Wo men de Drama Malam

Lots of things were different about this year's NYeDC show. It was a single matinee performance, held on the first day of the March hols. It was also a combined effort with the Malay and Chinese cultural groups, so in all we put up a total of four relatively short plays in three languages.

It made a lot of sense for a triple joint-venture. Dwindling resources means pooling whatever we can afford together for a single show rather than risk three separate, patchy ones. We also significantly reduced our competition to attract the same audience and make them pay separately for each. Usually, by the latest performance in the calendar, audience fatigue would set in and the last show is also usually the least attended. Today, we all got to perform to a full house, and that was very satisfying, indeed.

NYeDC's item was "Staying Alive!" by Haresh Sharma. It explores the reasons why people entertain suicidal thoughts and builds up to a happy resolution in which the characters find their motivation to stay alive. Despite its morbid undertones, the play has its light, comedic moments and isn't too heavy on moralizing and preachiness. Yup, sounds like NYeDC's style.

The Malay and Chinese groups were equally hard at work these last two weeks getting the publicity and ticket-selling going, while putting in a lot of rehearsal time as well. I will commend highly the Audio-Visual team who was always there, first to arrive, last to leave, making sure sound, lights, curtain, screen, projector worked their magic.

Given our new realities, we knew production this year was going to be tough, but though it wasn't always smooth-sailing, our three groups worked surprisingly well together. NYeDC still have our own big event coming up later this year, but could combined performances be the way forward for us? Guess we'll find out after our post-mortem.

Anyway, here's our happy ending for the family that wants (or rather, DOESN'T want) to kill itself. Glad it all worked out well for them in the end!