Theatre Event: Viennese Pork Chop
Date & Time: 23 August 2012, 8pm
Venue: The Substation Theatre
Performers: Yap Sun Sun
(Singapore), Andreas Pamperl (Austria) and Apollo Valentin Ye Yi Pamperl
(Singapore and Austria)
I would not call this post a "review". While the
performance was definitely a well-researched and crafted piece, I find that I
will be doing injustice to it by classifying this post as a "review", as it is beyond a
theatre piece that should be labeled with a grade or to be "marked" with a
number (such as 9/10 or 6/10). This piece is beyond theatre though IT IS theatre.
If it is beyond theatre, then what is it to me?
It is a pulse, a beating heart, a musical note, a
breath. Everything in the piece is so real and yet it is so theatrical.
The whole piece is constructed by memories. Performers
Yap Sun Sun (protagonist) and Andreas Pamperl (musician and multimedia artist) created stories,
multimedia images, songs and music based on their lives and the memories of
their mothers (a Hakka Singaporean and a Steirisch Austrian). In short, it is
an autobiographical performance which brings to life the stories of the performers
and their son, as well as the stories of their mothers who never met each other
but shared and enjoyed the same cuisine in each of their country-- pork. Yes, the
piece does sound personal. However, from their individual memories, as an
audience member, I was transported to a realm of collective memories. In that
experience, it was as if we had a shared memory. The notion of shared memory
in the black box space despite our diverse backgrounds was facilitated by the
intimate performance setting. Audience members were seated at both sides of a
long table on which Sun Sun performed. Most of the time, Andreas was at one end
of the table providing multimedia projections and music to the performance. At
times, he made comments and remarks as himself (a father and a son).
The intimacy of the setting in which audience members
were positioned around a long dining table reminded me of Theatre Master Jerzy Grotowski's Dr Faustus (1963). The intimacy of the setting allowed the audience members to
be closely linked to each other, not just physically but psychologically and
emotionally in a collective manner. At the long table, though I did not know
the other audience members, I felt that I was part of a large family. The sense
of familial intimacy was heightened when the aromatic smell emitted from the
pork chop filled the theatre, and when we were served with drinks and small
slices of pork chop (we were each given a wooden food picker before the
performance). As a big "family", stories of the actors and their mothers were
narrated to us. Somehow, their stories became part of our own stories. I could
identify with various issues presented by the performers-- how Chinese are
being viewed as "dangerous" or second-class citizens in Europe (as I stayed in
Italy for a year); the relationship between a mother and a child; and how I
have been haunted by my own memories in the forms of dreams, desires and
recollections.
Several humorous moments made me laugh and yet moved
me to tears and resonated deeply in me. For instance, the exaggeration of the taste
of Singaporean foods in Sun Sun's memories when she was in Vienna was humorous and at
the same time reflected how we tend to amplify various sensations in our
memories. Singaporean foods such as Mee Rebus, chilli crabs and chicken rice
were all magnified in her memories when she was away from Singapore. However,
when she is back in Singapore, these dishes do not taste as nice as what she
had in her memories. While Sun Sun was in her monologue expressing her
desire for Singaporean foods when she was in Vienna, Andreas threw in a highly
meaningful and humorous statement- "You can have your memories, but don't trust them". Yes, memories are always larger than life. We tend to add in more
imagination to our memories. Memories are beyond factual descriptions of life.
Memories include our longings, dreams, desires and nostalgia. Dark humour was
also seen in the scene where Sun Sun narrated about Andreas' experience of
accidents in his family with exaggeration. This episode of story ended with audience's
participation in the chanting of "so much blood" together with the performers.
Ironically, audience members were holding the piece of pork chop for
consumption while chanting "so much blood". I interpreted the pork chop (a dead
animal) as "blood" in our hands.
Other moments that touched me was Sun Sun's search for
the meaning of "home" and her search for one "happy moment" that she had shared
with her mother. As an immigrant in Vienna, Sun Sun questioned the notion of "home"
to her. Where is her home? Is it where she grew up? Is it where she lives now? Is
it where her family is? Which part of her family? Or -- is it the mother's womb? When
Sun Sun was back in Singapore after years of being away from her mother, she realized
that the mother with dementia has no longer recognized her. She was trying to
look for a happy memory that she had with her mother so that she could help her
mother to recall something. And yet, she could not find any. Then she realized that
the "happiest moment" that she has with her mother existed in "present". She rebuilt
her memories with her mother in "present". The happiest memory that she has with
her mother was the moment she held onto her hands for a long time after all
futile search for a happy moment between them. Through her excellent acting and
with her versatile way of handling different genres of songs—from popular songs
to folk songs, Sun Sun managed to bring us along on her search journey in a manner that
moved us emotionally.
While Sun Sun and Andreas were the main performers in
the piece, their 10 years old son Apollo was involved in the performance too,
as the chef of Viennese Pork Chop in the mini cooking show within the piece.
Apollo's role in the piece though small, was highly commendable. He was
attentive to the development of plot in theatre and was responsive to every movement
and expression emanated from both the performers and the audience. He executed
every moment of his action with precision and natural aliveness. At the scene
where he was tapping the meat, the rhythmic sounds of tapping added to the musicality of
the piece when the sounds fused in together with the theatrical
music. Andreas has also made good use of different multimedia and live music to
create this space of collective memory for both the performers and the
audience.
Overall, I laughed and I teared in Viennese Pork Chop,
which is to me humorous and sad at the same time. It was a black comedy with 4-D
experience to me. My five senses, as well as my conscious and subconscious
minds were engaged in the performance. The performers have excellent sense of managing
rhythm within each individual action as well as in the development of the plot.
There is no one boring moment in the piece, maybe because I was busy during the
performance too. I was busy with connecting and disconnecting with memories
that were being provoked by the piece. Some of them were pleasant, some were not.
Some of them appeared by surprise to me, just like this blog post. This post
itself is a surprise to me too, as I did not plan to write a post on this
performance as I entered the theatre.
