Preview: Singapore Night Festival 2024 – Art of Play

The Singapore Night Festival (SNF) returns to the Bras Basah.Bugis (BBB) precinct for its 15th edition this year, bigger than ever! Happening from 23 August to 7 September 2024, the festival will take place over three weekends for the first time. Organised by the National Heritage Board (NHB), and supported by Lead Sponsor Samsung Singapore, Singapore’s largest nocturnal experience takes festival-goers on a journey to … Continue reading Preview: Singapore Night Festival 2024 – Art of Play

Art What!: An Interview with Māori contemporary artist Lisa Reihana on ‘GLISTEN’ at National Gallery Singapore

Humans are often more alike than we think, with surprising parallels taking place across cultures, arts and beliefs, even thousands of miles apart. Bringing that to light is Māori contemporary artist Lisa Reihana, whose new work GLISTEN, installed atop National Gallery Singapore, finds links between Southeast Asian Songket and Māori Tāniko weaving from Aotearoa New Zealand . Taking the form of a large-scale outdoor kinetic … Continue reading Art What!: An Interview with Māori contemporary artist Lisa Reihana on ‘GLISTEN’ at National Gallery Singapore

★★★★☆ Review: Air by Drama Box

Portrait of a disappearing community told with sincerity and creativity through documentary verbatim theatre. Documentary and verbatim theatre can be a tricky genre to stage, requiring actors to embody and speak on the behalf of interviewees, rather than featuring them as in a documentary film. Particularly when it comes to marginalised groups, verbatim theatre runs the risk of bordering on appropriation, and even exploitation if … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: Air by Drama Box

★★★★☆ Review: tick, tick…Boom! by Sight Lines Productions

Navigating adulthood and friendships as an aspiring artist in Jonathan Larson’s other musical. Before smash hit musical Rent, Jonathan Larson was very much a struggling composer trying to catch his big break in New York City. Fast approaching 30 years old and saddled with the fear of never making it big in life, Larson’s story is a familiar one to many similar hopeful young artists … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: tick, tick…Boom! by Sight Lines Productions

Review: Elusive — a double bill by T.H.E Dance Company

T.H.E double bill explores themes of transience and extreme opposites. Dance is often seen as an art form that pushes performers to their physical limits, and if it’s one company that knows how to do that while shaping the human form into art in motion, it’s T.H.E Dance Company. Presenting a double bill as part of their 2024 edition of the cont·act Contemporary Dance Festival, … Continue reading Review: Elusive — a double bill by T.H.E Dance Company

Review: Dance at Dusk (2024) by T.H.E Dance Company

Two excerpts that showcase the beauty of contemporary dance against the waterfront and Singapore skyline. T.H.E Dance Company’s Dance at Dusk series has long been a key component of their cont·act Contemporary Dance Festival, making contemporary dance feel accessible for first timers, complete with Grace Lee-Khoo and sign interpreter Shawn ensuring greater inclusivity, while also showing off the technical and creative elements honed to a … Continue reading Review: Dance at Dusk (2024) by T.H.E Dance Company

Esplanade’s The Studios 2024: An Interview with Adib Kosnan, Kok Heng Leun and Zulfadli Rashid on Drama Box’s restaging of ‘Air’

While certainly not as common as its film counterpart, documentary theatre often has the same aim of presenting accurate and factual information about an interesting subject matter, shedding light and revealing new perspectives on it. For theatre company Drama Box, they successfully pulled it off in 2019 with verbatim theatre piece Air (Malay for ‘water’), as part of a two-part double bill Tanah•Air, which shone … Continue reading Esplanade’s The Studios 2024: An Interview with Adib Kosnan, Kok Heng Leun and Zulfadli Rashid on Drama Box’s restaging of ‘Air’

★★★★☆ Review: Titoudao (2024) by Toy Factory

Part memoir and part epic, Titoudao is a portrait of celebration and grief for the fading wayang scene.  How many of us have had a chance to catch a wayang performance in real life, on the streets as originally intended? With the amount of progress and modernisation Singapore has undergone over the years, wayang is but a lost art one can only experience in the … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: Titoudao (2024) by Toy Factory

★★★★☆ Review: Dream of the Red Chamber by The Finger Players

Skilful mask work turning actors into living puppets amidst pseudo-poetic translation of Chinese classic. Cao Xueqin’s Dream of the Red Chamber has long been considered one of the greatest works of Chinese literature, as the novel passes social commentary, criticism, and philosophy over power, hierarchy and morality, as it follows the rise and fall in a family’s fortunes. Adapted countless times for stage and screen … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: Dream of the Red Chamber by The Finger Players

Preview: Kumar Uncut by Base Entertainment Asia and Ra Ra Productions

As the reigning queen of comedy and Singapore’s drag scene, Kumar has remained an icon across the years, whether it’s bringing the house down behind bars, or even spilling the tea on what it means to be Indian, with ever full houses and a barrel of laughs born from witty jokes and astute observations of Singapore. Now, Kumar is set to return to the glorious … Continue reading Preview: Kumar Uncut by Base Entertainment Asia and Ra Ra Productions