My name is Helmi Yusof and I am a first-time playwright. I\u2019ve been an arts journalist for several years, and never thought I could or wanted to write plays \u2013 until TheatreWorks Managing Director Tay Tong asked me to join a playwriting course conducted by his company. Course instructor Tony Perez, a deeply spiritual playwright from the Philippines, read my scribbles and concluded I have a \u201cflair for comic plays\u201d. This was news to me \u2013 especially since I cried a lot during his course because he kept making us close our eyes and recall our traumas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thanks to his encouragement, I wrote a comedy called My Mother Buys Condoms<\/em> about a retired teacher and her romance with her air-con repairman. It\u2019s set to be staged at the upcoming Singapore Theatre Festival and will be directed by W!LD RICE Artistic Director Ivan Heng.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s billed as a \u201cWorld Premiere\u201d, which makes me wonder who outside of Singapore would appreciate it, since it has quite a bit of Singlish and its concerns (moral panic, social repression, restrictions on the freedom to love) seem so uniquely Singaporean right now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve been interviewed by a few publications and one of the questions often posed is: \u201cWhat is it like to switch from arts journalism to theatre practice?\u201d I never answer, \u201cOh, the disillusionment!\u201d \u2013 but there were pangs of that at first. Now that W!LD TIMES has asked me to write about my experience, I thought I\u2019d just tell the whole truth. This information might be useful to other first-time playwrights working with a professional theatre company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Remember the wonderful days in school when you read or staged Shakespeare, and you had to stick religiously to the words? Even when Shakespeare\u2019s plot didn\u2019t seem to make sense, you couldn\u2019t rewrite the words. Same goes for repetitive Ibsen, enigmatic Pinter, hard-to-stage Kane and anyone else in the canon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But, when you work with a professional theatre company, everything you write will be scrutinised by the director, dramaturg and actors. You must put your ego aside, listen very carefully and rewrite very quickly. Like a reporter, I kept a voice recorder on during all the workshops so I didn\u2019t miss anything anyone said \u2013 and even that didn\u2019t prepare me for the half of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Halfway through the rehearsal process, Ivan and Festival Dramaturg Alfian Sa\u2019at decided that the second half of the play just wasn\u2019t working. I was given three days to rewrite half a play. I had to take leave from work, lock myself at home and subsist on instant noodles and fried eggs until I had arrived at a workable solution. The voice recorder and taped conversations were extremely useful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The orchestra has only one conductor \u2013 who isn\u2019t you. In the early versions of My Mother Buys Condoms<\/em>, I had written the mother as an ordinary woman who is deeply hurt when people reject her romance with an air-con repairman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But Ivan thought she was too self-pitying. He said she\u2019d be \u201cunwatchable\u201d and that \u201cthe audience wouldn\u2019t champion her\u201d. He directed actress Lok Meng Chue to be more confident about what she wants. He cut out her more distraught moments. At first, it was me who was distraught about the changes. But Ivan\u2019s a successful director and knows his audience. He\u2019s also won the Cultural Medallion \u2013 which no one else in this production has done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So I decided to trust him wholeheartedly. We reworked the lines to fit this new assured woman that was rapidly emerging from Meng Chue. And it\u2019s all worked out very, very well, I think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Incidentally, I recently watched a DVD of the 2014 staging of Medea<\/em> by London\u2019s National Theatre. It was so potent that I purchased online the script by Ben Power, National Theatre\u2019s Associate Director. But I realised some of the speeches in his book had been changed for or omitted from the staged version. My guess is those lines just weren\u2019t working for Carrie Cracknell\u2019s direction. So Power \u2013 despite all his, um, power \u2013 acceded to the director\u2019s vision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Theatre is a collaborative art \u2013 don\u2019t forget that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I must say, one funny thing about being on the production side is that I\u2019m finally learning the truth about some famous artists. As an arts reporter, I might interview someone and curiously ask: \u201cSo what is it like working with so-and-so?\u201d And the reply is often: \u201cOh, so-and-so is amazing, so hardworking, always nails the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n When we were casting actors for My Mother Buys Condoms<\/em>, a different picture emerged in the discussions of those very same people: \u201cOh, so-and-so can\u2019t remember lines. So-and-so has a limited range. So-and-so is a diva.\u201d I kept saying: \u201cNooooo! What? Really?\u201d Turns out famous artists are only human. It made me wonder how much of what some people tell me in interviews is true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Well, I\u2019ve tried to be completely honest in this piece. I hope you\u2019ve found it useful. Good luck, and I hope to see your play on stage soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n1. Be prepared to rewrite\u2026 a lot!<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
2. Theatre is a collaborative art<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
3. Actually, everyone is fallible<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n