Discussion on the Sinhala translation of ‘Creeps’:

Misfits try to hog the spotlight

By Dilshan BOANGE

The non mainstream is gaining ground and space for discussion in Sri Lanka with gradual interest developing in what ‘alterity’ can offer as ‘food for thought’ to society in its ever motional path of change. On August 14 and 15 the Inter Act Art organisation presented a theatre production that is very much not meant for the theatregoer with taste woven around conventionalism. Performed at the German Cultural Centre –the Goethe Institute, the drama was an ‘edited’ translated version of Creeps by the German dramatist Lutz Hubner, directed by M. Safeer, with the script done by Jayalath S. Gomes.

The form of the performance by virtue of the spatial realities of the chosen venue disallowed the conventional stage setting and the dynamics that go with the dimensionalities of the proscenium. The show itself was not meant to end with the curtain call but to further an audience engagement with the cast and director opening the space for dialogue by taking questions and seeking feedback. The politics of this creation was therefore not in the content alone but also the interaction it built into the evening’s program through artist and audience dialoguing.

Defining the title

The drama was titled in its Sri Lankan form tagged with Sinhala to read as Creeps –e mamai (that is me). The title when read with reference to the English language gives one the impression that the story may be about people who are ‘creepy’ in the sense as unnerving and unwelcome among the general company of people. But the discussion after the show revealed that the title Creeps was in fact what the original German script was titled and was a word coined to refer to people in Germany (the youth mainly if I understood correctly) who disregarded what was said by people in the 60s and 70s and, thus a label to a segment of people who adhere to a credo of sorts that rejected what the generation that preceded them advocated. This revelation of course was part of the discussion that took place after the performance and thus not meant to be manifest within the text of the play itself.

The director when posed with the question of whether the play was an ‘adaptation’ as opposed to a translation denied the former as being not accurate in defining the artistic process. The text of the play, however, as discussed further on in this article, showed a very markedly ‘adoptive’ hand having been at work to script a Sinhala translation which still had observed a sense of boundary consciousness to preserve the idea of a translation as the German definition of ‘Creeps’ wasn’t made self explanatory through the text of the drama, which one may assume is more or less understood by a German audience.

Therefore, the word Creeps, which was the title of a TV show to be launched for which a ‘hunt’ was on for a host, a broadcaster was the premise on which the drama unfolds, was somewhat abstract insofar as whatever definitional purpose it would have meant to serve in the original script’s intentions.

Reading into the text

In adherence to the theorems of Roland Barthes if one were to kill the author and disregard whatever would be the authorial intention and relate to what the text meant to the reader or in this case the viewer, the word Creeps seems to very aptly suit all the characters who formed the ‘physical’ cast as well as the voice of the unseen studio operator that comes over the speaker directing the three candidates. The word Creep or its quality of creepiness fits the characters Dayalan, Thiwanka, Shamika and the ‘audio persona’ named ‘Ammo’ in different ways.

The drama opens with an audio visual presentation of three persons. The first is a ‘funky’ looking male wearing a colourful afro type hairpiece dancing to Michael Jackson’s ‘Smooth criminal’. Secondly a somewhat homely looking male strums a guitar and sings a Tamil song. The last is very clearly a ‘pansy’ type male with very effeminate facets dancing to a track.

The live action opens with the character Thiwanka whose visage strikes very much as a cross-dressing type homosexual coming onto the set which consists of the video projector screen, a table and chair of a cafe style, a little cabinet filled with numerous kinds of edibles ranging from Coca-Cola to Cheese Buttons to Zesta Tea to Elephant House Soda to even a can of Stout (which was visible from the front rows) and a drawing room suite couch with a small coffee table of the modern decor type made of a block of tree stump fitted with a glass to serve as the table top, which was mounted on a platform like elevation.

The other item that revealed to be part of ‘the set’ apart from the lighting, was a single red light hung overhead to show that the space is a studio as the red light would light up when the voice of the studio operator or director ‘Ammo’ marked its first presence.

Thiwanka is soon joined by Dayalan who when asked who he is by the first to arrive, answers that he is the one who ‘is doing this show’. A third character in the form of a showy flashily dressed self assured ‘slick’ persona arrives on the scene. The voice over the speaker that introduces itself as ‘Ammo’ and says that it will be the ‘person’ who directs them in the process of choosing which of them will be picked to be the TV show presenter to anchor the planned program – Creeps.

Revelations of characters

What unfolds is a revelatory trajectory of the interiorities of the three candidates, their dilemmas and why each of them wants the job to anchor the show Creeps that is set to air. The interactions and contentions that arise between the three, the spontaneous alliances sparked between two of them against the other and how that wilts in a moment to create a new axis to leave another out shows how the dynamics of competitiveness come into action to test the moral fibre in the three characters under the given circumstances.

Dayalan reveals to be a person who has failed in life. Being seen as a failure and an oddity by his schoolmates and then later his mother he is desperate to impress her by landing the job as a TV personality since she had already assumed her son who was seen as incompetent and mentally unbalanced schoolboy was called to audition for the role of the TV show host.

He says in the course of his desperation to make Shamika see how important it is to him, that his mother had insensibly told all her friends that Dayalan is going to be a TV show host. To Dayalan the job is very much a matter of life and death since he states he is not going to return home having proven to be nothing but a failure which is the given about him by the way he has been treated by society.

To Thiwanka the application and audition for the job seems more like an adventure he wishes to try out to see if he would have a chance at becoming a TV personality. Thiwanka’s reasons aren’t moulded by the complexities of Dayalan nor Shamika the latter to whom the job is seen as his rightful due owing to his claimed social status readily available paternal influence, it’s also an ‘ego trip’. He openly says his desire is to remain no more than six months in the job and then move on to a better prospect. This facet of Shamika speaks very loudly of how in a consumerist society a career is very much about marketing one’s image and self-worth to further career prospects regardless of given ethicalities involved in serving an employer.

Dynamics of video screenings

A very potent aspect of the drama is that the production includes audio visual material being projected at certain junctures on to the screen placed right at the centre of the set. Not only does the screen serve to show the three video clips of the three at the very beginning of the play but ‘Ammo’ announces to them to see how they performed as video clips of their performances in auditioning are shown as catchy montages which makes them larger than life as well as unreal in a way since the people shown on screen aren’t the very beings who performed live, as they are visual material mixed with other footage to be marketable or broadcast material.

The video reflections of their performances in a way shows their shortcomings as more amplified since seeing one’s own performance can be rather daunting at times for a performer. And one must keep in mind in this sense the trio are to be thought of as ones auditioning and not yet professional broadcasters.

The trio in their auditioning are made to showcase different abilities required for the onscreen ‘performances’ of the show. From presenting to interviewing to singing and dancing is tested in them to the subtle dictates of ‘Ammo’ who enticingly invites them to show their talents. What is interesting to note is that the three had very different approaches to presenting their first ‘intro’ in the auditioning process and brought out three distinct levels to what they would each introduce about themselves to the audience.

Self-introduction

Dayalan the most excited and hyper of the three delivered what was a very urgent and enthusiastic self-introduction of himself saying he was from Nuwara Eliya and that he is an ardent supporter of environmental conservation. His verbal ‘content’ in his intro showed how he was in a way desperate for recognition and wanted to be known for his personal self more than a TV persona.

Thiwanka’s approach was more on the basis of a mix of introducing himself as well as presenting rhythmic gesticulations typical of ‘musical chart show’ presenters but in a very effeminate vein. Stating he is from the bustling city of Galle in the South the cross-dresser doesn’t harp on about his interests urgently to the audience in the manner Dayalan does. But his ‘performance’ is ridiculed by Shamika who takes the next turn and delivers a very assertive forceful vocal intro that very much thrusts upon the viewer an imposing disposition thinly garbed in a disingenuous love for the viewer.

Interestingly Shamika doesn’t say anything of himself in the intro like the other two, except for his name but drives a very well rehearsed adrenaline pumped TV anchoring to give more emphasis of what the show is about why the viewer should continue to watch it. His approach is more on the lines of a professionally attuned media personality since he later reveals he is also qualified in journalism. But what is rather undeniable is the absence of appeal in any of the characters in their anchoring tryouts.

Spiralling discord

In the interviews and the breaks from the auditioning that follow discord arises between the three when they each try to jump the line to showcase their talents when a moment’s hesitation is detected from the person who gets called on by the unseen studio operator. The spiralling friction at one point leads Thiwanka who is the least determined to win the role to call for a cessation of animosity and not let the simple opportunity of a job create hatred amongst them.

The juncture where they are made to act as guests interviewed on the show tests each of their abilities to cope with being the questioned one as well as being the questioner. Although its only auditions and not real broadcasts, it still leads to a point where interrogative questions are posed to Dayalan by Shamika who subtly causes ruptures to Dayalan’s sensitive mental fabric by ploughing into his dilemmas of frustrations and dejections by being marginalised as a failure.

This is clearly a means of sabotage Shamika pulls off to his advantage. How Shamika would have come to know of Dayalan’s possible domestic situation of being from a broken family is a mystery since nothing is said of it through any source.

What is left to reason is that ones such as Shamika would be able to read the troubled demeanours of insecure self-conscious people such as Dayalan who are very much the underdogs in scenarios such as the ones presented in the drama.

Fish in a glass bowl

How the characters define themselves and made to reveal what they are is rather intriguing. The set up is such that they are very much in a fish in a glass bowl situation where they are looked at and observed and made to become amusement for the onlookers. There are two primary instances where space for character defining is presented voluntarily, and that is when they are given the go ahead to present their TV anchor intro tryouts and then play guests in an interview session.

What fails to register with the characters especially Dayalan and Thiwanka is that they did not really have to be their real selves that reveal their biographic details and could have fictionalised answers and content to make the scenario more jazzed up. Yet the presumption that the media is interested in their real selves even in a simple audition reveals their naïveté when faced with the pressures of being the focus of TV media.

Thiwanka reveals to have won a contest to be crowned ‘Miss Big Apple’. Dayalan reveals that he is rather stunted in terms of expressing who he is other than the set details he had come prepared with when asked questions for the auditions. Shamika who is the more media savvy and attuned to the ways and ploys of media resists the prodding from ‘Ammo’ when asked to tell ‘a bit about himself’.

Shamika very sardonically says his first pet was ‘Henry’ who got flushed down the toilet by his elder brother and with unapologetic rudeness asks if anything more needs to be said. What creature Henry was is never said, which shows the degree of disinterest Shamika has in speaking to the camera about himself.

Shamika is more the astute one who knows that to get carried away by the entrapments of the media would be to leave yourself vulnerable to attack which is exactly what happens to Thiwanka who is subtly made fun of by ‘Ammo’ for being a homosexual and transvestite and gets interrogated in a seemingly harmless set of queries whether he is a streetwalker and what sort of company he keeps and what they do at night on the street and so on. When such questioning gets on Thiwanka’s nerves and begins to feel violated, he rejects the whole audition and decides to walk out.

Failures and ‘falls’

What makes Dayalan want to walk out is the pressure he is faced with in the overwhelming revelation of being exposed as a failure and a misfit. His climatic moment of desperation for the spotlight to redeem somehow his declining status and personality arrives when he by force begins to sing a medley of Tamil songs and blunders miserably, yet persists in pathetic desperation as if his life depended on it. It showed in one way how for one such as Dayalan the opportunity becomes a great space for expression and a moment to fulfil his need to be heard or at least to believe he is being heard through the expression modes he has chosen.

Shamika who is very aggressive in stating his right to the role not on his own merits but resting on ‘paternal might’ and is very self assured and callously sneering towards Dayalan whom he sees as very contemptible, meets his fall when the voice of ‘Ammo’ accidentally comes over the speaker as in what happens when the ‘On’ button gets pushed unintentionally and the private conversations of the people at the microphone become heard to the audience. ‘Ammo’ laughs about Shamika although admitting that when his father calls they will say his son was given the job.

The whole exercise then seems as though nothing of great importance to ‘Ammo’ and the directorial segment he represents since the plan had been to anyhow give the job to the one who wields influence.

But what really ‘castrates’ Shamika of his smugness is when they all hear ‘Ammo’ say in a fit of laughter that Shamika’s face looks like a ‘toilet’. This is the point where the crassly arrogant and obnoxious Shamika is felled. What is revealed of his character through this turn of events is that the ideas of ‘Ammo’ can impact him in a big way. And being laughed at especially regarding his looks to make him lose all his self confidence means he was superficial and not a man of substance.

The Orwellian Big Brother

The ‘character’ of ‘Ammo’ is enigmatic. Though not seen, he is felt as omnipresent. Though unseen he is possibly the most forceful persuasive factor to drive the drama.

His manipulative ways are surreptitious and how he lures the trio to reveal their inner selves is based on two primary factors. One is that he is the authority who must be adhered to if the job is to be got, which is very stringently the case for Dayalan and Thiwanka though it seems to affect Shamika to a very lesser degree.

Secondly, the unseen factor gives his persona a dimension of being beyond what is physical and average and by that his voice assumes something of a higher authority in a godly status. What can be said of the presence of ‘Ammo’ is that he is very much the symbolic Orwellian ‘Big Brother’ who sees everything but remains an unseen enigma who still commands authority.

Media entrapments

Finally though the disaffection unites the trio to rebuff ‘Ammo’ and issue a challenge to show himself the tease is that none of them truly have the power to break away from the field of command ‘Ammo’ has cast over them, and walkout as they kept threatening to do. The conclusion may seem to have projected a negativism with no visible victory for the oppressed trio, yet it is very much possibly the prevailing reality of things.

The magnetism of the media and the perceptions of society that it grants people a status larger than life can at times be the undoing of people who seek to escape their plight as misfits by getting into the exalted space of the spotlight.