From left: Desmond Moey, Stella Kon and Dr Kenneth Lyen.
It starts as mere whimsy or a vision to take a story beyond mere words – and when brought to life on stage complete with music and dramatic props, nothing quite compares to the immersive allure of musicals. At least not for Dr Kenneth Lyen, a renowned paediatrician and veteran musical writer. “There is no art form that has the great emotional power of a musical to touch people,” he told Singapore. “It has everything – music, songs and great stories.”
As one of the founders and the Creative Director of Musical Theatre Limited (MTL), Lyen aims to take musicals in Singapore to the same heights that they achieve on stage. Set up in 2005, MTL is the only musical incubator in Singapore, and encourages aspiring writers to come forward. The aim is to nurture musical scripts and ideas into fruition to grow a vibrant body of locally made musical theatre pieces.
One does not need a formal theatre background to be part of MTL, just the passion for musicals – be it for the stories, songs or lyrics, said MTL’s Managing Director Desmond Moey, an award-winning songwriter with over 300 works to his name, including music for the 1997 National Day Parade and songs for the Singapore Paralympic team.
Lyen himself is also one of the most prolific composers in Singapore and has written for at least 16 productions – many with tennis buddy Moey. In addition, MTL is helmed by Singaporean playwright and author Stella Kon – renowned author and creator of local theatre classics such as Emily of Emerald Hill – who is MTL’s Chairperson.
“We get all sorts of people, from the very young to the very old, and we find that Singaporeans are really quite talented,” – Kenneth Lyen
Moey explained, “We are not a production house, but we still try to do the whole song and dance. We help in the creation and development of the music and cut these into demo CDs which we can pitch and perform.” Stella elaborated, “We have an incubation system of our own, in which paid professional reviewers assess new scripts and give their professional assessment and recommendations on how to improve them.”
Open auditions that welcome any member of the public are held when casting for each production, and each time, the creativity and talent from the public is quite remarkable, said Lyen. For example, for television musical School House Rockz, MTL found a group of talented 12-year-olds for the show. “We get all sorts of people, from the very young to the very old, and we find that Singaporeans are really quite talented,” Lyen quipped.
Kon considers herself one of MTL’s own discoveries. “Before MTL, I had never written songs for musicals because I didn’t have the know-how or support,” she told Singapore. She now has written songs for five mini-musicals.
MTL has also nurtured other musical talents (see box) that have gone from nofrills shows to full-fl edged productions. For IT-professional Lee Chee Tian, 37, MTL has been a catalyst for his ideas. “I’ve always had an interest in theatre and musicals, but have limited contacts and resources to bring my ideas to stage,” he said. “MTL gave us a chance to bring our story ideas to life,” he said. Lee was “astounded” when his piece, Sunset Bloom – a love story – was performed in 2008 under MTL’s Five Foot Broadway showcase.
MUSIC TO THE PEOPLE
Like in any musical, there are the inevitable obstacles to overcome. Obtaining funding, said its founders, remains a huge one, as sponsors prefer tried and tested broadway hits. But there’s reason for optimism. For one, Lyen believes Singapore has what it takes to be a ‘Broadway of the East’ because of the wealth of local stories, fables and legends, the unique confluence of cultures and Asian musical infl uences, as local productions Chang and Eng, Beauty World and Bugis Street have shown.
MTL now showcases several shows a year under its Five Foot Broadway programme. “We’ve travelled a long way from our initial start and are going full steam ahead,” said Kenneth. Most recently, MTL got its own permanent space at The Arts House. Colin Goh, General Manager for The Arts House told Singapore, “By providing a residency space for musical theatre, made-in-Singapore musicals will have the breadth to grow and evolve into something of greater quality.”
Apart from incubating musicals, MTL also conducts workshops by local professionals for writers and composers of musical theatre as well as school children. To grow appreciation for musicals, MTL is taking musicals to the community, said Moey. “We want to be a node from which we grow musical theatre clubs in the community, across constituencies and schools all across Singapore.” They are not afraid to dream big. “Hopefully, one of these local musicals gets picked up and becomes the next Cats!” laughed Moey. Whether this dream ever becomes a reality is anyone’s guess, but MTL is unafraid to try. Said Lyen, “We’re planting the seeds; not every one will grow, but we’re having fun doing it in the meantime.”
MUSICAL STEPS
FIVE FOOT BROADWAY BEGINS!
Dr Kenneth Lyen bemoaned the lack of avenues for new musical works with his tennis buddies. Four of them, Lyen, Moey, Phillip Sim and Sean Wong, formed the Musical Theatre Society and showcased fi ve new musicals under its Five Foot Broadway programme in 2005. Each year since, Five Foot Broadway showcases new original works.
SINGAPORE BOYS/BOTAK BOYS
Written by Jonathan Wong, Singapore Boys – a piece about surviving basic military training in the Singapore Armed Forces – was presented as a 15-minute mini musical in 2008. It was taken up by award-winning theatre practitioner Ivan Heng’s theatre company Wild Rice and expanded into a 40-minute piece and renamed Botak Boys.
GEORGETTE
Performed as part of Five Foot Broadway in 2006, the musical Georgette – a story about Singaporean artist Georgette Chen (1906-1993) – written by Ng Yi-Sheng was received by local reviewers as “cheeky but polished”, “intelligently written” and touching. In 2008, it was picked up and performed in Manila.
