Nothing by Natalie Hennedige

And with Natalie Hennedige's Nothing, the first season of Open Roads comes to a close!


Thank you for all your support ... and see you for season 2 in 2011!

Mergers and Accusations by Eleanor Wong

Nine of us gathered this afternoon to talk about Eleanor Wong's Mergers and Accusations. Closing the session was the playwright herself.

Up next for Open Roads is our last session of the year. On Sat, 27 Nov, 2pm - 4pm, Substation Classroom 1, we'll be looking at Natalie Hennedige's Nothing which won the Life! Theatre Award for Best Play in 2008 when it was staged by Hennedige's company, Cake Theatrical Productions.

Hennedige's unique imagination and theatrical sensibility manifests itself powerfully in this meditation on life and death and this is an opportunity not only to catch video clips of the 2007 production but also to talk to Hennedige who will be our special guest for the afternoon.

A review of the play is available here:
http://inkpot.com/theatre/07reviews/0428,noth,at.html

To register for the session, email us at admin@inkpotreviews.com. The fee is $5 which you can pay on the day itself.


Note: The play is not available in the form of a published script but Hennedige has kindly given us permission to email copies of the script to participants in advance of the meeting.

Mergers and Accusations by Eleanor Wong

The next play that the Open Roads book club will be talking about is Mergers and Accusations by Eleanor Wong. The session will be held on Sat 13 Nov, 2pm - 4pm, Substation Classroom 1, and the playwright herself will be joining us for a Q&A to close the session.

In addition, TheatreWorks and W!ld Rice have kindly lent us videos of the 1993 and 2003 productions of Mergers and Accusations and we will be watching excerpts during the session as well.

To register for the session, email us at admin@inkpotreviews.com. The fee is $5 which you can pay on the day itself.

(Advisory: Please note that due to the adult themes of the play, the session is open only to those 18 and above.)

"To label her trilogy as lesbian plays is to be reductive. These plays succeed primarily because they are textured, weaving ruminations on personal identity, love and friendship, family and kinship, religious faith, the inextricable connection between the personal and political, the dialectics of centre and margin." - Dr K. K. Seet on Invitation to Treat

First staged in 1993, the play about Ellen Toh, a closeted lawyer who falls in love with a woman after committing to a marriage of convenience with a man, went on to win the 1996 National Book Development Council of Singapore Award - Drama. It also spawned the sequels Wills and Secession (1995) and Jointly and Severably (2003). The play is available in the TheatreWorks collection Dirty Laundry, Mergers & Undercover: Plays from Theatreworks` Writers' Lab and Wong's collection of her trilogy, Invitation to Treat. Both collections are available at the national library.

Reviews of the play can be found here:
1. The Flying Inkpot: http://www.inkpot.com/theatre/03reviews/03revinvitreamergaccuwillsece.html
2. The Flying Inkpot: http://www.inkpot.com/theatre/01reviews/01revmergaccuwillsece1.html

PIE by Chong Tze Chien

A group of 9 participants met up this afternoon to talk about Pan-Island Expressway. Joining us was our special guest, playwright Chong Tze Chien.





Next up for Open Roads on Sat 13 Nov, 2pm - 4pm, Substation Classroom 1, is Mergers and Accusations by Eleanor Wong. First staged in 1993, the award-winning play (1996 National Book Development Council of Singapore Award - Drama) about Ellen Toh a married lawyer who falls in love with a woman, eventually spawned the sequels Wills and Secession (1995) and Jointly and Severably (2003). The play is available in the TheatreWorks collection Dirty Laundry, Mergers & Undercover: Plays from Theatreworks` Writers' Lab and Wong's collection of her trilogy, Invitation to Treat. Both collections are available at the national library.

"To label her trilogy as lesbian plays is to be reductive. These plays succeed primarily because they are textured, weaving ruminations on personal identity, love and friendship, family and kinship, religious faith, the inextricable connection between the personal and political, the dialectics of centre and margin." - Dr K. K. Seet on Invitation to Treat

Reviews of the play can be found here:
1. The Flying Inkpot: http://www.inkpot.com/theatre/03reviews/03revinvitreamergaccuwillsece.html
2. The Flying Inkpot: http://www.inkpot.com/theatre/01reviews/01revmergaccuwillsece1.html

To register for the session, email us at admin@inkpotreviews.com. The fee is $5 which you can pay on the day itself.

(Advisory: Please note that due to the adult themes of the play, the session is open only to those 18 and above.)

PIE by Chong Tze Chien

The next meeting for the Open Roads reading club will be on Saturday 30 Oct 2010, 2pm - 4pm, Substation Classroom 1 and we will be looking at Chong Tze-Chien's P.I.E. (Pan-Island Expressway), the political satire which took the first prize at the Singapore Dramatist Awards in 1998.

The playwright himself (who has gone on to write/direct such acclaimed works as Poop, Between The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea and Furthest North, Deepest South for The Finger Players) will be joining us to close the session with an informal Q&A.

We also have a copy of a 1999 TheatreWorks production of the play which we will be screening clips from to deepen our discussion.

"Every symbol of national pride so familiar to us is subverted by clever wordplay and skilful plot maneuvers" - The Flying Inkpot

"Chong enjoys playing with the device of multiple perspectives, often repeating a scene from the points of view of different characters – and subtly changing it each time ... This jumping back and forth in time is interesting, and Chong is skilled enough never to let this get in the way of the story." - Quarterly Literary Review Singapore

Reviews of the play can be found here:
1. The Flying Inkpot: http://www.inkpot.com/theatre/01reviews/01revpanislaexpr.html
2. PopMatters: http://www.popmatters.com/books/reviews/p/pie-to-spoilt.shtml

To register for the session, email us at admin@inkpotreviews.com. The fee is $5 which you can pay on the day itself.

The play can be found in "PIE to Spoilt" by Chong Tze Chien which is available from the various branches of the public library as well as major bookstores.

***

The Substation and The Flying Inkpot Theatre and Dance bring you a fortnightly series of reading club sessions from July to November 2010 where instead of novels, the group will come together to discuss scripts by local playwrights. This will be a safe, friendly space for anyone to come and share their views about a particular work, whether they are a regular theatre-goer or new to the theatre scene. Participants have included retirees, professionals, students, teachers, arts practitioners and army boys!

Sessions will be facilitated by Matthew Lyon and Kenneth Kwok, Editors of The Flying Inkpot, an online arts journal which has been active since 1996.

10 July: Emily of Emerald Hill (Stella Kon)
24 July: Off-Centre (Haresh Sharma) *special guest Haresh Sharma*
21 Aug: Everything But The Brain (Jean Tay) *special guest Jean Tay*
4 Sep: Those Who Can't, Teach 2010 (Haresh Sharma) *special guest Alvin Tan*
18 Sep: The Coffin is too Big for the Hole and No Parking on Odd Days (Kuo Pao Kun)
2 Oct: Three Fat Virgins Unassembled (Ovidia Yu) - available in the collection Fat Virgins, Fast Cars and Asian Values *special guest Ovidia Yu*
16 Oct: Homesick (Alfian Sa'at) - available in the collection Alfian Sa'at: Collected Plays One
30 Oct: P.I.E. (Chong Tze Chien) - available in the collection P.I.E. to Spoilt *special guest Chong Tze Chien*
13 Nov: Mergers and Accusations (Eleanor Wong) - available in the collections Playful Phoenix and Invitation to Treat
27 Nov: Nothing (Natalie Hennedige) - copies will be made available to participants *special guest Natalie Hennedige*

Three Fat Virgins Unassembled by Ovidia Yu

We had eight participants for this afternoon's session of Open Roads and joining us as our special guest was Ovidia Yu, the playwright of Three Fat Virgins Unassembled.




The next meeting for Open Roads will be on Saturday 16 Oct 2010, 2pm - 4pm, Substation Classroom 1 and we will be looking at multiple award-winning writer Alfian Sa'at's Homesick. Thanks to W!ld Rice, we have a copy of a performance of the play which we will be showing excerpts from as part of our discussion.

"Rises to the occasion admirably ... endearing and engaging in its earnest intelligence and soaring ambitions." —The Straits Times

The play which explores the meaning of home through the story of a Singapore family quarantined during the SARS crisis, was first staged in 2006 and subsequently received a nomination for Best Original Script at the Life! Theatre Awards.

Reviews of the play can be found here:
1. Theatrex Asia: http://www.theatrex.asia/?p=30
2. The Flying Inkpot: http://www.inkpotreviews.com/2006reviews/0802,home,at.xml
3. The Flying Inkpot: http://www.inkpotreviews.com/2006reviews/0805,home,ny.xml

To register for the session, email us at admin@inkpotreviews.com. The fee is $5 which you can pay on the day itself.

The play can be found in Collected Plays One by Alfian Sa'at which is available from the various branches of the public library as well as major bookstores.

Three Fat Virgins Unassembled by Ovidia Yu

"Inside every fat virgin is a thin schoolgirl. There is no sadness like the inner sadness of fat virgins and skinny schoolgirls. There is no sadness like the sadness of a dreamy schoolgirl trapped inside the body of a fat virgin."

Session 6 of Open Roads will be held on Saturday 2 Oct 2010, 2pm - 4pm, Substation Classroom 1 and we will be looking this time at Three Fat Virgins Unassembled by award-winning playwright Ovidia Yu.

The play, an insightful but playful commentary on what it means to be a woman in contemporary Singapore society, is available from public libraries and major bookstores in the collection "Fat Virgins, Fast Cars and Asian Values".

The full text is also available online for free public access at:
http://econtent.elibraryhub.com/SHC/Singapore%20Pages/NORA/Literature/Drama/Ovidia%20Yu%20-%20Three%20Fat%20Virgins%20Unassembled.pdf

The playwright has generously agreed to join us for the session and we have also managed to get a recording of a 1992 production of the play from TheatreWorks that participants will be able to take a look at as part of our discussion.

To register, email us at admin@inkpotreviews.com. The fee is $5 which you can pay on the day itself.