The riskiest gimmick in the Malay theater scene for 2003? There’s really no contest. Especially when the Lelaki Lembut (effeminate men) phenomenon is a much debated and talked about issue in Malaysia recently.
Jangan Bunuh Sam (Don’t Kill Sam) is a play written by Zakaria Ariffin, directed by Nam Ron, and performed by Teater Keliling 2003, a theatre ensemble made up entirely of ex-students of Akademi Seni Kebangsaan.
Akademi Seni Kebangsaan has also done local theatergoers a service by giving the play a chance to be more widely seen, taking it on tour to various parts of the country, up to even Terengganu. Last weekend, from Dec 16 to 18, it came back to KL and was staged at MATIC.
The play documents the struggles of Rahim (Mohd Shahrul Mizad Ashari) who plays Sam, an effeminate character from a popular sitcom called Butik Sam (Sam’s Boutique). Rahim is troubled by the fact that the TV character he plays is about to be killed by the producer, Encik Othman (Azizi Mohd Said). According to those in power who wants Sam “killed”; Sam is ‘contaminating’ the local culture and that the Islamic law forbids a man to impersonate a woman. This is not as far-fetched as it sounds: various well-loved effeminate Malaysian sitcom characters have actually been excised for these reasons. After all, the Sam in this play was inspired by Sam from the popular sitcom 2 + 1. Anyway, Rahim insists that Sam was just born that way.
Encik Othman is now in a dilemma. He has to change the script to “kill” Sam, but at the same time, he is reluctant to do so because he knows that Butik Sam has high audience ratings. Rahim and the casts and crews of Butik Sam are also unanimously against this move. Together they work on a scheme to ensure the “survival” of Sam. After all, the character has managed to stay on air for 15 years.
The first thing you would notice about the play is how well it was directed. Expectations were appropriately high for the director. Nam Ron has already been hailed as one of the most talented young Malay theatre practitioners today. His recent monologue matderihkolahperlih seen at Teater Ekamatra’s Projek Suitcase provoked feverish acclaims. Nam Ron places a lot of emphasis on audience participation, as is expected in a good sitcom. His expert use of video interaction (between Sam and Rahim) helps us understand the disturbing schizophrenic relationship between the two characters.
Shahrul is thoroughly mesmerizing when he inhabits his main persona, who is, of course, Sam. Without a doubt, the scene where Shahrul plays the part of Sam in an episode of Butik Sam is simply delectable. Here, you can obviously see why Sam is well liked and even emulated by the public. It is hard to hate Sam, let alone see him killed!
Azizi is the standout performer in a good cast. He is already polished enough for a career in sitcoms, what with his handsome looks and strong voice. He embodies the character of a troubled producer quite well, sending out occasional sparks of testy defiance. Norzizi Zulkifli who plays the character of Sherrie/Kartika is worth mention for her indelible performance, both angry and uproarious.
Zakaria writes quirky dialogue with a lovely style. But I.do wish he would have the chutzpah to write a more thought provoking play. For all intents and purposes, Jangan Bunuh Sam has all the ingredients and potential. The lelaki lembut issue is an inescapable fact of Malaysian life. As long as politicians get political mileage from it and the entertainment industry make money from it, lelaki lembuts will continue to be objects of vilification. It is therefore about time that a playwright like Mr. Zakaria takes a stance by writing a play about them.
But I don’t see a reason why we are often being reminded that Sam is effeminate by an accident of birth and that he is in fact a hot-blooded heterosexual man. What happens if Sam was an effeminate man and a homosexual to boot? Can he still be proud? Will the play be more (or even less) meaningful? Will the audience still feel that the character of Sam should be saved from extinction, in spite of his sexual orientation? These are the type of questions I would like to see presented in a Malay play like this.
The main missing ingredient in Jangan Bunuh Sam is any sense of menace or danger that may lie beneath the dialogue. That partly stems from the way Mr. Zakaria presents Sam/Rahim – more as a victim than a rebel. One could not hope for a more promising fall from grace. In the end, Rahim come to a decision to make Sam, Malaysia’s favourite lelaki lembut, a butch, in other words, a macho straight-acting man. We could see, how Sam completely ceases to be an interesting character we can laugh with (and laugh at). He is now merely another boring character. And like in a sitcom, Rahim’s problems with Sam are resolved accordingly in one episode. How I wish life is that simple.
I guess, in many sense, Mr. Zakaria is indeed trying to tell us something. Lelaki lembut, despite getting negative press, are indeed humans – without them, life will be less ordinary, in fact dreary and incomplete!
Of course, Jangan Bunuh Sam isn’t a perfect play. It doesn’t aspire to be. It is a howl of a satirical protest against much that helps define Malaysian culture to the rest of the world: badly written sitcoms, soft men, religion, and overzealous Moral Police. That’s what makes the play, for all its sometimes ungainly dispassion, so entertaining, with its idiosyncratic brand of humour and the spontaneous interaction between casts and audience. Jangan Bunuh Sam is the most stirring new work to appear on the Malaysian Malay theatre scene this year.
First Published: 24.12.2003 on Kakiseni