jukebox playin'
kau lilin cintaku - francesca peters
kau merubah segalanya - fauziah latiff
sandarkan pada kenangan - jamal abdillah & siti sarah raisuddin
last friday, i accompanied my bro fer his med. appt at sgh.. it was supposed to be at four in de evening but saw the doctor only around fivish.. one whole hour spent waiting. then we had to get the prescribed medications at the pharmacy. another half hour went by, waiting. then waited for the mrt to take us back west. five minutes. stood in the packed train (it was peak hour) & waited fer the journey to end. forty minutes. waiting.. waiting.. waiting... there's juz an interminable amount of waiting that we have to do in this sordid world... WHY is that so???
well anyway, dropped off at CCK & met up wif some of the usual suspects; tjay, fizzy & chacha. Had a sumptuous dinner at the alfresco-themed 'rasa istimewa' restaurant (located at the nearby cck park) & then played pool at the only surviving pool & billiard place in the west at Lot1. as expected, i was pretty lousy but in my honest-to-goodness opinion, i DID show a marked improvement. however, i'm so used to losing at evry game i play that i'd feel weird if i didnt lose... the same goes fer bowlin but that's another story.. haha. by some twist of fate, we bumped into old fren Damien whose fone we cudnt get thru earlier... & ended up 'melepak'ing at mcdonald's til after elevenish.
on saturday, i dropped by ayer rajah food centre at westcoast fer a late dinner and virtually feasted on black-pepper chicken rice & my fave local fare; SATAY!!! however, to my utter horror and disappointment, they were out of mutton so had to settle fer chicken & beef instead.. i was further dismayed pasal the satay tak cukop garing & the gravy was cold... tapi the meat was SO tender & juicy, it's Sinful! hahaha.. before i am accused of being a finicky food critic-wannabe, let me first explain myself: a long time ago, i tasted satey frm that same westcoast stall & deemed it was the BEST i ever had in singapore... and i even came down a couple of times to the foodcentre but on both occasions, the stall was closed (kesian aku!). SO you see, i was absolutely craving fer satey frm that particular stall only.. mengidam agaknyer~! whatever the case, it wasnt up to my expectations and it got me thinking that my opinion of the satey there might be grossly overRated. hmmmm.. my overactive imagination Must have been workin overtime lah.
my hair is getting abit long but i'm not gonna cut it yet becuz 1) i'm too lazy 2) short hair is really unbecoming on me 3) shall only cut next week or after. The last factor is really important; wif hari raya juz looming around the corner, i want my hair to be the PErfect length fer styling when the festive season arrives. LOL. furthermore, i juz bought my fave gatsby hairwax (the 'megahold' type, what else?? ;P ) which is THE most essential must-have fer my hair... i've tried other types but my hair always end up looking limp & flat after a few hours... *sigh* i know i must sound like a total himbo; i'm feeding my vanity too much but hey~ i'm just a geek wif an insecurity streak ok??? ;( Got my hair-essential at watsons imm on sunday and boy, That place was THronged with shoppers... apparently the whole mall was having a 'mega-sale' thingy but only fer a few hours.. thus explaining the crowd of vicious shoppers. i think whole families were out in full force!!! aunties wif their pot-bellied husbands, grannies wif their pesky, noisy grandkids in tow... its like a zoo outing or sumthing. i cant stand crowds (unless i'm intoxicated ;p) so i was out of imm in a flash... LOL
last night, artscentral aired a recorded performance of dick lee's "the forbidden city: portrait of an empress" and i was fortunate enuff to cajole my mom into letting me watch it on the living room telly (actually she was gonna watch a telemovie on suria...) becuz as usual, my bro was hogging the tv in my room. the musical revolves around the notorious Dragon Lady of China, the late Empress Dowager Tzu Hsi. Though renowned in history as a vicious ruler driven by an insatiable greed & lust for power, the musical detracted from these already established perceptions of the empress & chose instead to portray her as a woman who was more a victim of shady politics than a devious tyrant. though i'm sure the creators of the show had many noble & noteworthy intentions, i think the musical falls flat in a few places. Firstly, empress tzu hsi ruled fer over five decades; thats a pretty LOng period of time to cram into a twohour-an-ahalf musical extravaganza. Wif so many events happening during her reign as china's monarch, an audience member who is only vaguely familiar wif China's convoluted history is in danger of becoming as lost as a lab-rat in a labyrinth by the end of the show. each scene in the musical moves almost at a frenetic pace and when juxtaposed by dick lee's pulsating percussion beats in the background, the overall effect is akin to watching an earthvisions documentary albeit on a rollercoaster.
moreover, becuz the musical is through-sung (in the style of Evita & Les Miserables) extra effort has to be made to follow the intricate plot. dick lee's music too is a bit of a let-down. the leitmotifs he had composed fer the musical is only mildly impressive. None of the solo numbers by the principal characters were truly memorable and the ensemble pieces were at times, too draggy and bogged down by annoyingly noisy synthesizer-created music. THAT i think is the musical's major failing; budget constraints had prevented the use of a live orchestra and thus, throughout the show i was constantly plagued by a sense of incompleteness. A synthesizer is Never a good substitute fer a company of stringed instruments... BUt there were a number of saving points; the angmoh principals, hal fowler & leigh mcdonald were obviously theatre veterans and they carried watever song handed to them wif impressive polish & panache. Blossom Lam as the aged empress had a gorgeous earth-mother contralto which was equally matched by kit chan's smooth & "poppish" soprano voice. adrian pang, hossan leong, sebastian tan, robin goh & darren seah (all of whom are local theatre thespians) were all pretty good in their lesser roles... and so was amy cheng (of First Touch fame), though she was just part of the chorus. the colorful costumes, designed by the creative director of esprit international, yang lerong, were visually stunning and so was the minimalist set by famed west end designer francis o'connor. these highpoints made the show worth watching but it's such a shame that "the forbidden city" is blemished by an almost incomprehensible storyline, a frenzied pacing, & wearisome music. i almost sympathise with the luminous kit chan who virtually carried the entire weight of the musical upon her shoulders. indeed, she has the gift to transform the most forgettable & lacklustre songs into worthy showstoppers.. many times during the musical, her soaring vocals gave me the goosebumps!
afficionados who want a taste of asian-inspired musicals, i recommend dick lee's earlier efforts such as sing to the dawn or even snow.wolf.lake (which was a star vehicle for cantopop king jacky cheung & had kit chan in a supporting role). better still, go sample cameron mackintosh's miss saigon or rodgers & hammerstein's flower drum song. forbidden city is just an epic that doesnt live up to either its lofty pretensions or its publicity of epic proportions... (only reminds me of the now-forgotten chang & eng)
Quoteworthy
"Music is a language by itself," - veteran Malaysian singer, Zainal Abidin, in an interview with a singaporean journalist recently
PS: EKa mairina Must win tonite!!!
