve been friends for awhile.

All the inside jokes, all the falling on the ground laughing until we’ve exhausted ourselves, the hobo-ing on the ground eating tuna crackers, appreciating each other’s ideas and that exhilaration where together we find a sequence which works. And of course our neh neh exercises involving lots of HTHT and tears (and fries. and farts).

It wasn’t without obstacles though.

Towards the last week (where we had one entire scene un-finished.. YES. scary), things happened. We were over-budget (by quite a bit) for unexpected costs and ticket sales were slow for 3pm (which meant more losses). To be frank I’m quite the worriers so I internally panicked about all the money and was thinking “Why the hell are we doing this WE ARE UNPAID UNEMPLOYED STARVING ARTISTS NOW. IN DEBT.” For this, we have people to thank, and I cannot stop thanking them.

Most of all – the St. Nicholas community. Six of us were from SNGS, and we’ve always felt that whatever we are capable of now and who we are comes mostly from our time in St. Nicks. And we trusted that St. Nicks will be there for us when we needed them. It’s just a SN thing. We were not let down – in fact the response was astounding. We sent an email to the SN alumni describing our position, and in no time and all, many SN Jiejies had raised funds for us (from their own pockets) to partly sponsor our play. It’s with utmost willingness, without any doubt or expectation of returns, just with that distinctive St. Nicholas spirit to instinctively help each other.

The response we got from our donations jar and the spike in ticket sales after we sought help from friends (3PM SOLD OUT TOO), we credit wholly to the audience. Thanks to you guys we are NOT IN DEBT!

And then there was the problem of cast. Celine’s tooth got chipped for one of our later rehearsals during a particularly bad fall, and there was the fear of her leaving. A week before show. Imagine the angst. After we have calmed down (from bubble tea and stress-laughter and good news, tragedy struck again (the next day), where Celine slipped after rehearsals and apparently fractured her foot. Thank God it was a false report and it was just a tissue tear.

We also have to thank God, because I truly believe He helped us through all our obstacles. As a cast we were all pretty strong in our faith, and had prayed and prayed for everything that had gone wrong – and in the end everything was smoothed out for us in ways that’s nothing less of a miracle.

Bump in was surreal. The last time I had performed at the Black Box (with fancy bulb mirrors and dressing rooms and sign-in tags) was under Temple, where we were masked crocodile cheerleaders and part of an ensemble for a piece much greater than ourselves. This time, the play was ours. We were it.

Thank you G’s mom for the fantastic food and G’s uncle for the brillz photos (G BETTER UPLOAD SOON) throughout tech-run and recording.

AND THEN IT WAS SHOW DAY.

We met early at Xin’s house in varying shades of lethargy actually. Again I’m thankful for the dynamics of our friendship, because it calmed me down like nothing else. I KNEW we’ll always have each other’s back and until then we had our usual mocking thing going on to bring me back to the familiar. Make-up, taxi.

Stand-by. Warm-ups.

Neh neh exercises.
(One particularly got to me. I had trouble dealing with understanding loneliness to a deeper extent. The exercise required us to think of a moment where you felt a very real human connection. To hold on to it, want it forever. Naturally I thought of the Mugs, where we just loll around and be completely ourselves. Then G says, imagine you never, in your whole life, experienced this. How would life be for you. That was the part that broke me down really bad.)

So and then.

Show.

It’s a 50 minutes play but it feels like 10 when you’re doing it, seriously. Maybe because there is no backstage and you’re literally performing every freaking single second so there’s no time to stop and think: HELL. THIS IS IT.

The 3pm crowd was great in that they really GAVE energy. They were very tense (“Cannot breathe.”) in a good way and responded amazingly. 8pm crowd had many, many crying – that one was slightly more heartfelt than intense energy.

While some of us were concerned more with what important theater veteran guests thought about it, I was way more worried about whether my friends would enjoy it. My perspective is that we’re doing a show not only for ourselves, but to give the audience (my friends and family) a message in a way that’s extraordinary.

8pm for me had the greatest impact. Maybe because it was the last show, maybe because we’ve rid of nervous energy at the matinee, maybe because we had good feedback from theater people and kept in mind the minute details that called for a more nuanced performance.

The craziest thing is this: we actually had a few technical screw ups – basically sequences we’ve drilled for ages. Strangely, I’m happy they happened. The group dynamics was so strong, so focused, we picked ourselves up immediately and convincingly, no one could tell. I felt that made me grow so much more as a performer than a thoroughly perfect run could have.

The audience were too nice, really.

Even the ones we thought would be critical thought it was “damn good”. Friends I didn’t think would appreciate it, did. We had constructive feedback from professionals about theater techniques of course, which I learnt a lot from. Maybe they were being nice because after all we’re a fresh new group of young people, but they gave a lot more compliments than we deserve.

My greatest fear was that people wouldn’t understand or enjoy it because it’s slightly less explicit (thus less accessible), but I under estimated the audience – they didn’t need to fully understand to enjoy it, they just needed to feel. Understanding comes later. In fact, by making it less explicit, many had original interpretations that applied to them personally, which probably makes it more relate-able than text-based. You can say we aimed to incite feelings/thoughts (viscerally), not to entertain.

Every time an audience tells me they could relate, they could feel, or that something made them cry (8pm had lots, for some reason), it makes me feel like everything, EVERYTHING is so worth it. THAT’S what I’ve been performing for.

My parents/relatives: “Now we know why you lost weight! Cause it’s like exercise the whole time! Climb here run there!” Which is their way of saying they liked it and that my time away from home was worth it.

Probably the most unexpected but common comment we’ve got from many, both professional and not: They want to see another show by us. Nad’s friend: “Please don’t let Pedestrian Productions die.” We were not planning to have another (didn’t even know if we could survive this one), so this came as quite a surprise.

Back in the dressing room Gee asked us seriously, Are you guys happy just letting this end here?

It was a unanimous no.

So, friends, we’ll see you again in the future. Maybe when we’re 60 and Celine with dentures and osteoporosis. But we’ll be there, and when we are please come back and show us the same support you have this time round.

To do something you love so much, with people you love so much. And for others to love the product so much (ok or at least not hate it).

I’m blessed.