{"id":34407,"date":"2015-04-01T17:25:00","date_gmt":"2015-04-01T09:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/?p=34407"},"modified":"2021-06-03T17:05:50","modified_gmt":"2021-06-03T09:05:50","slug":"business-as-usual","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/business-as-usual\/","title":{"rendered":"Business As Usual"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In Public Enemy<\/em>, Gerald Chew plays pragmatic businessman Lim Hock Seng \u2013 a character first created by Henrik Ibsen 133 years ago, but who could easily be living in Singapore today. Gerald chats with us about drawing inspiration for his character from Singapore as a global financial city, his own life and collaborating with director Glen Goei.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tell us about your character.<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Lim Hock Seng is a business leader, a typical businessman, in Singapore. When Dr. Chee releases his report about the toxic water supply in the country, my character initially sees improvements to the water system as something that\u2019s business-friendly. Then, he finds out the financial consequences of Dr. Chee\u2019s report. At that point, he makes a very quick turnaround.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s what I find wonderful about the character. He presents a conundrum for many audience members, especially in a pro-business city like Singapore. They might find themselves agreeing with him more than they would like! After all, so many decisions here are made purely for pragmatic reasons \u2013 not just at the systemic level, but at the personal, individual level too. Lim Hock Seng represents that point of view.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ibsen wrote An Enemy of the People<\/em> 133 years ago. Were you surprised by the play\u2019s relevance today?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Absolutely. I think Ibsen \u2013 via David Harrower, who has updated the play \u2013 is presenting a very realistic situation to audiences. Our characters are arguably doing something that is possibly bad for us in the long term, but we still do it. It\u2019s an allegory for the issues we face and decisions we make every day. Sometimes, countries encourage war because it increases their profits. And, of course, the play asks questions that are still relevant today. Good intentions, good theories and good ideas can exist and they should be an ideal to be aspired to. But do they hold true in practice?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/
Gerald with Ivan Heng, William Neo and Lim Kay Siu at our Gala Premiere<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

What kind of preparation did you do for the role?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

First of all, I tried not to judge my character. I also worked on finding the layers of truth in him. What was fascinating to me was that I found a lot of the energy and truth in creating this character from everything around me \u2013 in what I feel and know of my environment and the people I live and share this country with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tell us about working with your director, Glen Goei, and this cast.<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s been a great experience. As an acting company, we feel very enabled to do, or ask, or create, yet trust that Glen is there to take care of the whole story. I feel very much in safe hands as an actor. The audience will be in safe hands as well! I think the play is dealt with incredibly well under his vision and guidance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m so fortunate to be a part of this company. Everyone gets along well. We are all very generous with one another. And we\u2019re all on the same page \u2013 we want the same things from the production. I\u2019m really happy about it!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Public Enemy, Gerald Chew plays pragmatic businessman Lim Hock Seng \u2013 a character first created by Henrik Ibsen 133 years ago, but who could easily be living in Singapore today. Gerald chats with us about drawing inspiration for his character from Singapore as a global financial city, his own life and collaborating with director Glen …<\/p>\n

Business As Usual<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":35518,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"default","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[339,399,397],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34407"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34407\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}