Long long ago in a galaxy far far\naway there was a land whose people enjoyed a good twist or two, and whose\nwomenfolk wore tight fitting kebayas that accentuated their curves, and\noriginal songs and movies were peppered with naughty fun. It was a bygone era —\nwhen it was all right to have a good time. (Note — the above is best viewed in\nscrolling texts tapering into the distance).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The tragedy recurs through the ages\nand those who have forgotten history can only glimpse at lessons from the past\nthrough the antics of those bold enough today to remind us. They are a breed\nthat is fast being swallowed up by the general mass of indifference consuming\nour people, so much so that when we hear even one voice, however naive,\nattempting to speak some truth in some way, the feeling is like encountering a\nfew drops of water amidst miles of desert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That is how I found myself weeping\nat the recent Cempaka Schools musical extravaganza We Will Rock You the Musical<\/em> that ran for an entire week from 4 –\n12 Aug 06 at Sri Cempaka Cheras Campus. Okay, I confess, the tears came not\nfrom the touching portrayals or deep revelations, but from laughter. With wit\nabundant, the kids at Cempaka showed that humour was not a forgotten art in\nMalaysia, and I literally laughed till I cried.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Travelling to the Cheras campus was\nin itself an adventure — tucked away deep in fringes of the city high up on a\nhill surrounded by thickets of secondary forest, I followed the cryptic roadmap\nwhispered by ear (i.e. transmitted by cellphone) that took me to the iron gates\nbeyond which young nymphettes in silvery costumes flitted in the dusklight. I\nexpected to be asked the password but was surprised to be allowed in unhampered.\nDisoriented, I ended up backstage where the nymphettes twittered excitedly in a\nschoolkids’ language I had long forgotten. Bizarrely costumed characters\nhurried about with sound technicians and makeup artists on their tails. This\nwas no ordinary school play. There was a marketing team, and merchandise (Rock\nYou CDs and T shirts) was being sold at the door. Press relations led me up to\nthe circle — I joked, “isn’t this where the Datin-datin sit?” and\nreceived a matter-of-fact reply, “Datin will sit in the front row.”\nRight, this really<\/em> wasn’t an ordinary\nschool play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n First there was the material — We Will Rock You<\/em> is basically a musical\nweaved together, Mamma Mia<\/em> fashion,\nfrom the songs of legendary rock band Queen. Scripted by Ben Elton with vocal\narrangements by Mike Nixon and Queen’s guitarist Brian May, it first rocked\naudiences at the West End in 2002. It was interesting to see the discreet gay\nanthems splashed out on gigantic banners adorning the venue. “I Want To\nBreak Free”, “Under Pressure”, it’s the ultimate irony that\nsongs expressing the liberation of an oppressed sexuality have come to\nsymbolise the oppression of ideas and free expression today. Freddie Mercury\nwill be proud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The matter of sexuality cannot be\nunderplayed. In a nation where homophobia is still rife even amongst the supposedly\neducated, (don’t take my word for it, just check out the comments that were\nposted to a review of some gay plays in this very website) it is heartening to\nsee one of the greatest gay rockers of all time being held up as an icon for\nworld liberation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then there was the premise — a\nrebellion against the obliteration of all original thought and personal\nexpression in a world where consumerism has taken over government, where\neveryone marches to the same beats from the same tunes churned out by some\ncorporation. This is Cempaka’s vision of the future, an Orwellian\n“1984” world programmed by Windows and powered by iTunes and lorded\nover by Killer Queen, a Big Brother-like (Big Sister?) tyrant who controls\nevery copyright and every consumer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s not a vision born purely out of\nfertile youthful imagination and a rock culture, but one that is closer to home\nthan is obvious — just pay attention to the scrolling Star Wars styled\nintroduction to see where Malaysia fits into the creation of Planet Mall, the\nall-consuming binary world of the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The inhabitants of this awful (and\nawfully tacky) world called Planet Mall are the factory-made asexual Ga Ga\nGirls who live on a diet of Boybands and Girlbands (it’s the same nightmare I\nonce had after watching American Idol) and by the Yes Things, mutants who must\nhave come from the rat racers, pencil pushers and newspaper reporters of today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The musical opens with more pomp and\nceremony than I have ever witnessed from a real commercial production, which\ngoes to show what can be achieved when students are given a free hand and\nallowed to have a good time. Queen’s latter hit “Radio Gaga” opens\nthe set with the nymphettes doing the approved dance steps to a digital backdrop\nof computer-generated dancers — very cool. From amidst the conformity emerge\ntwo wrinkles in Planet Mall’s perfect world — Galileo Figaro and Scaramouche\n(characters taken from the infamous anthem “Bohemian Rhapsody”,\nbanned nowhere in the world except Malaysia), who despite careful brainwashing\ncontinue to hear fragments of lyrics emerging from a distant past.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They are lines from “Bohemian\nRhapsody”, and they lead the duo into the underground rebel world of the\nBohemians, who, having discovered relics from a golden age of rock long erased\nfrom memory, try to rescue their future by rediscovering the lost religion of\nsong. Their scriptures are fragments of ancient magazines (“like websites,\nonly made of paper”). I think I have a copy of Movie News or Fanfare\nsomewhere in my storeroom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Led by the muscle-flexing Britney\nSpears (a name he adopted from one of these “paper websites”), the\nBohemians await the arrival of their prophet, who turns out to be the unwitting\nGalileo. Their attempt to rediscover their individuality through rock leads to\na fatal clash with Killer Queen and her creepy deputy Khashoggi. Predictably,\nGalileo and Scaramouche stumble upon a guitar long-buried by Freddie Mercury\nfor posterity, and with the help of some hot licks unleash the waves of\noriginality that devour Planet Mall’s virtual reality world like a computer\nvirus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite the simplistic ending and a\nslightly sluggish second half, We Will\nRock You the Musical<\/em> is well executed, and the sheer gutsiness of the\nCempaka team compensate for any deficiencies expected from a school production,\nespecially one as ambitious as this. High on entertainment and rich with\nallusions to our aversion to long hair and our own slowly receding intellectual\nand spiritual freedom, Rock You<\/em> may\non the surface look like an innocent rock fantasy, but underneath, it signals\nthat our kids have a mind of their own after all, and that knowledge certainly\noffers a shard of hope for our future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ~~~ <\/p>\n\n\n\n CH Loh is no longer the young man hard man shoutin’ in the street gonna take on the world some day, but he enjoys seeing others do it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n First Published: 24.08.2006 on Kakiseni <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Long long ago in a galaxy far far away there was a land whose people enjoyed a good twist or two, and whose womenfolk wore tight fitting kebayas that accentuated their curves, and original songs and movies were peppered with naughty fun. 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