Theatre Review: Forever Young, The New Jukebox Musical by Sing’Theatre
PUBLISHED October 13th, 2017 11:00 am
Fast forward 50 years, and the people we once knew as stalwarts of the Singapore arts scene are now old, wrinkly, and whether by coincidence or not – all residents in the same retirement home. Such is the premise of Forever Young, the hilarious new jukebox musical by Sing’Theatre that’s based on Swiss writer Erik Gedeon’s cult hit of the same name.
Rewritten for the Singapore audience by Benjamin ‘Mr Miyagi’ Lee and directed by Hossan Leong (read our interview with him here), Forever Young is not an easy production to process. It is not quite play and not quite musical, but a genre of Gedeon’s devising called “song drama”, which forgoes much plot, exposition, and dialogue in favour of a mash-up of ironic pop tunes. It starts off quietly in a barebones set, as Sister Sara (Candice De Rozario), the no-nonsense caretaker, slips into an empty residents lounge while whistling the Kill Bill tune and cleaning tables.
One by one, we are introduced to the aged thespians as they comically make their way – albeit draggily – onto the stage. First up is the former music director and resident pianist Joel Chan Wen Fu (Julian Wong), who reluctantly takes his seat behind the keyboard piano to provide the soundtrack for the other entrances. And despite his intelligible babbling, the old man undoubtedly has some serious musical chops.
For all the show’s lack of proper characterisation, the cast are superb in bringing their characters to life – or lack of it. We surmise that Ebi Shankara’s suave Ramesh Chandran and romantic Tan Kheng Hua’s Margaret Lim are sweethearts, that Adrian Heng (Hossan’s own character) is a dog-lover with a dwindling memory, and that Tan Hwee Neo (Karen Tan) is … well, a grumpy and vulgar woman with uncontrollable tremors. There is also Suhaimi Yusof’s snarky Adam Aziz, and from the reception on opening night, he might just be the most popular character on the show.
Once Sister Sara closes the door, the ensemble scrambles into action and launches into song, though not without the believable hiccups faced by the old – shakiness, bouts of confused stares, bad legs, uninhibited outburst, and the general deterioration that comes with a greying head. There is a fight – one of the slowest we’ve seen, there is bumbling choreography, and there is a poignant scene between the two romantics with their version of “I Got You Babe”.
At certain times, Forever Young seems draggy because of its lack of plot, and comic sequences are aplenty if only for the sake of the songs. When Tan Hwee Neo loses a prosthetic limb, she launched into an entertaining version of Aqua’s “Barbie Girl”. A random scene also sees Sister Sara, in between bouts of threatening the residents with a giant syringe, in full dress churning out an operatic number with impressive air control and vibrato – for what reason, we don’t quite know.
But when you get used to the format, you enjoy the production for what it is: a fantastic high-energy song and dance extravaganza that reaffirms the fact that we should always listen to our elders, in more ways than one. In its entirety, Forever Young aims to make us reflect on the way we treat and view our elders, and if the way to do it is through acappella renditions of Led Zeppelin, One Direction, and Britney Spears, we happily accept.
Forever Young is running at the School of the Arts (SOTA) from 11 to 21 October 2017. Tickets are priced from $40, available via SISTIC. For more details, check out the Facebook page here.
