Review by Leysha Al-yahya
SUMMARY: Andak Bertandak debuts at KLPAC from August 29 to September 1, 2024. Directed by Azhar Zainal, this farcical comedy explores superstition and family, featuring a blend of veteran and new talents.
The lead cast of Andak Bertandak from left to right: Ellie Suriaty as Mak Andak, Riena Diana as Kiah, and Azhan Rani as Pak Andak. Photo Credit: Akmal Helmy Burhanuddin
Andak Bertandak tells the story of Mak Andak and Pak Andak as they try to figure out what is ailing their only daughter, Rokiah. They do this by calling on the local shaman, along with their kampung’s bidan (midwife) but all the while stopping Rokiah from seeing her husband-to-be, who is later revealed to be a doctor. As I first entered the theater, I was in awe of the set, a well built two-storey kampung house that fit perfectly into Pentas 2 at KLPac. The details of the set design and props transported me to a place I must admit, I don’t often visit these days and I was excited for what was to come.
The play begins with Elly Suriarty miming a classic Malay song as she sweeps the exterior of her home when out of nowhere, her only daughter, Rokiah, begins to scream from inside her room asking for her mother. Running out of her room, Rokiah explains to Mak Andak that she feels a pain in her chest, and thus the chaos of Andak Bertandak begins as Mak Andak opens up to Pak Andak about their daughter’s ailment. Clueless, the two of them call on the local pervy shaman and the trusted midwife separately to help figure out what is hurting Rokiah. After ruling out that it is a hex put on them and that it is simply just misplaced wind, the family is stumped but when Rokiah’s fiance and the resident doctor arrives, he is the one to explain to everyone that what Rokiah could actually have is cancer. This is where the play ends as the family rushes to bring Rokiah to the clinic.
Jay Izwazir as the Pervy Shaman discusses Rokiah’s mysterious ailment with Azhan Rani, who plays Pak Andak, in a tense moment from Andak Bertandak. Photo Credit: Akmal Helmy Burhanuddin
In an article with Sinar Harian [1] Fasyali Fadzli, the scriptwriter of the play mentioned that this was a play he had written in 2007 as part of his diploma at Aswara. The play discusses the culture in certain Malay societies where people’s distrust for more modern medicine pushes families to overlook very serious illnesses as a hex to be healed by herbs and chants or by excess wind that can be released with massages and hot stones. Although I understood this as a whole, the play did fail at highlighting this very point for me as most of the scripts’ punchlines about the couple’s more traditional thinking fell flat as the lines took a backseat to the ad-libs done by the actors to get more of a reaction out of the audience. The script in itself felt dated in the way the story was told and in the ways the characters spoke. I understand many people in rural communities still believe in these traditional healing methods and though I felt there was promise to the premise of the play, the way it was told felt trite and didn’t bring much to the conversation of traditional healing methods vs modern medicine other than to say that the characters, Mak Andak and Pak Andak were wrong for believing in practices their societies had done for centuries before. This made me wonder if there were any efforts to edit and or update the script from 2007 as I found myself wondering if the handling of this topic was something the playwright would agree with more than ten years later.
To elaborate, I felt that the use of comedy in the play seemed to take away from the issues highlighted by Rokiah and her parents, including their clear refusal to allow Rokiah to see her fiance and the local doctor not only because it would cause gossip amongst the villagers but also because they feared for what he might think of her. Instead, jokes were made about Rokiah being “broken” and “unkept” and Mak Andak worried that all this would cause the doctor to not want to marry Rokiah. Though I know plenty of people who speak like this. It did feel like the comedy of the play was less reliant on the timing and the idiosyncrasies of the characters but instead, focused more on the jokes about women’s bodies and the superstitious mindsets of the village people around them as jumpscares and the talk of demons and ghosts became more and more prevalent throughout the performance. Two new characters were introduced midway and it was very clear they were there neither to push the plot forward nor to introduce a new idea to the play but instead served as walking, talking props. One of them passed out very quickly after he was introduced onstage and was asleep on stage all the way until the very end, where when he is woken up by the old midwife and is scared out of his mind, is used as the punchline to the entire play. A part of me felt this was a waste of a character and an actor as the punchline could have come much earlier and didn’t necessarily require someone else to make.
Riena Diana as Kiah, clutching her chest in distress, is confronted by Ellie Suriaty as Mak Andak anxiously tends to her in a pivotal moment from Andak Bertandak. Photo Credit: Akmal Helmy Burhanuddin
Aside from that, the comedy only seemed to make light of what can be seen as something as serious as sexual harassment. The clearest scene this happens is when the shaman insists on entering Rokiah’s room to “heal” her and his firm request that Mak Andak and Pak Andak do not bother them no matter what happens, even if Rokiah screams. Although this was a clear criticism of the predatory behavior that exists within these practices, the scene itself made me extremely uncomfortable because it felt unearned and unnecessary since the conversation before was already filled plenty with sexual innuendos and the shaman’s character was already seen pushing boundaries, the conversation felt enough to convey the criticisms the writer had but the push to allow the shaman to enter the room felt like a weird comedic decision that in the end, did the opposite of its intent. There was a distinct pause in the audience’s breathing as we all prayed the play wouldn’t go there. Thankfully, it didn’t but those few minutes of that scene, as Mak Andak and Pak Andak continued arguing outside the room as their daughter screamed for her mother asking for help only seemed to make the two main characters look like horrible parents when I felt the scene could have instead carried more nuance on the conditioning and societal pressures a pair of parents from a conservative Malay community might feel during a moment such as that. I felt there to be a lack of empathy for the characters, even the good ones, as the writer’s biases were very clear from the get go and though this is something I have no serious issues with, it just felt like this did not allow for the characters to grow, to evolve or simply, to change. The characters of Mak Andak and Pak Andak don’t change a great deal during the play. They are the same at the end of the play as they are at the beginning of it and this took away from the cast to portray actual characters and people with thoughts and emotions. Rather, they seemed to merely portray a particular bias, and only that.
Azhan Rani as Pak Andak raises a chair in defense as chaos unfolds, while Ellie Suriaty (Mak Andak) and the rest of the cast—Riena Diana (Kiah), Jay Izwazir (Pawang Salleh), Dottie (Bidan Peah), and Aizat Saha (Dr. Zali)—react in a frantic scene. Photo Credit: Akmal Helmy Burhanuddin
The ensemble of actors included some very well known and talented performers including Jay Iswazir and Azhar Rani and though I have no real issues with the acting, the direction and pacing of the theater performance was found to be lacking as some scenes felt terribly rushed and the lines overlapped so much, it was hard to keep track while other scenes felt much longer than they needed to be. Many of the key points of the plot were repeated multiple times throughout the show and even though the actions somewhat changed, I didn’t feel like I was learning anything new from the later scenes. There was a clear dip in energy after the midwife’s character was introduced as it seemed that the scene merely repeated the same structure and information that was given to us in the previous scenes with the shaman. The final act in itself was a chaotic mess of shouting and jumping and screaming as the ensemble fought to keep the energy and comedic timing up. It felt as though there might have been minimal rehearsals between the ensemble because as the play progressed and the more performers were involved, the text and nuance of the script was lost to an array of slapstick comedy action and overlapping ad-libbed lines by the actors.
The actors seemed very focused on the lines they had at hand but were also very aware of the audience in front of them as throughout the play, the jokes, and physical humor became bigger and bigger in a bid to receive more laughter and cheers from the audience. I noticed how some of the more experienced actors tried to hold and balance the energy on stage but I fear it all became too muddy at the end and although I enjoyed most of the performances, I did feel I didn’t truly get to know any of the characters, most obviously was the character of Rokiah who seemed to spend her time either screaming in pain, or screaming for her mother or later on in the third act, to loiter around in the background while quietly reacting to the conversations that are literally about her while they happened without her. It was clear the actress who played her was very talented but was severely underused much like the actor who played the two village boys or the actor who played Rokiah’s actor boyfriend. Only appearing at the very end, the character served as a kind of public service announcement as he advised all the characters on the importance and benefits of believing in modern medicine. He manages to address every issue brought up throughout the play and solve it without much friction from the others. This moment at the end with all the actors onstage was what brought me to the hypothesis that not many group rehearsals happened as the clear fractures between the ensembles’ energies were felt and seen here. To improve this, I feel the director would need to work with the ensemble more on the timings of what is said and what isn’t said as comedy is just about the silent moments as it is about the spoken ones. Grounding work as a group would also help the ensemble to build an unspoken language with each other on stage and it would allow for them to feel each other’s energies better. The practice of a group of performers bouncing a ball between them and not letting it touch the floor isn’t simply a fun children’s game. Instead, it helps the performers ready for the back and forth that exists within scripted theater. It would allow for the performers to see how one not only acts but also reacts as saying your lines onstage are not only just saying words out loud, but also a dance, a musical melody that through it, the tone of the story is felt, and through that; the story of the play is heard.
Pak Andak, Mak Andak, and Bidan Peah share a humorous moment on stage in Andak Bertandak, with Bidan Peah at the center of the conversation. Photo Credit: Akmal Helmy Burhanuddin
Despite the lack of onstage chemistry, I truly felt that the performers were warm and funny and I am very sure that if they were given more time to hone their communal energy, they would have hit it out of the park. I understand how hard it must’ve been for the director to direct some pretty big names on stage as the balancing act of egos in a theater production is as much a director’s responsibility as it is to bring together the entire play but it was very obvious in certain moments of the production when the actors had been directed and when they hadn’t. A big disconnect happened for me as I watched this play where a lot of the actions happened much higher than eye-level and the scenes with most of the conversational dialogue was done seated. There was a sense that the director was directing this play for a camera’s point of view rather than for the proscenium theater form that it was presented in.
The ensemble stands on stage, expressing gratitude for the audience's support after a lively and heartfelt performance, framed by the charming, traditional Malay set design. Photo Credit: Akmal Helmy Burhanuddin
Looking back, my experience in the theater was enjoyable and there were moments I truly laughed out loud at the jokes but after recounting all of the things I have above, it did make me wonder, why this specific script was chosen to be staged. Was it for its comedic elements which has proven in the past to attract audiences? If so, why was the comedy of the play downplayed by the slapstick nature of the performances? As someone who quite enjoys slapstick comedy, I found a disconnect between the actions and the comedy. Where audiences were supposed to laugh, they didn’t. I am all for creating a performance simply to give the audience a good time and to hopefully, sell out tickets and make some money but it did feel like quite the waste to have that cast line-up and with that production budget to do the play as they did.
All in all, I feel if there was a better understanding of the play between playwright and director in terms of what the play was truly trying to say, the nuances of the play could have had their moment to shine. It did feel as though the director and the script were at odds as the topic of alternative healing methods and malay superstition took a backseat to the jokes about women’s bodies and pervy shamans which made the play suddenly feel cheap and irrelevant. I feel this play, and its entire cast and crew had so much potential but it ultimately fell flat as I left the theater unsure of what I was supposed to feel. As someone once told me, one of the worst things an artist can do is make their audience feel nothing for their art and I fear I felt this way about Andak Bertandak. I neither liked it or disliked it, my feelings not going so far as to love or to hate. I did enjoy the scenography as well as the sound design though, live musicians included.
About the writer.
LEYSHA AL-YAHYA
a jack of all trades while attempting to be a master of some. A writer and producer in both the film and theater industry in Malaysia, Leysha has been part of numerous theater and film productions, spanning multiple genres and mediums throughout her short decade old professional career. A founding member of The Tulis Group, a playwrights support group that aims to add to local and original Malaysian plays where she wrote her first full length play, Aku Kau dan Dia. Some of her recent works for theater include Maphiko, an international collaboration between Malaysia, Philippines and South Korea while also producing for other performing artists. Her most recent work for film has been behind the scenes as a screenwriter for TV shows such as Senduk Swap and Kuasa and she does the occasional acting gig when she is asked. Now, a mother, Leysha is searching for the balance between making money and making art, between the art of survival and the art of life while trying to, you know, make art.
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