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A Plague Upon Your House
Price
RM35.00, RM45.00, RM140.00
from
RM35.00
Cast & Crew
Purchase Ticket
Friday
4th
Mar 2022
8:00PM (GMT+8)
Watch at Venue
Saturday
5th
Mar 2022
8:00PM (GMT+8)
Watch at Venue
Sunday
6th
Mar 2022
3:00PM (GMT+8)
Watch at Venue
About the Show
A play for our day and age, brought to you by The Penang Players Music & Drama Society and CENDANA. It offers a template to frame important questions as we try to make sense of our pandemic today.
Plague-infested London of 1603 is coming to terms with lockdowns and loss. Jay Menon's new play explores how Will became Shakespeare and offers a radical perspective on the indispensability of plagues.
Synopsis
The Plague is back in London, killing people and destroying livelihoods. Only the powerful bureaucracy, religious hierarchy and the Order of Physicians seem to thrive. The London City Council, charged with bringing the plague under control, takes the route of strict lockdowns on most public venues including theatres.
Upcoming playwright-impresarios Will Shakespeare and Ben Jonson are not taking it lying down. Ben lobbies the Council to allow theatre to operate, even if under stifling conditions. Will aggressively pursues other avenues to keep his theatre company afloat by writing racy lyrical poems and romances for his steadiest patrons and even offering them his family-recipe remedy for the plague.
When a member of his company gets infected, Will at considerable danger to himself offers the last of his supply of the remedy to his infected actor-friend. Will too eventually falls victim, and is on his death-bed when a gipsy Esmeralda arrives from Stratford with a fresh batch of the medicine.
This meeting catches the attention of High Spirits Khaliban and Ariela whose charter includes non-interventionist trend-spotting on human societies devastated by the Black Death 300 years ago.
Waiting upon humans to break through out of their plaque-encrusted legacy institutions that are gradually being dismantled by repetitive plagues, the High Spirits clash when they experience Will’s plague-enhanced mind.
About the Writer-Director
Jayaram Menon, retired engineer and Past Chairman of Malaysian Mensa, has been active on the Penang stage as actor and director for both The Penang Players and Cape Poetics for the last 21 years.
Among the notable plays he directed was “Death of a Warrior”, “Men without Shadows”, “Plaza Suite” and “Underneath the Lintel”. He wrote and directed “Memes: A Love Story” in 2019.
He has been organizing the Puzzlers Challenge for Penang schools for the past 12 years, was the question setter for TV3 series – Clever Girl - that ran for 2 seasons, and runs a company – RoadRunners MS – specializing in treasure hunts, team-building and extreme makeovers.
Production Team
Producer… Mano Balachandran
Assistant Producer / Costume Design… Joelle Saint Arnoult
Director / Playwright / Set Designer… Jay Menon
Dance Director… Khoo Jen Leong
Choreographers …Havela D. and Sylvi
Music Coordinator… Nick Pagan
Stage Manager… Nergish Manecksha
Assistant Stage Manager… Sariel Leong
Backdrop Artist… Havela D.
Wardrobe / Make-up / Hair… Joelle Saint Arnoult / Adrian Chang / Afifa Hanafiah / Nancy Jenster / Laurence Prabaharan
Poster Design / Publicity & Ticketing / Treasurer… Eric Yeoh
Publicity & Ticketing… Peter Yeoh
Publicity / Ticketing / Mass Media / Social Media… Philip Yeoh
Front of House… Lawrence Chin / Siew Fong / Eric Yeoh / Peter Yeoh / Mano Balachandran
Photography… Eric Yeoh / Joelle Saint Arnoult
Sound & Lighting Design… Jay Menon
Stage Crew: Anil Roshan & Letchumana
Acknowledgements
CENDANA
PRISMA
My Creative Ventures Sdn. Bhd.
Staff & Management of LOFT 29
Nancy Jenster of Myth Productions
The Management of Studio Pentas
Colin Lamb for managing
the Penang Players website.
Penang Club
Sam’s Batik House
Jayaram Menon & Dr. Gita Menon
for kindly turning their home into a studio for practices.
Conditions of Admittance
Fully-Vaccinated
2 doses + 14 days (Pfizer, AstraZeneca & Sinovac) or 1 dose + 28 days (Johnson & Johnson and CanSino) with valid MySejahtera Digital Certificate. Screenshots will not be accepted.
Health Status
Only low risk or casual contact – both with no symptoms – on MySejahtera. The organizers reserve the right to deny entry if the above conditions are not fulfilled. No refunds will be made to those who have purchased ticket(s).
Venue reserves the right to deny entry if the above conditions are not fulfilled. No refund will be made to those who have purchased ticket(s).
Covid-19-related SOPs
The Penang Players and Loft 29 have comprehensive Covid-19 measures including vaccination verification and health status screenings, compulsory mask-wearing, pre- and post-show Covid-19 testing for all production team members, physical distancing measures, frequent sanitizing and disinfection measures, visitor education and going contactless.
About The Penang Players
https://penangplayers.org
The Penang Players Music and Drama Society is one of Malaysia’s oldest English-language theatre societies, founded in the early 1950s by a group of expatriates residing in Penang. Since then, it has grown and evolved into a diverse group of Penangites on a mission to encourage, promote and perform all forms of drama including musicals in the English Language, conduct workshops for all aspects of stage production and develop a community of such performers in Penang and Malaysia.
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