Big Fool
Lee is a glorious throwback to the heyday of Rediffusion and broadcasting
superstar Lei Dai Soh, when streets would come to a complete standstill
to listen to him tell stories over the public radio loudspeakers, and
taxi drivers and hawkers would woo him with free rides and packets of
chee cheong fun to spin a tale in cabs or outside their stalls. As with
Titoudao,
Toy Factory has created a lively, inspiring interaction between current
audiences and the cultural relics of our past.
At its heart, this production is an ode to the allure and art of traditional
Cantonese storytelling. Lei's soothing and evocative voice registers
in almost every sequence of the play. His silky smooth Cantonese pervades
the hubbub of everyday life at a village square in one scene, and captivates
a hodgepodge of characters - housewife, samsui woman, beggar and hawker
- in another. Lim Keng San's intricate set elevates these scenes, providing
a lively backdrop for playwright Koh Teng Liang's sketches of a generation
that lived through a voice.
Toy Factory's latest also illuminates the power of broadcasting personalities
in the 40s, 50s, and 60s, when radio was the entertainment medium of
choice. In Big Fool Lee, Lei is a ubiquitous figure, reaching
out to the public through an exhausting schedule of charity concerts
and fundraising events. In a concert raising money for the victims of
the Bukit Ho Swee fire, he not only obliges the rich merchant who places
an outrageous bid for him to tell a story, but also gamely engages in
a gaudy song-and-dance routine much to the crowd's delight. As much
a radio icon as a celebrity everyman, Lei's generosity, charm and breadth
of spirit elevated him to hero status in the eyes of an adoring public
desperate for a role model.
Koh also demonstrates how Lei harnessed his celebrity to inform and
soothe the public during national crises. A montage of violent war scenes
(which also re-enacts the brutal murder of Lei's brother) culminates
in Lei's defiance of the Japanese to continue broadcasting from a rickety
radio outpost. Jeffrey Low's Lei keeps up a determined stream of Cantonese
while a single spotlight is trained on him on a darkened stage. Low
displays rare strength and delicacy as he speaks with a vividness that
turns remote yesterdays into today's news. A look of bone-deep sadness
seldom leaves Low's face as he speaks. We realise that the stories he
tells distract him from his own tragedy in the same way they distract
his audience from their hardships.
In his careful script, Koh also scrutinises the personality behind
the persona, evoking the conflict between an uncompromising artist and
a husband saddled with family obligations. Immersed in his art, Lei
had little time to care for his schizophrenic wife, Ah Foon, let alone
his mistress and true love, Ming You Hao. Big Fool Lee is as
much about these women as it is about him: their lives and fortunes
are inevitably intertwined with his. As Ah Foon, Koh Wan Ching is an
excellent counterpoint to Low's reserve, throwing herself into hysterics
and periods of great withdrawal. In one scene, she writhes and thrashes
about on stage after Lei scolds her for almost dropping their child.
The reaction she provokes in Lei is revelatory. He tries to calm her
down while struggling to keep his anger in check, his frustration tempered
by a deep sense of responsibility and concern.
Leelian Chua's portrayal of Lei's mistress is touched with
elegance and pathos. In a poignant sequence that marks the decline of
radio and Cantonese, a composed Chua weathers one of Lei's tantrums
and painstakingly teaches him to read in Mandarin. Ming also fought
battles of her own she largely kept private. She struggled to overcome
a gossipy public, a suspicious Ah Foon and Lei's long periods
of absence. In a fleeting display of vulnerability, Ming lashes out
at Lei after he is late for dinner on the eve of Chinese New Year. For
a brief moment, her stately demeanour cracks and her eyes well with
resentment; her secret love too much to bear.
Playwright Koh also finds dramatic energy in the very enervation of
the Cantonese dialect. In Big Fool Lee, this decline is played out with
frenetic pace. A tidal wave of Speak Mandarin campaigns (replete with
bright red banners celebrating the language swooping onto the stage),
Chinese television serials and radio programmes dominate the latter
half of the play. The stark irony of these sequences was not lost on
us in the audience: the very language that displaced Cantonese in the
past now finds itself threatened by English.
Unfortunately, this sprawling three-hour production suffered from a
tendency towards excess. Director Peter Sau tried too hard to pair Lei's
life story with a modern playwright's struggle to stage a play about
him, rendering several sequences choppy and unfocused. Rants against
the government, and existential sequences involving characters from
Lei's stories were also distracting. The ending plodded on for too long,
dragging out the protagonist's death and indulging in too many spiritual
antics. Lei's favourite characters, Sun Wu Kong and Justice Bao, made
unnecessary appearances throughout the play, engaging in slo-mo opera
and wushu displays. By the third hour of Big Fool Lee, the
audience's restlessness was palpable. With more rigorous editing and
cleaner direction, these lengthy periods of weakness could have been
avoided.
Nevertheless, these problems did not detract from Big Fool Lee's
ability to find heightened reflections of the present in the past. This
play not only rues the loss of an important cultural medium, but also
exposes how swiftly it was lost. Along with Titoudao, it is
continuing evidence of Toy Factory's skill for sustaining a vital dialogue
between an ancient art form and contemporary culture. I left the theatre,
moved and enthralled. |
"Along with Titoudao, it is continuing evidence of Toy
Factory's skill for sustaining a vital dialogue between an ancient art
form and contemporary culture"
Credits
Cast: Jeffrey Low, Leelian Chua, Nelson Chia, Gordon
Choy, Qin Zhan Bao, Darius Tan, Koh Wan Ching and Lee Swee Har
Aritstic Advisor: Goh Boon Teck
Director: Peter Sau
Playwright: Koh Teng Liang
Producer: Justin Wong
Production Manager: Yeo Hon Beng
Stage Manager: Cynthia Sim
Choreographer: Gordon Choy
Set Desiger: Lim Keng San
Lighting Designer: Suven Chan
Sound Designer and Composer: Philip Tan
Radio Broadcasting Designer: Leelian Chua
Costume Designer: Vivianne Koh
Hair designer: Lim Chin Leong
Multimedia designer: Noktheepen Amata
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