Arts

Guards at the Taj, written by award-winning playwright and winner of the best new play in the 2016 Obie awards, Rajiv Joseph, will be performed in KC Arts Centre from 14 November 2018 to 1 December 2018. Set in 1648, Guards at the Taj is a dark comedy based on a myth about Taj Mahal, a mausoleum commissioned by the Mughal emperor, Shah Jahan, to house the tomb of his favourite wife, Mumtaz Mahal. In the play, the majestic beauty of the Taj Mahal is a deliberate contrast to the ordinary guards who are placed in charge of the mausoleum the day before its unveiling.…

Last performed in Singapore in 2014, with iconic ABBA hits from the 70s, the musical Mamma Mia! once again proves its broad appeal with its latest production at the Sands Theatre. The audience was going wild in every scene, with non-stop laughter, applause, and even tears. The playful sexual innuendos, heartwarming family scenes, and lively rendering of the catchy oldies are the highlights of the night. One of the scenes that have made the deepest impressions is where leading lady Sophie’s mother, Donna Sheridan, met her three ex-lovers for the first time since decades. It is also the moment when…

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3’s Diva, Shangela, will be making her debut in Singapore with her brand new show ‘Shangela is Shook’ next month on 12 December, 2018! The drag performer is known for being the only contestant to compete on three separate seasons of the Emmy-award winning reality series RuPaul’s Drag Race – Seasons 2, 3, and All Stars 3). A native of Paris, Texas, the performer graduated with honours from Southern Methodist University and currently resides in Los Angeles. Shangela – otherwise known as D.J. Pierce – has also guest starred as an actor on television shows…

The Chinese character 界 (jiè), the theme of this year’s Singapore Writers Festival (SWF), is multi-layered in its meanings, referring to both the world and the universe at large, and physical and non-physical boundaries. It also alludes to the endless worlds of imagination, where such boundaries are more porous and even erasable. (L-R) Festival Director Yeow Kai Chai, Guest-of-Honour Senior Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth, and Transport Mr Baey Yam Keng, and Chairman of SWF steering committee, Professor Kwok Kian Woon Its opening ceremony song under the same name already set the stage, with homegrown musician Kelvin…

What comes to mind when “satirical cartoon” is mentioned? The common tendency is to associate them with The New Yorker or other famous western comics of similar genres. The latest special exhibition, Between the Lines – The Chinese Cartoon Revolution, aims to highlight this lesser-known history by taking us on a time travel back to the golden age of Chinese political cartoons that emerged at the end of the Qing Dynasty. The exhibition space of Between the Lines – The Chinese Cartoon Revolution. You may be as surprised as I am to find out that witty commentary-styled cartoons in Singapore…

To call Shirkers a mystery would be an understatement. The documentary, now out on Netflix, explores the story behind Sandi Tan’s 1992 would-be film of the same name. Together with her best friends and teacher from film class, they embarked on a two-month long adventure to make Singapore’s first surrealist indie road movie about a serial killer. Just when shooting was over, however, their teacher, Georges Cardona, vanished with the footage. He left no reason for his disappearance and no trace of the film the friends had poured so much into. The film answers the questions raised by the disappearance…

At first glance, Ruin Me looks set to be a decent horror flick with the interesting premise of a girl being brought into a camping trip that doubles as a haunted house, and has to make it out alive when things go awry. And of course, what could go wrong eventually went wrong. This is the debut feature film for director Preston DeFrancis and honestly, it isn’t perfect. But that’s fine, and there are certainly positive points about the film. For now, however, let’s not sugarcoat things. The film stars Marcienne Dywer in the leading role as Alex, a non-horror…

The sustainable light festival will be returning with its bicentennial edition from 28 January to 24 February 2019. With artists from 36 countries – including Singapore – presenting their artwork proposals based on the theme ‘Bridges of Time’ at next year’s festival, this edition will also mark the largest response ever to the call for artwork submissions. An artist impression of City Gazing Singapore by VOUW (Mingus Vogel and Justus Bruns) from The Netherlands for i Light Singapore 2019 Organiser of i Light Singapore and chief executive officer of Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA), Mr Lim Eng Hwee, said: “This special…

Shirker (noun):Someone who avoids something, especially work (Cambridge English Dictionary). If you aren’t sure what the film is about, even after watching the trailer, you will not be alone. The mysterious trailer raises several questions while giving almost nothing away. Nevertheless, let me try and break it down for you. Premiering at the Singapore Film Society’s 60th anniversary event on 20 October and globally on Netflix on 26 October, Shirkers is a documentary by Singaporean-born film-maker Sandi Tan. The film chronicles the story of Sandi and her friends’ first movie-making experience back in 1992. The group filmed a Singapore-based indie…

Everybody wants to know what everyone else thinks about Crazy Rich Asians (CRA), particularly, if you’re Asian. Many commentators have already weighed in about how CRA is either a triumph of representation for the Asian community, or an opulent neo-colonial misrepresentation of the Singaporean, Asian, and Asian-American ethnic groups, and an actively discriminatory film. These are critical issues that deserve attention, but they ultimately grapple with the contexts that the film interacts with, and not the heart of the film itself. If we want to understand what the film means to the people who are watching it, then we should…