Behind The Wheel: onehundred&seventysevenminutes

fiftynineminutes.
original short plays and monologues performed within one hour.

“Two friends discover faith, direction and the truth. An actress whom we all like to hate. A bitter past haunts a bitterer couple. A girl finds beauty in ugliness. A man and a woman make love over dinner. A fellow Malaysian makes the country proud. And a group of roommates bring back the dead- all within fiftynineminutes”

When September 28th - October 1st 2006 @ 8.30 pm

Where The Dram Projects, BG06 Happy Mansion Apartments, Jalan 17/13 46400 PJ

I went three times to see Johann in his first ever monologue titled "The World's Smelliest Durian" over the last week at the Dram Projects. Dram Projects is this tiny teeny weeny studio next to the Food Foundry at Section 17. Quite a little gem of a place, really, although in terms of sound insulation, it fails. This effort is put up by the oral stage which is mainly made up of really young actors, directors and writers.

It was great to see the young actors letting their creativity flow and I truly feel that we should have more outlets like this for the youth. Although I felt that most of the actors lacked that connection to their charaters and therefore I had difficulty believing what they were doing or saying, overall I would say that it was a good effort.

But more on the oldest "youth" there, Johann Lim. I know I am biased, but his, was definately my favourite performance. He was a real natural, kept it simple and basically allowed the audience to connect with the script and the character. I really did not know what to expect walking in as I have never seen him do somethig like this before and neither did I see him rehearse his lines. I was even preparing what to say to him incase it sucked. "You were...erm...kinda good...babe.." "Maybe... you erm... didn't have enough time to practice." "It was not bad... for your first time." Anyway...PHEW! He was great! and I told him so. Not that I would have lied and not tell him like it is if he wasn't, (hmm).. but to be fair, I thought the script was one of the better ones. Amongst the other ones which had darker undertones, The World's Smelliest Durian was like a breath of fresh air. I am no expert, but I know what speaks to me and what does not. I AM proud of my world smelliest baby. You rocked babe!
The one I disliked the most? Has to be the final act with 6 girls. It was annoying, messy, lacked clarity and well... just plain annoying... sorry girls... that was what it was for me.