first play i ever watch

I was staring at my empty walls, just another restless and sleepless night for me. Every now and then, it happens. I have so many things on my mind now. The next thing I knew, it brings me back to the play that I have watch a few weeks ago with my fellow course mate. The play called “Psychosis.” A young talented director and actor, Gavin Yap, directed it. Call me an ignorant, I only knew him as one of the actor in the comedy sketch show, “Buddies.” Therefore, when I saw him at KLPAC, I thought he was just coming to give support to the actors and the director of the play. Only after I the show is over and I finally bought the program book that I realize, he is the director. Well, I guess that happens in our learning process. We learn new things everyday.

Well anyway, you must be wondering, why on earth am I thinking of such a depressing play on the night, I mean, morning like this (it’s two o’clock in the morning)?

My younger sister used to tell me that I’m the “worrier” of the family and I meant it as a noun not as a verb, if there is such word as “worrier”. Looking back, it does ring some truth. As the eldest, I find many things are rather depressing sometimes. It’s not about setting the benchmark or setting a good example, to me, it’s about your conscience of what you thought people would expected from a first born.

The play “Psychosis” makes me wonders when the last time I have experienced the same kind of intensities that the actors had presented in the play. I still remember the first line spoken in that silent dark stage, “Do you have lots of friends?”. It’s rather ironic to think that this line doesn’t warm me up to the idea of having lots of friends but instead, it left me feeling cold and alone in that full rooms of people. As if I’m being stripped off of my feelings. It makes me feel somewhat nauseous because some of the things spoken are somewhat too close to heart for comfort.

And I can’t help but notice when one of the female actors pointing straight to the male actor and address him as she and her. In the beginning I thought was another common error, but later it cross my mind that it might be intentional. Could it be? After half an hour, I realize that all the conversations, the dialogues and the monologues carried out between these actors in a way that makes me feel like they are talking to the reflection of their own self and not to another two real persons in the play.

Have you ever heard of Monsieur Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis theory? The id, ego and super ego? According to Freud, these are the three parts of a mind in every human. The id designated as the repository of sexual and aggressive wishes, which Freud called "drives. The drives or id could also be conscious or unconscious, and that consciousness vs. unconsciousness was a quality of any mental operation or any mental conflict. And there is also, the subconscious state of mind. Why I go on about this theory? It’s because it occurred to me that all the characters in this play have a slight representation of each state of mind of human.

After the show was over, I learned from my friends that the playwright of the play was actually a mentally disturbed woman and she committed suicide after she finish writing this play. Hmm…no wonder she could write up something like that so well. The actors were brilliant. They play their roles so effectively.

The setting of the stage was minimalist and there is no intermission. When I was watching it, I do wish that they do have intermission, because I’m feeling kind of psychosis myself, like I’m being brainwashed or something. I remember how felt when the play was over and curtains opened, I have never felt that depressed, alone and completely stripped off. I think the play is good, maybe too good that it affect me too much. But, I don’t think I watch enough play to give a fair judgments of this play. All the same, I’m glad I take my time and watch it.