Does grander always mean greater?

Earlier this year, I heard a rumour that the Stuttgart Ballet, one of the world’s finest dance companies, would be joining the Bangkok’s 14th International Festival of Dance and Music to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Thai-German diplomatic relations. The exact reason for their eventual no-show was never revealed, but as it turned out the Staatsballett Berlin replaced them in the line-up. 

The latter’s “Swan Lake”, with traditional choreography by Frenchman Patrice Bart, was one of the hits of the festival. I’d never seen so many swans on stage, or the court scenes so pleasant. No, I’m damning it with faint praise, despite the fact we’ve seen so many versions of “Swan Lake” here before, and none strikingly different from the conventional standard, and that Thai dance companies will never be able to match their grandeur. So, we should feel grateful that it was deemed fitting to spend all those Thai baht and German euros on such a propitious occasion, shouldn’t we?

Meanwhile, touring across Europe right now is a contemporary version of “Swan Lake”, with both a racial and a sexual twist, by a South African company much smaller than that of the Berlin company, led by young choreographer Dada Masilo. They were in France for the Lyon Dance Biennale last month, where the artistic director of Europe’s dance mecca, the Sadler’s Wells Theatre, caught the show one evening and booked it right away for next year. Singapore’s Esplanade programming director did the same – but for 2015 (yes, the company’s schedule is that busy for the next few years).

I am now checking the history of diplomatic relations between Thailand and South Africa to see whether we might get the chance to watch them soon. They might have to add more swans, of course.

In late August, I watched a musical play on campus – for a celebration of something I no longer recall. In a small theatre that seats 300, the tickets were Bt500 for a production of about 40 actors, 25 musicians and 35 backstage staff. I told the director after the show that it could have been stripped down to only six actors – main characters only, no chorus members – and pre-recorded music. That way it could tour other venues, with the added bonus that the period costumes and set would look less like a school play. He seemed to agree. Thanks to the play’s crowd-pleasing messages – too didactic for my taste unfortunately – and its stereotyped grand-musical format currently so popular here, there is now an attempt to restage it, in its full scale. I doubt this plan will be realised soon. 

Two weeks later, I paid ¥9,000 (about Bt3,500) to watch an international touring production of Broadway musical “Million Dollar Quartet” in Tokyo’s newest playhouse, which seats 1,972. A fellow critic from Japan wondered why I remembered this number – it’s auspicious for my mum and dad. The production featured eight actors and no other musicians – most of the actors also played musical instruments. And it wasn’t celebrating any special occasion. This is typical of how theatre around the world has been created in the past decade, as the economic downturn has taken its toll. Directors and producers try every possible way to make maximum use of their performers’ time and skills in any given production. Which is fine – no audience has ever calculated a show’s worth by dividing the ticket price by the number of cast and crew. 

Unfortunately, it seems that Thai arts authorities would beg to differ. Our tax money has been spent on a much grander scale when it comes to cultural performances. In 2006, the Culture Ministry organised the first Thai festival in France. It was on an enormous scale, with mostly traditional content and in celebration of something titled “Tout à fait Thai”. Among the highlights was the National Theatre’s full-scale khon production at the Palace of Versailles. While its Bangkok counterpart, the French-Thai Festival “La Fete”, is continuing to deliver contemporary productions annually, it took three years before the second “Tout à fait Thai” returned, and then on a less grand scale. So far, there is no news of a third edition. 

And let’s not forget that the reason “Pichet Klunchun and Myself” – a dance dialogue by the Thai performer and his French counterpart Jérôme Bel – has been staged in more than a hundred cities around the world, from Beirut to Zagreb, in the past seven years is that there are two only two skilful artists, one technician and a MacBook travelling. And they only require two chairs, a few bottles of water and electrical extension cables on the stage. And they have never bothered to celebrate anything.