Balls to the walls – literally, as play about cyst-ers in PCOS goes wilder and more personal in its reboot.

While its title and promo image may look more or less identical to its 2022 version, Impromptu Meetings’ new staging of Lotus Root Support Group is in fact, a completely different incarnation that sees creators Shannen Tan and Miriam Cheong shedding the characters they devised and played two years ago. Instead, the two millennial theatremakers have now chosen to embrace their more chaotic, actual selves, and use it as an opportunity to tell their own personal stories and explore their friendship with each other in this entertaining yet deeply vulnerable and personal reboot.

One of Lotus Root Support Group‘s primary intents remains, in part, to act as an educational show that informs audience members about polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), a rare chronic condition that both Shannen and Miriam have lived with their entire lives. This isn’t a lecture-performance though, and instead, takes on more of an irreverent sketch show format. Adopting both live performance and a backdrop of tongue-in-cheek slides (complete with WordArt, embarrassing teen photos, and garishly bright pink backgrounds, of course), we’re given a quick low down on how PCOS is prevalent in our society, from how women with PCOS are more common than female Bulbasaur in Pokemon, to a song that helps us remember the plethora of symptoms that may or may not affect PCOS sufferers. At one point, Shannen even delves into a faux stand-up comedy act, where she utilises her deadpan tone to effectively land striking punchlines about Singapore’s babymaking obsession, passing commentary on everything from ex-PM Lee Hsien Loong’s social media, to public advertisements on the MRT.

These segments are very fun, luring us into a false sense of security that what we’re about to witness is going to be comical, and that we can let our guard down and just enjoy ourselves – we even see the stage lined with multi-coloured plastic balls meant to represent the cysts in their ovaries, making us feel like we’re in an almost circus-like atmosphere. Yet, there is a darkness that’s always lurking at the corners of every joke, with how these women are literally turning pain into humour. This comes through most prominently when they each tell their own origin stories of how they first discovered they had PCOS – Shannen leading in with a story about how she thought she was pregnant at age 11, before getting an ultrasound in her teens, to Miriam adopting a royalty-free indie folk tune to narrate her struggles with being both her size and hair loss. While there is some editing that can still be done to make these origin stories a little snappier in pacing, both still end up achieving what they set out to do. On the surface, both of these seem light-hearted, but there is a nagging, underlying sense of fear and pain that cuts through both narratives, and their individual sense of solitude, and fear that they are going through this utterly, completely alone.

This then, is where Lotus Root Support Group finds its beating heart – the complex relationship and camaraderie Shannen and Miriam find in each other, born in the dressing room of Gateway Theatre while rehearsing for The Old Woman and the Ox back in 2018. It is from their shared pain and suffering that they realise they are no longer alone, and have each other, not to wallow in, but to have someone else out there who understands what they’re going through, not only with PCOS but as a fellow struggling artist of similar age, who both went to the same primary school, secondary school and junior college, sharing similar loves for the hot anime boys of Shaman King and Bleach, and finding their own respective ways to cope with the condition. It’s precisely the kind of unexpected, genuine friendship we recognise in our own experiences, the kind that feels so good in finding a kindred spirit on so many levels, that you feel an instant connection to and want to treasure for a lifetime.

And so, the show then becomes almost a metatheatrical, retrospective look at the origins of Lotus Root Support Group, where Shannen and Miriam creatively present the process of bringing the show to life. This also forms the primary conflict we see from the show, and reveals how despite sharing the condition, both of them developed completely different perspectives towards it, because of how differently it’s affected both of them. Shannen goes into ‘well-researched’ diets and working out to the point of puking, while Miriam does her best to live her best life, despite the negative inner thoughts nagging away inside her subconsciousness, always telling her she’s never good enough. And when both of them reveal these thoughts to each other, they realise they weren’t on the same wavelength to begin with, putting their friendship in peril as they judge and criticise each other for their respective coping mechanisms.

In a sense then, the show embraces the messiness of its process and the messiness of friendship. There are times this affects the pacing of the show – throughout, there are clips from a recording of the original 2022 production that run just a little too long, breaking the momentum built up over the shorter segments. In addition, some of the latter segments begin to stretch out as well, necessary to an extent to allow both Shannen and Miriam to say all they have to, purging their own emotions and establishing their mindsets onstage, but lacking the same rhythm of the earlier segments that made the show feel fast and furious. An ‘Actors on Actors’ segment, for example, is particularly disruptive, crushing the immersion by turning the house lights on, while Shannen and Miriam discuss, at length, being typecast in the local theatre industry. As much as it is a bold experiment with form and structure, it does eventually end up a little draggy once it fulfils its purpose and outstays its welcome.

It is when the show lets go of its inhibitions and shapes these overwhelming emotions into equally overwhelming presentation that is when Lotus Root Support Group manages to find its peaks. One of the most powerful scenes in the show is when both Shannen and Miriam find agency in art making, reclaiming the stage for themselves after being denied or barred for so long by industry standards and stalwarts. This is presented in two well-written spoken-word meets physical theatre segments, where under red light, Miriam narrates Shannen’s struggle of presenting as more femme, while Shannen puts on a wig, a red dress and heels, clearly off balance and uncomfortable in trying to conform to society’s ideals of womanhood. Switching positions, Shannen then narrates Miriam’s story of always being the backup dancer and relegated to playing older women, while Miriam showcases impressive choreography, high kicking or rolling around the stage, expending copious amounts of energy as she pants and sweats profusely, trying her darndest to prove that she can do everything a more stereotypical actress can, if only they’d give her the chance to. Yes, it’s a little awkward, it’s a little messy, but it is also heartbreaking, and reminds us how unforgiving and cruel the theatre machine can be, where in spite of its purported championing of creativity, too often it falls back on easy modes and models for the sake of convenience rather than giving alternative body types and newcomers a chance.

After the initial flurry of jokes, Lotus Root Support Group hits you with a sucker punch of vulnerability that makes you root for our two creators. Lotus Root Support Group then becomes more than just a personal story of suffering from PCOS. It is fundamentally a universal underdog story, of two individuals who are trying their hardest to get by in a world that makes them feel they don’t fit in, who learn to get by through finding fellow misfits and discovering that they are not alone. It is a cry of rage at the world and the lot that fate has thrown them, but also a journey of growth and maturity. Life is already hard enough as it is, and as tough as it gets, it becomes a little less difficult when you hold space for each other, that all-important support that you only get when you find kinship in trauma.

Coming away from this show, you feel a sense of solidarity with the cyst-erhood, wanting them to do well for themselves in spite of the obstacles in front of them. As it ends this run in Singapore and prepares to travel to Australia for the Melbourne Fringe Festival in October, Shannen and Miriam should be proud of themselves for having the courage to revisit a work that takes so much out of them, both emotionally and physically, and somehow turn it into an even more demanding, but ultimately, satisfying romp through pain and friendship. A veritable showcase of skillsets each performer possesses, and a scream into the void (or to its audiences) to be perceived beyond stereotype, this is a show not just for PCOS sufferers, but for anyone who’s ever felt alone in the world, and needs a reminder that somewhere out there is someone else who might be going through the exact same thing – maybe we just need to speak it into this world, and who knows, you too might find a friend, or a cyst-er in your midst.

Lotus Root Support Group plays from 28th August to 1st September 2024 at 42 Waterloo Street. Tickets available at Eventbrite

Lotus Root Support Group travels to the Melbourne Fringe Festival from 9th to 13th October 2024, with tickets available here

Production Credits:

Creators and Performers Shannen Tan and Miriam Cheong Producers Adeeb Fazah and Miriam Cheong Sound Designer Mark Benedict Cheong Dramaturg Sonia Kwek Stage Manager Genevieve Tan Assistant Stage Manager Jasmine Khaliesah