It was suppose to be a play, not racial harmony day

Last Sunday I got the opportunity to watch Mobile, a Necessary Stage Production about foreign workers in Singapore and their suffering. A very relevant topic, I applaud their sincere intentions in opening the can of worms, but was stunned by how almost amateurish the production was. The plot lost its point almost immediately after the intermission, many of the scenes had no relevance to the topic and from a play about migration and foreign workers, it became a play about God and poverty.

Mobile is guilty of the same thing most Singapore theatre, mine little amateur piece included, is guilty of; clichéd symbolism and attempting to cram too many issues into one play without developing any of them. Using a highly technical form as an excuse for shallow characterisation and loosely tied narrative, Mobile tries to distract the audience with technicalities like a play within a play and intercultural mediums. It’s disturbing that 9 years after the likes of LEAR, a professional theatre company still needs to use pulling red cloth out from between your legs to symbolise abortion and rape. If I ran the National Arts Council, there would be a red cloth ban on all Singapore stages.

All in all, Mobile was like giving a literature or art history class in secondary school a stage and some very elaborate props and asking them to do a play on the futility of life. They might have done better. Who knows.