'AT A PLANK BRIDGE'

'AT A PLANK BRIDGE' - a play by Kannan Menon
This new home-grown creative literary work is composed by Kannan Menon, one of the early stalwarts of English-language theatre in Malaysia. The current show follows a highly successful off-Broadway staging in New York in Jan 2003. The performance by Cape Poetics now marks the first time the play is staged in Malaysia.
Date:
24th (Fri) and 25th July (Sat) 2009
Time:
8.30pm
Venue:
Wawasan Open University 54 Jalan Sultan Ahmad Shah, Penang
The entertaining drama deals with the issue of our national and social identities through a retrospective historical setting in the twilight of the Second World War. The script presents an intelligent and amusing encounter between two men who bump into each other near a wooden bridge over a river along a rural road in Perak, right in front of a rubber plantation. The chance meeting happens in August 1945, just after the Japanese army terminates its occupation of Malaya and surrenders to the British. As the two meet, their peculiar and shadowy backgrounds begin to emerge with revelations about their identities...
"It has elements of a thriller based on real historical events of the time," says playwright Kannan Menon. It is a Malaysian play set at the end of World War II... What happens to the two characters, Chandran and Fook Leong, during their encounter on a lonely country road, encapsulates some of the critical encounters of the turbulent war years.
At the same time, the play raises questions about how much and what we remember of such events. How do we arrive at a truthful reconstruction of such events? Who controls history? All this is woven in the dramatic encounter between two people, each of whom has burdens and secrets.
Directed by Jayaram Menon, the play features acclaimed veteran actor Himanshu Bhatt and rising star Lim Yao-Han.
Tickets priced at RM10 are available now. For enquiries, contact 019-5664641, 012-4201364 or e-mail capepoetics@yahoo.com