Where is the Cat - a brief review

Last evening, my hard working spouse (literally) drove me to see ‘Where is the Cat’ at Petaling Jaya’s PJ Live Arts. That oft used venue is ensconced within The Square at Jaya One. On route we discovered that we had left our tickets at home. Dear spouse u-turned, and headed back home to collect them, whilst making a deft telephone call (using the onboard loud speaker system to avoid cries of illegal use of handphone whilst driving) and was notified that extra tickets would be provided for us at the main door. Technology is wonderful isn’t it? Another u-turn, and deja vu ramped up a notch.

Simon, our go-to Waze instructor, guided us through mazes of Malaysian streets to shave a few seconds off our arrival time and, despite the complexity of the route and the various u-turns, we arrived before time. Time enough to grab some water to quench thirst during the ninety minutes of performance.

I admit to trepidations. Virtually untrained young persons, let loose on a stage for 90 minutes was not my idea of fun but, maybe, a tad closer to one of Dante’s outer rings of hell. My spouse, who is an educator of several decades standing, was positively drooling with anticipation. I, not so much. And then it started.

I also admit to having to place my scepticism, negativity and propensity to a short attention span to one side. I had nothing to do for the next 90 minutes, except exist. My Samsung life saver was switched off. The theatre darkened. I listened, watched and was quickly captivated by the boundless energy and enthusiasm generated by a small troupe of 14 year olds (I only became aware of their ages after the event). Such was the professionalism engendered by the young actors that I could hardly believe that they were Waldorf schoolchildren (Class 8).

Boundless energy pranced across, and around, the stage. There was a sense of city. Bustling. Vibrant. Yet there was also an undercurrent too, of potential disconnect, as an elderly mother looses her cat. Pandemonium ensues as said elderly mother, perhaps touched by an elderly mental fatigue, goes off in search of her one, solitary, companion. The perceived loss of the ‘mother' promoted the young actors to seek, to call and to worry about the ‘aunty’. Aunty, perhaps, represented all mothers and all attachments which John Bowlby suggested are prone to become insecure. The performance was exhilarating, even more so when you consider the ages involved and their short experience as actors.

As an individual who has only been able to absorb scant snatches of languages other than English, and who continues to struggle with that too, I did find the multi-lingual aspect of the ‘play’ (English, Malay, Mandarin, Tamil, Hokkien, Cantonese, Teochew, and Hainanese) a tad disconcerting, not to mention confusing. My spouse, bless her, did try to keep me informed, but gave up at Tamil (from which I knew only one word - the one for cat- Punai).

I did struggle following the plot, not to mention wondering what the significance of no 226 in the Perry index of Aesop's Fables (The Tortoise and the Hare) was, gave up, and accepted the whole as a dance experience. That worked for me. I’ll not give away the ending but, there again, I’m not too sure what it was anyway.

Bravo to the cast, teachers, director et al who helped bring this performance to fruition.

‘Where is the Cat’ was adapted from Singaporean writer Kuo Pao Kun’s 1988 ‘Mama Looking For Her Cat’.