Journal no. 3

 so i went to watch a play yesterday.
entitled "It's Dark Outside" (official website has images), it's a dialogue-less and poignant piece involving puppets and screen projection to tell a story about an old man who was gradually losing his mind due to disease/old age.

 so this is the interior of the state theater.
 golden rods, like bamboo, surrounding the glass enclosed space. gives it a dynamic yet sophisticated quality.
 studio underground at the ground floor. people hanging out before the doors opened.
 i thought they offered free chips, wine and chocolates... no, you buy from the man behind the counter.

at 6pm, the doors opened and we went in. it was a small space that fit about 100 people. i was in the middle of the 4th row.

in this play, they used simple props and related to ordinary moments in life to generate powerful emotions and associations for the viewer. there were 3 actors (Arielle Gray, Chris Isaacs and Tim Watts) performing all the roles for the hour long performance. they created and performed the piece.

the main character is an old man, actually played a lady with an old man mask, whose mind was playing tricks on him.
at first, they established how lose our physical strength and our mental faculties. cups were moving by themselves (moved by an actor in black) so when he tried to stop the cup from moving, he broke it.
then he started to dream and travel in the fantasy world of a cowboy-western movie, represented by actors in black moving bunches of cotton wool and a projection of cartoon-style suburban landscape turning into dunes and cacti.

the scene where the old man approached a scared tent (which moved like a horse (the actor on all-fours played the tent)), gained its trust and starting riding it across the desert - it was a metaphor for how we dare to love and trust each other, how we get friends and partners for life.
and later, how we drive away or lose those who love us, was shown by how the man suddenly changed his attitude toward the tent-horse for no reason, beat it with a stick and rejected the tent-horse's attempts to get close to him. then the old man was left all alone. that was really sad.

the old man interacted the clouds of cotton wool, which stood for his thoughts or memories. in one part, it became a very happy dog (actors in black brought the cotton cloud to life by animating a dog-shaped cloud) - so the old man played ball with it. in another part, they used a knee-high puppet to represent the old man who loved and cared for a little cloud bundle that represented a newborn baby.
i got quite emo because i was reminded of my childhood and my parents/grandparents and how i have lost or will lose them, eventually. ;__;

in the end, it was revealed that the "villain" who was confronting the old man and catching the thought-clouds in a net was actually his son. but by the time we realise that, the old man could not remember who he was anymore, so he couldn't recognise the son.
in the final scene, the old man just stands on the stage motionless, while the son is desperately trying to make him take back the cotton wool clouds by stuffing them in the space between his arm and body. of course, the bunches of wool keep falling out.
so then, the son begins the ritual of removing articles of clothing from the still body, taking off the old-man mask, and ends by placing the old man's hat over the 'face'.

but it wasn't a complete sob-fest - the part where the actors animated the puppet of the old man to dance to 1950s style music, even dance on the cotton wool clouds, was charming. and the clever use of illusion throughout the performance, combining the actors, screen projection, shadows, let the audience immerse themselves in the world of fun and make-belief.

this is after the performance. the 3 actors said they will be hanging out on stage to chat, sell merchandise and also offer hugs. d'awww...
i think some people got emotional. i certainly did.
the 2 ladies sitting beside me went down to gave their compliments to the actors. i agree, it was very well-done.