Very Much Alive

After being adjacent to matters of mortality for some time it was rewarding to get out this afternoon to a live performance of the theatrical variety. In this case a distinctly youthful production put together in every sense by students from NTU. Through Your Eyes, written by a young lady from NTU-USPRESENTS (I think I got that right), played this afternoon in the black box at the top of the National Library building down town and proved highly engaging. I'd been notified of the show by my ex-student Shana, who was playing one of the leads, and I'm very glad she did so.

There was no shortage of energy and talent onstage and the whole thing was very much 'meant', if you see what I mean. It had urgent things to say about the choices facing intelligent young people on this island and said them with balance & sensitivity; and it managed to be funny when it needed to be.

My only quibble with the show involved the use of the mikes. This was very well done, actually, and the sound balance with various effects had obviously been painstakingly put together. So this is not a criticism of the show in itself. But I would have preferred unamplified voices in that space, which I think would have carried to what was a genuinely attentive, supportive audience. I just think you get more range & nuance with 'real' voices.

But that's an insignificant point really, given the life that those involved created. And it was a delight to see how the efforts of the whole team were reflected in the publicity materials and the curtain call. That in itself had the stamp of truth and lived experience about it.