An Aliran Dedication to Instant Café Theatre Not That We "Cintai IT!" Less, But We Love ICT More
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Shall we remember it as a time of modernization? But didn’t our process of modernization begin before Mahathir ruled the political stage? Or shall we remember it as a period of industrialization? Yet, didn’t our most successful programme of industrialization, the MNC-dominated export-oriented variety located in Penang, take off while Mahathir was an UMNO ejection, way before Perwaja was established? Fix Him Better Perhaps it’s not out of place, therefore, to offer a humble word of advice to anyone who’s writing about Mahathir’s legacy: don’t stamp it with a dreary economic label for if there’s one thing Mahathirologists agree on, it must be that the man is never boring. After 2 September 1998, an Anwarista or reformnik might choose to look back on the Mahathir era in anger. Following Mahathir’s speech at the last UMNO General Assembly, a European might dismiss it with disgust. But what will you do if you’re neither here nor there (like me)? What will you say if you’re worried, like some other people, that Pak Lah’s reign will be gloriously tedious, or if you’re indescribably nostalgic about Mahathir’s era although the end is near but not yet here? Save this one for your grandchildren. Tell them that era Mahathir was zaman sindiran, roughly an age of satire. Satire is not a Malaysian invention and there’s no need to reach for the Book of Records. But Satire as an art form suits an era in which leaders use slogans to promote the virtual and hide the real, fitnah and tohmah make for media, a surat layang is a judge’s way of exposing injustice and a talkin is a hack’s method of doing in a living No. 2. Spices of Life Satire is alive and kicking. It’s spice to our mundane lives, unless you’re a diehard BN type who believes that no news is good news, and that ‘only the news that matters’ doesn’t matter. Occasionally Satire is chucked out of newspapers. Amir Muhamad perforated New Straits Times with irreverence. Nobody could domesticate Amir’s wit, definitely not during the post-Anwar days. Amir could bend his prose any way he wanted. So NST transferred him (free agent, I suspect) to malaysiakini. Nowadays Amir does his stuff with shorts, including sombre essay films. Watch him lampoon the IC bureaucracy here or the Singapore immigration. You won’t fall off your chair laughing but the chuckles become harder and harder to suppress.
Sometimes Satire supposedly so offends that clever commentators blush and courageous critics blanch. S**T, don’t whisper to me. Go tell it to Shahnon Ahmad. Squeamish people condemned his allegory for turning art into obscenity. If you’re not a prude, perhaps you’ll think that Shahnon turned obscenity into an art. At the 1999 election, lots of Kedah voters must have thought so, too, because, P***M**, they turned this NL* into an MP. Diary and Cartoons For the record, Satire isn’t obsessed with vice. Sabri Zain’s online Reformasi Diary was peppered with entries dedicated to Virtue in its endless guises. Sabri praised the Activity of shopping so long as the merchandise it sought was justice. He encouraged Ambition in those who yearned to be the PM’s clones. He applauded Intelligence evident in the attainment of super political IQs. He sang admiringly of Virginity but, Sabri being no Madonna, at least one woman was not amused. Nor is Satire always refined. Few of the cartoons drawn by Zunar, who transferred from the NST group to Harakah, were truly refined. One recent and hopelessly confused cartoon attributed SARS to pigs. (Some people will blame anything on the poor swine.) Still, Zunar’s peculiar collection, Keranamu Hidung!, did exclusive and original nose jobs on Mahathir, none terribly cosmetic, sorry to say, and all were personal like mad, as Malaysians say. This Land is Your Land 
Well, this is Malaysia zaman Mahathir. The lines between politics and profanity, and vice and virtue have been blurred. Politics and politicians are personal like mad. If you’re an MB, say, you can show the finger or slam your palm at your fist in public. If you’re BA, though, don’t show yourself at by-elections.
This is Bolehland against which a much sued and maybe wounded MGG Pillai fights with fiery words and fantasy. Most of all, Ladies and Gentlemen, this is Bolehwood, the world of the Instant Café Theatre, where Jo and Co. treat society as a stage and use the stage to portray society. They’ll laugh their heads off if you call them fundamentalists of a sort. But it isn’t untrue, is it? Fundamentally their art spares no one and holds nothing sacred. Here, where art is politics and politics art, only mockery, wit and sarcasm rule. Politicians are scumbags and bureaucrats mere machines. Corruption is exposed, pretensions are hollowed and lies are nailed. The kopi o kau flavour of the ICT joke, instantly served, is never forgotten. Instant Café Theatre has shredded many reputations with 2-in-1 acts, 3-in-1 performances, and riotous fusions of styles. You’d tremble to be there except as a member of the always packed, always appreciative audiences. Return to Sender Then came a boringly predictable heavy-handed response to ICT’s ‘insulting’ airing of ‘sensitive’ issues. One morning, we woke up, read the news rags and choked on our coffee. One lousy letter, just one carping complaint, to Utusan Malaysia – the last newspaper to respect public sensitivities – and Dewan Bandaraya Kuala Lumpur revoked ICT’s permit, suspended its licence, and kicked Satire off the stage. This bureaucratic suppression of artistic freedom was directed at ICT’s sell-out performance, The 2nd First Annual Bolehwood Awards 2003: The Director’ s Cut. This was the ‘most unkindest cut’, delivered by an un-elected council claiming to run a 21st century capital city boasting the world’s tallest towers and freest Multimedia Super Corridor. Wasn’t the incident suspiciously like the police raid on malaysiakini that took place after the guardians of morality in UMNO Youth lodged one equally lousy, equally miserable police report? What If Satire’s spirit is aroused: what if an irate reader had written to Harakah to complain that the UMNO President made fiercely anti-foreign remarks ‘live’ on TV that scared away investment and tourist dollars? (See AM Vol 23 No. 5: Letters) Would the police have raided RTM overnight and carted off cameras and sound systems? Or would the Ministry of Home Affairs have raided PAS and shut down Harakah for publishing a letter from a non-party member? Such is Satire’s popularity that ICT is still with us. In these times, when the misnamed ‘local government’ bureaucrats throw their weight at their own risk, at least one bureaucrat with a sense of humour had the sense to tear up the revocation script. In Bolehwood, where awards are liberally given, but rarely credit is given where credit’s due, let’s speak plainly: ICT lives on because the Company wasn’t cowed. (Bravo, Adeline, your lines in malaysiakini were well spoken!) At heart it’s because Satire is irrepressible. Every Move You Make Satire is everywhere in our society, sniffing out dirty politics, taking in abusive power and noting down greasy money. Then Satire recycles them into delicious art. Satire never tires. It invents, remakes and enacts all kinds of situations, and gives them names that any informed citizen would appreciate, such as …
Touch wood, ‘Next Change’ at ICT. Now e-mail us and tell us what you think. | ||||||||||||||||||
Most of all, Ladies and Gentlemen, this is Bolehwood, the world of the Instant Café Theatre, where Jo and Co. treat society as a stage and use the stage to portray society.
