Went to watch Cats last night at the Istana Budaya (trans: "Cultural Palace"). It was terribly fun, the choreography was fantastic, Palladino's rendition of "Memory" was worth the price of admission (which is unfortunately considerable at RM150 per person), and the usherers were bastards.
It was a full house - every single seat was booked by the looks of it, and with good cause too; the marketing blitz for the show has been intense and very targeted. Maxis, Astro, HSBC: these companies are known to have clientele that fits the profile of people who would want to and be able to to afford to watch this musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber. It worked - nearly everyone i saw last night were young professionals, or older couples with their children.
It was neat to see all the people milling about, gorging themselves on the free finger food, waiting for the doors to the theatre to open. The men were dressed as you would normally expect men to dress: shirts, long pants and shoes. Not very much variety possible there considering that we men share our clothing department with the children section AND sporting goods. But the women, who have whole floors to themselves, sometimes TWO whole floors of clothing and apparel, were dressed to kill. I certainly didn't have enough fingers to count the number of women who were wearing the most gorgeous cocktail dresses, complete with shawls and high heels. Then there were those who tried to be to sexy (some actually succeeded) with blouses and tops that seemed to be struggling to keep everything in. Me? I was clad in a simple orange shirt with my customary khakis.
The usherers were true bastards. First of all, they asked me to tuck my shirt in (in compliance to the "smart casual" rule boldly printed on the ticket stubs) while they were letting in ladies who were wearing the most ridiculously short skirts or shorts (i wonder if they froze to death in the cold theatre). Then as i was taking pictures with my camera, thy rudely pointed out that i couldn't take any pictures inside (duh, i've been to theatres before, i know the rules). And besides, the PA system has been blaring that particular notice the moment i entered the place: "No FLASH photography while inside the performance hall". Then during the intermission, i wanted to take a few photos of the stage, and the same usher came to me and sourly said, "I thought i told you no pictures in the hall". How rude! I replied, "No, you said no flash photography". She flustered a bit but as i saw that she was turning a beet red, i calmly put the camera away. I managed to get the pics i wanted anyway, but the rudeness of the whole incident left a bad taste in my mouth.
I had seen Cats once before, or rather slept through one, while on a trip to Singapore when i was 17. So i had made it a point that i would not sleep through this one, and i wasn't disappointed. It was a good performance and worthy of the standing ovation the actors received at the end. But i swear, no matter how high tech and culturally sophisticated KL has become over recent years (FAME was staged here just a few months back, now CATS and Phantom some time next year), everything is really skin deep unless we can somehow improve our civility. There really is no point to want to build a civilization, if we have yet to appreciate the finer points of what it means to be civilized. The usherers at the Cultural Palace last night are just a simple example of this lacking.
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