A successful first-of-its-kind: Teater Ekamatra's Baca Skrip: #HantaranBuatMangsaLupa

The Baca Skrip: #HantaranBuatMangsaLupa team after the last audience member left the Zoom room. Photo credit: Fezhah Maznan

Kicking off Teater Ekamatra’s Baca Skrip: #_ series was a trilogy of plays titled Hantaran Buat Mangsa Lupa (Offerings for the Victims of Amnesia) written by Irfan Kasban. Each of the plays is inspired by a significant historical event that led to the establishment of Islam.

The fourth hadith (Prophetic narration) in the collection of Hadith 40 states that the roh (soul) is blown into the baby on the 40th day of its conception. Along with its roh, the baby’s fate, sustenance, faith, and death will also be decreed. In the play Genap 40, we meet a pregnant Hawa (read by Shida Mahadi) who receives a premonition that she will meet the angel (read by Izzul Irfan) on the 39th day of her pregnancy., where she hopes to discover the fate of her child and herself.

W.C. (read by KayKay Nizam and Mish’aal Syed Nasar) is inspired by the sacrifice of Prophet Ismail in Prophet Ibrahim’s hands. The play explores the complexities—abandonment, trust, perhaps even love—between men. In its live staging, the two male characters are trapped in a toilet cubicle while trying to negotiate their relationship in a very awkward space.

94.05 (read by Fir Rahman) tells the story of Ahmad bin Abdullah and his struggles with fate. Every now and then, he contemplates mortality but holds on to the promise in the fifth verse of the 94th chapter of the Quran: “So, verily, with every hardship, there is relief.”

Izzul Irfan as the angel and Shida Mahadi as Hawa in Genap 40. Photo credit: Teater Ekamatra

I was particularly excited for this online reading. I had watched W.C. live when it was first staged in 2010. I remember being seated on a carpet on the floor, close enough to the actors to see them sweat in the toilet cubicles. During parts of the play, I also remember a woman in prayer garb pacing up and down the stage, shifting the attention and disrupting the proximity between the two men. Was there incense burning in the background? There could have been.

I was intrigued as to how the scene will be recreated and how the intimacy between the characters will be achieved without its particular setting. While watching the play, and the other two plays, I was reminded that Irfan has a gift with words. His script is laden with symbolism and clever wordplay that simply reading it, stripped bare of the costumes and stage set-up, was enough for the audience to enjoy. In a way, it also felt even more intimate, like I was eavesdropping on a private conversation between the two men. Or in the case of 94.05, like I was a part of this private conversation.

The opening of W.C. Photo credit: Teater Ekamatra

Fir Rahman reading 94.05. Photo credit: Teater Ekamatra

The first of its kind, actors KayKay Nizam and Mish’aal Syed Nasar agree that the one element that is jarringly different between performing live and online is the connection with the audience. “You don't get the warmth or reaction that you'd usually get from the audience,” Mish’aal shares. “Plus when you're doing it online, you can actually see your own face (or maybe I didn't know how to disable that feature) so that was something that I really had to get used to.”

KayKay also describes how the “reality” of what is being presented to the audience is remarkably different. “Performing live, we have other devices that help us ‘suspend’ reality, such as the set, lights, sound, costumes and make-up, and multimedia. But online, the audience is simply staring into their screens and watching us read the play.”

KayKay Nizam getting ready to read W.C.. Photo credit: KayKay Nizam

Mish’aal’s desk set-up for the reading of W.C.. Photo credit: Mish’aal Syed Nasar

With cultural events and gatherings being suspended for the foreseeable future, even with the gradual reopening of the country after being in lockdown, online theatre may present itself as a new and accessible source of entertainment for many of us. KayKay shares, “Maybe, other elements of theatre like lighting, sound and set can also be translated for an online audience. I am excited to see what’s in store for future online performances.”