Sisa-sisa | Three Doors -- my interpretation

Sisa-sisa? The name of the play wandered in my mind. A collection of four plays, the name and the poster did not sound too happy. So I wondered how my Saturday evening date with the theatre would turn out. 

Sisa-sisa? What is it? The English translation came up as "scraps." The dictionary definition is "a small piece or amount of something, especially one that is left over after the greater part has been used."

Hmm....

As expected, the stories addressed the more distressing realities of life, Nevertheless, I went in with an open mind to observe the artistic and theatrical styles of telling the stories. I was thrilled to see that it was a full house in Pentas 2 of KLPAC (KL Performing Arts Centre). Claps for Malaysia's theatre scene.

Four plays: Three Doors (top left), Reservations (top right),
The Joy of Solitude (bottom left),  Blind Spot (bottom right)

Three Doors opened the evening. 

Faridah Merican plays a woman at the funeral of her husband. Though a sad topic, the play is humourous, beginning with two female neighbours, played by Douglas Wong (in wig) and Ho Lee Ching (in wig too), attending the funeral, unapologetically taking advantage of the free prawn bihun (rice noodles) served at the funeral, and then complaining about the coffee. 

The woman, instead of being depressed, shows off her fiery character by chasing away the obtrusive neighbours, and questioning the dead "old man" about leaving her there by herself to decide which of the three doors she should choose from -- the three doors being her three sons. With whom could she spend the rest of her life with?

Faridah Merican. Courtesy of KLPAC


Then, as she related how differently she served curry chicken to each of her three sons, a revelation of how different each relationship is, she moved three chairs for us to symbolize the three persons.

From left: Ho Lee Ching, Faridah Merican, Douglas Wong (Courtesy of KLPAC)

Douglas Wong's silhouette and voice becomes the dead old man, who is still having a conversation with his wife, albeit imaginary. 

Then he takes on the roles of each of her three sons, coming on stage as flashbacks of her conversation with each of them. The director could have cast 3 different actors to play each of the 3 sons, instead, he had Douglas Wong come on stage in 3 different personalities, which somehow differentiates even more how differently each feels about their mother. The character that struck me most was her eldest son, a health freak who ironically lives nearby to her, but distances himself from mother by only offering her brown rice and tofu... if she came over.

Ho Lee Ching and Faridah Merican. (Courtesy of KLPAC)

Ho Lee Ching also potrays several characters, one of it being a very blonde Chinese girlfriend of her second son who offers the old woman chocolate as condolences, which pisses off the old lady even more. This also tells that all is not well of her relationship with her second son.  Ho Lee Ching offers more comic relief as a dreadlocked vagabond, who meets the woman on the streets as she searches for her missing son. The vagabond then breaks into a funny rendition of popular Hokkien song "jiu gan tang boei bo..." (do you have empty beer bottles to sell), which is an iconic song of the poor who lived on the streets, as it is from a hit Taiwanese movie about a mute man who found a baby girl while collecting bottles on the streets.

Saturday night out at the theatre!

A rare photo opportunity with Datuk Faridah Merican

Three Doors' humourous presentation, with great acting in English and hilarious smatterings of Hokkien, was interesting enough to make it worth an evening drive out. 

The reason NOT having 3 actors play the 3 sons WORKS, because in the end, the 3 chairs that symbolize each one are still empty. As an audience, we also agreed with the old woman that neither of the three doors would make her ideal life.

Three Doors was directed and written by Mark Beau De Silva.