Who wants to watch a show about a xylophone?

As we reported on Tuesday, history’s most popular song-and-dance show, “The Sound of Music”, is being given its first-ever Thai-language treatment at the Muang Thai Rachadalai Theatre. 

And once we’re done romping up and down the Alps (those “hills are alive ...”), Workpoint Entertainment returns us to the East with the first musical interpretation of the hit film “Hom Rong”.

Also called “The Overture”, it is the fictionalised story of esteemed Siamese classical musician Luang Pradit Phairoh, otherwise known as Sorn Silapabanleng, and the sort of lives such maestri led from the late 1890s to the 1940s. 

Sorn was especially gifted at playing the xylophone-like ra-nad ek – despite his father’s prohibitive condemnation – and eventually went toe to toe and mallet to mallet with the champion of the instrument, Khun In.

Ittisoontorn Vichailak directed the award-winning 2004 film. For the musical, Teravat Anuvatudom and acting coach Rotsukhon “Kru Ngor” Kongkate are splitting the task between them. Kornkan “Arm KPN” Sitthikoses will play Sorn and he is busy practising his ra-nad chops. 

He’s pretty good, but he’ll have to be terrific to put on a convincing duel with real-life classical musician Chaiyuth Tosa-nga, who’s playing Khun In. In an interesting turn of family fate, Chaiyuth is the brother of Narongrit Tosa-nga, who portrayed the prodigious Kun In in the movie. 

Fans will recall that, when the film first appeared it theatres, it was basically ignored. Who wanted to watch 90 minutes of tinkling on an instrument that was so utterly mundane? But then this new Internet thing flexed its muscle and word spread that the film was absolutely riveting. It might have been the first time a Thai movie was saved by online word of mouth.

This was before Facebook and Twitter, of course, but Pantip.com had its Chalermthai chat room devoted to cinema, and “Hom Rong” got tagged as a must-see.

The curtain goes up on April 4 at the new Siam Pic Ganesha theatre atop Siam Square 1.

 

First round to Golf

Awards season blankets the planet, with the Oscars just around the corner and, coming up on March 1, “the Thai Oscars” – the Subhanahongsa Awards. Meanwhile trophies with a little less sheen are also being tossed about in Thailand.

Movie magazines Bioscope and Starpics have named their favourites, and these are seen as critics’ choice awards – which also means they carry weight at the galas still to come. 

Both magazines named former pop idol Pichaya “Golf” Nitipisalkul the best actor of 2014 for his portrayal of a vengeful monk in the omnibus horror “Tai Hong Tai Hian”. Not everyone in the showbiz media thought he deserved the double win, though, and Golf felt compelled to respond. He wondered on Instagram why people can’t simply congratulate those who win instead of making discouraging comments.

He says he’s really proud of the awards because the judges on both panels are well respected in the trade. And, that being the case, his acting couldn’t have been all that bad if they picked him for the honours!