Seen.By.Ice.Queen: coming to my senses

Following the hugely successful launch of the "Shakespeare in the Park" series w­ith A Midsummer Night's Dream in May 2007, SRT is delighted to present another c­omedy that will bring audiences from all walks of life to Fort Canning Park in t­he biggest local theatre event of the year.

In May 2007, over 20,000 people picnicked while 40 actors transformed the park ­into a magical theatrical experience. This year's Much Ado About Nothing - set in 1930s Singapore - will be even more spectacular, engaging and twice as­ much fun.

A major coup for Singapore is that the comedy will be directed by London-based ­Edward Dick, who has directed A Midsummer Night's Dream for the Sydney Theatre C­ompany, Romeo and Juliet for Shakespeare's Globe, and Twelfth Night at Regent's ­Park in London.

The cast will be lead by MediaCorp Artiste Adrian Pang, who also starred as Ham­let in SRT's production in 1997. Adrian will be joined on stage by Jason Chan an­d Wendy Kweh (Life! Theatre Award winner for her role in SRT's A Midsummer Night­'s Dream) and a cast of local and international actors.

Synopsis
Beatrice, independent and forthright, and Benedick, a self-confessed 'woman-hat­er', pass their time constantly goading and scorning each other. When they are t­hrown together to defend a friend's and family's honour, their true feelings beg­in to be revealed.

Date:	From 7th May 2009 (Thursday to Sunday)
Time:	7:30pm (Ticket holders are encouraged to picnic from 6.30pm)
Duration:	2 hr 30 mins (not including 20 minutes interval)
Price:	Advance sale: Sunday - Thursday - $33/ Friday - Saturday - $38 At the Door: Sunday -Thursday $43/Friday - Saturday - $48 VIP Packages (Incl. 2 glasses of wine and canapés - seating under marque­e) Only advance sales $78 Sunday - Thursday and Friday - Saturday $83 Student price $25 on Thursdays and Sundays
Venue:	Fort Canning Green, Fort Canning Park
Ticketing:	SISTIC at 6348 5555 or www.sistic.com.sg for concessions, wet-weather plans and VIP packages
Website:	www.srt.com.sg

Received this in the mail from the marketing people at Zebra Crossing. It was unfortunate that I had to miss the project but I do look forward to more Zebra Crossing productions :)

Here's a look at what I missed..

Presenting a project by Toy Factory. Directed by Goh Boon Teck, The Crab Flower Club was inspired by poems from A Dream of the Red Chambers.


In the original text, characters in the novel enjoy gathering in a pavilion garden to consume river crabs and compose poems of flowers. In this contemporary theatre piece, Goh Boon Teck borrows the sense of vulnerability and decadency in Cao’s context to create a contradictory space where his original characters communicate and confront.

The newly created set of protagonists are five related women in a respectable household in Qing Dynasty, all ready to embrace each other’s wholesomeness as well as bringing one another down to ashes. During their preparation of a complex crab feast and creating metaphorical poems about Chrysanthemums and Begonia, we are enlightened by their multi-faceted world of morality, conspiracy and philosophy.

The pillar of sound for The Crab Flower Club will be Franz Liszt’s Symphonic Poem Les Preludes. This symphonic poem is a pure display of emotion, and subtle on depiction of messages and meanings. Liszt felt that the language of music could be cross-pollinated by other arts, such as poetry and painting. This symphonic poem was composed during the era of this play, the fusion brings sensitivity of the west into an oriental story. The music will be treated with contemporary sound design.

Video Art will also be incorporated in this production. Working closely with ink painter Hong Sek Chern, her LIVE painting will be projected to create the multiple changes of visuals on stage. As the leading female artist in Singapore, her powerful and sensitive visuals will provide extraordinary dimension to the play.


Performance Information
Performance Venue: Drama Centre
Dates: 03 - 05 June 2009 (Wed – Fri)
No. of shows: 3 shows
Duration: Approximately 90 mins - no intermission
Show time: 8PM
Language: English with Chinese subtitles
Ticket Prices: $50, $40, $30, $20
Ticket Agent: SISTIC hotline 63485555 or visit www.sistic.com.sg

My son came home from playschool one day and told me, "Mommie, the largest bone in your body is called a FEMUR and the smallest bone is STIRRUP. There are 206 bones in a human body".

This info took me by surprise and I was ashamed at my lack of knowledge to furnish him with more scientific facts about the human body. Today, a colleague kindly beefed up my general knowledge again with the following facts and illustrations. I shall go home and tell my son about them.. :)

Scientists say the higher your I.Q. The more you dream (OK before you get excited, it DIDN'T say that if you dream a lot, you HAVE high I.Q.)


The largest cell in the human body is the female egg and the smallest is the male sperm


You use 200 muscles to take one step


The average woman is 5 inches shorter than the average man (which means to say that either I am taller than the average woman.. OR alot of the men I know are shorter than average men..hmmm)


Your big toes have two bones each while the rest have three


A pair of human feet contains 250,000 sweat glands


A full bladder is roughly the size of a soft ball


The acid in your stomach is strong enough to dissolve razor blades (so ladies, if you ever get attacked by a man, just puke at him buahahaha...)


The human brain cell can hold 5 times as much information as the Encyclopedia Britannica (erm.. ok... not mine..)


It takes the food seven seconds to get from your mouth to your stomach (one, two, three.. yeah i'm eating)


The average human dream lasts 2-3 seconds (i can almost swear that mine are longer. i even get continuing dreams that follows where it ends off after waking up to pee)


Men without hair on their chests are more likely to get cirrhosis of the liver than men with hair (hairless = weaker liver? double depressing for these men)


At the moment of conception, you spent about half an hour as a single cell


There are about one trillion bacteria on each of your feet (now you know why mum always nags at you to wash your feet when you get home huh?)


Your body gives off enough heat in 30 minutes to bring half a gallon of water to a boil (energy conservation ideas anyone?)


The enamel in your teeth is the hardest substance in your body


Your teeth start growing 6 months before you are born


When you are looking at someone you love, your pupils dilate, and they do the same when you are looking at someone you hate (hence the saying that you can only hate someone you love?)


Your thumb is the same length of your nose (and I know you are measuring it now o_O'")

Went to watch The Wedding Game last Wednesday (28 Jan 2009) with my friend. Just a girl night out. After all the hoo-ha about the real life vs reel life, I just had to watch it.

I have a love-hate relationship with Fann Wong. I love her skin color but hate her elusiveness. To me, there're no such things as a Celebrity in Singapore. C'mon, Singapore's way too small to attempt to be elusive and mystical. The probability of running into her at the public toilet is as good as running into an old friend there as well.


Anyways, about the movie.

The couple plays a 'pretend couple' attempting to use their relationship to spice up their popularity. Her for the sake of making more money to save her dad's factory (she's supposedly a malaysian from malacca) and he to win his father's favor again.

Not much meat to the story except to watch out for the chemistry between the couple. or is that all? not to me. i particularly enjoyed watching Hei Ren and Alice Lau as their devoted gay and idolising artiste managers.

Hei Ren has always been depicted as a macho big guy so seeing him portray an effeminate gay man was refreshing. Ashamed to say that I didn't exactly know of Alice Lau's existence before this movie, I was entranced by her dramatism that can only be in a Canto-opera.

Her love-smitten-ness towards her charge, that is Chris and great comic timing gave the otherwise 'good only for eye candy movie' the needed artistic value.

As for Chris and Fann? I only wished there were more sexy interactions between them cos at the end of the day, isn't this what the audience wants to see?

Bravos:
:) The cutesy image portrayed by Fann's character, Vickki. Didn't make me regurgitate despite it coming from a 38 year-old (yes, Fann is 38, darling!)
:) The supporting casts of the 2 artiste managers and Vickki's childhood friend, played by Saiful Apek

Boos:
:( The much touted fashionable wardrobe was not glitzy enough. C'mon! These are CELEBRITIES! Give'm more glamour!!
:( Sex quotient was extremely low and disappointing. I wanna see more sexy action between the love-birds.


Ratings:

Am seriously overloaded with tasks and am falling behind on updating my blog. Quite a few things to look out for coming up.

There's FHM Girl Next Door 2009, Miss Singapore Universe 2009 and Manhunt 2009. Will try to update on those whenever I can. For now, catch the trailer of WTBS coming to you from 7 Feb 2009.