(SOME MATURE CONTENT)
STARRING (IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER)
LIGHTING DESIGNER
GENEVIEVE PECK
HAIR DESIGN
LEONARD AUGUSTINE CHOO
LEONG LIM
SOUND DESIGNER
DANIEL WONG
ACCENT COACH
PETRINA KOW
TIMOTHY KOH
PRODUCED BY
DIRECTED BY TRACIE PANG & ADRIAN PANG
18
Originally produced on Broadway by Carole Shorenstein Hays, MTC Productions, Roger Berlind, and Scott Rudin on March 31, 2005.
Originally produced by the Manhattan Theatre Club on November 23, 2004.
In a pivotal moment in Doubt: A Parable, the beleaguered Father Flynn gives an impassioned sermon to his congregation about the irrevocable and farreaching harm that gossipmongering can do, making a good case for Gossip being the Eighth Deadly Sin.
Legend has it that Socrates, the Greek philosopher who lived from 470 – 399 BC, was once approached by an acquaintance, who said: “I’ve something to tell you about someone.”
“Wait,” Socrates said, “whatever you want to tell me, have you witnessed it firsthand?”
“Well…I actually heard it from someone else,” the man replied.
“So, you don’t know if it’s totally true. Well, is it a good report you want to make about this person?”
“Not really. That’s the reason I wanted—”
Socrates interjected, “So, you want to tell me something bad about someone, but don’t know if it’s true…Finally, this information about this person, is it of any use to me?”
“Umm…Not as such….I just wanted to share.”
“Well,” Socrates concluded, “if there is any doubt that this information is entirely true, it is not a favourable report, and, it is of no real positive useplease, I don’t want to know about it.”
This “Triple Filters Test” that Socrates employed to deal with Gossip might indeed be a parable for us today. Especially at a time when the Internet has become the toxic town square for this ancient sin that is Gossip, precious few of us are without that sin.
Gossip is a slippery slope of Chinese whispers that begins with hearsay, rumour and assumption, and then can easily mutate into exaggeration, sensationalism, and outright lies.
Doubt: A Parable is set in 1964, but it makes us consider matters which concern every one of us today in our age of “wokeness”, “trial by he said/ she said” and social media mob tribunals: crime and punishment, right and wrong, good vs evil, guilt, accountability, redemption, justice, atonement,
forgiveness, and the dangerous role that gossip plays in every one of these issues.
Often, gossip masquerades as “righting a wrong” –Socrates’ 2nd and 3rd Filter: the blind-sided belief that a wrong has been committed, and that this wrong has to somehow be “righted”. But while we believe that we all know good from bad, fact from fiction, it is all too easy to ignore one thing that threatens to topple our black-and-white pillars of morality and blur binary beliefs in light and dark: Doubt. Because if there is any shred of doubt that information about someone is factually true in its entirety - Socrates’ 1st Filter - then it should never even arrive at the next two Filters.
But the dubious information has already gone viral, fuelled by self-righteous virtue signalling, earnest vigilantism, overzealous vendetta and vicarious vengeance. It can quickly escalate into what is conventionally known as a “smear campaign”, a “witch hunt”, “naming and shaming” – what we know in modern parlance as “cancel culture”, the bloodlust to “right a wrong” by having the wrongdoer’s life summarily and publicly cancelled.
But as much as we believe we are righting a wrong, if we spread allegations and accusations based on flimsy “facts” and dubious anecdotal narratives, while willfully ignoring any reasonable doubt on the matter or the accused - that is Gossip. No doubt about that.
Many thanks to our courageous cast for telling this difficult story together with our fearless director Timothy Koh; and also to our brilliant Creative/ Production/Technical/Stage Management Teams. As always, lots of love to the brilliant Pangdemonium family. Much gratitude to our fabulous Season Sponsor, DBS, for your continued faith, and to our wonderful Production Supporters.
And THANK YOU for supporting us in our effort to tell stories that confront the greys and doubts in our lives, as we navigate between the light and the dark.
Lots of love,
Adrian & Tracie Pang Artistic Directors
Doubt: A Parable is a text that has been in my life for more than a decade. I first came across the movie adaptation as a teenager. My artistic sensibilities were rawer then, less refined, and I wouldn’t have been able to identify super-objectives or map out how the event of each scene fed into the next. All I remember was how it made me feel: floored.
Then, I read the play. As I grew up and learnt more about theatre, I revisited the text with more learned eyes. Over the years, the secrets of the play slowly unraveled before me, and I began to recognise the genius of its complex storytelling hidden within a disarmingly simple premise. To this day, I consider Doubt to be one of the greatest examinations of human motivation ever written for the stage.
The play’s intellectual project is presented in the title’s two halves: Doubt and A Parable. The first word looms large over the trajectory of its storytelling: did the priest act inappropriately toward the boy or not? The search for an answer causes our characters excruciating doubt as they wage a battle of wills within a structured institution.
Beyond this, doubt is refracted, repeated, and refocussed throughout the piece: Father Flynn opens the play with a sermon on the power of doubt when wrestling with one’s faith. The young, well-meaning Sister James doubts her pedagogical methods when questioned by Sister Aloysius, her senior and herself a woman doubtful of the students under her charge. Mrs. Muller, the mother of the alleged victim, doubts Aloysius’ intentions, openly questioning her methods of pursuing justice. Then, the play hurtles toward to the most famous closing lines in all American playwriting.
On the other hand, parables are simple, narrative stories that hold some sort of moral or spiritual lesson. They appear in both the Bible and the Quran; many other cultures contain parables to teach lessons as a sort of an extended metaphor. What can we learn from this play? Is it an excoriating denouncement of ‘cancel culture’, presciently written before the term ever existed? Is it a deep dive into gender politics, is it a metaphor for Vatican 2.0 and shifting religious mores?
To me, the parable is everything and nothing listed above. The parable is also our biases, our battles, and our selves. The moral lesson is that there isn’t one, and that in the great muck of existence, there isn’t always a clean-cut answer. Human beings are morally ambiguous and amorphously motivated. Occasionally, they become diametrically opposed to you, even if you worship the same God, eat the same food, or share the same bed. Sometimes, you cannot be certain of the moral rightness of your choices. The only certainty is doubt. Therefore, my interpretation of this piece purposefully eschews moral didacticism.
I have chosen to stage this in the round, without a realistic set. Each member of the audience faces another, with the action happening in between. You are in a bowl, a lens, a microscope, watching four humans duke it out below. The design isn’t meant to perfectly replicate a 1960s Catholic School in the Bronx. Indeed, in willingly avoiding perfect representation, I hope to bring renewed focus to the language and the questions raised.
Still, I have been faithful to spirit of the play. I have strove to not reinterpret but distill the piece by being a faithful steward of Shanley’s words. I have sought to treat the play as a classic – as one treats Miller, Chekhov or Shakespeare – and find fresh meaning in known words. In some ways, this production is a parable demonstrating the antiparable. I hope you do not walk out of this play with armed certainty. I hope that you do not leave the theatre imbued with any galvanizing force of moral clarity. I hope you walk out unsure about who was right. I hope to present the characters charitably, as people deserving of our pathos. They are doing their best with the moral compasses they have been provided.
They are human. They have doubt. I hope you will, too.
Many thanks to the cast, creatives, production, technical, and stage management teams for bringing your best to this play. Eternal gratitude to the Pangdemonium team for successfully staging our second show of the year. And of course, my undying thanks to Adrian and Tracie for being such supportive producers through it all! Thanks to my fam too for always being in my corner.
What holds it up? You might as well ask what’s under me? On what am I built? There’s something silent under every person and under every play. There is something unsaid under any given society as well.
There’s a symptom apparent in America right now. It’s evident in political talk shows, in entertainment coverage, in artistic criticism of every kind, in religious discussion. We are living in a courtroom culture. We were living in a celebrity culture, but that’s dead. Now we’re only interested in celebrities
if they’re in court. We are living in a culture of extreme advocacy, of confrontation, of judgment, and of verdict. Discussion has given way to debate. Communication has become a contest of wills. Public talking has become obnoxious and insincere. Why? Maybe it’s because deep down under the chatter we have come to a place where we know that we don’t know... anything. But nobody’s willing to say that.
Let me ask you. Have you ever held a position in an argument past the point of comfort? Have you ever defended a way of life you were on the verge of exhausting? Have you ever given service to a creed you no longer utterly believed? Have you ever told a girl you loved her and felt the faint nausea of eroding conviction? I have. That’s an interesting moment. For a playwright, it’s the beginning of an idea. I saw a piece of real estate on which I might build a play, a play that sat on something silent in my life and in my time. I started with a title:
What is Doubt? Each of us is like a planet. There’s the crust, which seems eternal. We are confident about who we are. If you ask, we can readily describe our current state. I know my answers
to so many questions, as do you. What was your father like? Do you believe in God? Who’s your best friend? What do you want? Because under that face of easy response, Your answers are your current topography, seemingly permanent, there is another You. And this wordless Being moves just as the instant moves; it presses upward without explanation, fluid and wordless, until the resisting consciousness has no choice but to give way.
It is Doubt (so often experienced initially as weakness) that changes things. When a man feels unsteady, when he falters, when hard-won knowledge evaporates before his eyes, he’s on the verge of growth. The subtle or violent reconciliation of the outer person and the inner core often seems at first like a mistake, like you’ve gone the wrong way and you’re lost. But this is just emotion longing for the familiar. Life happens when the tectonic power of your speechless soul breaks through the dead habits of the mind. Doubt is nothing less than an opportunity to renter the Present.
The play. I’ve set my story in 1964, when not just me but the whole world seemed to be going through some
kind of vast puberty. The old ways were still dominant in behavior, dress, morality, world view, but what had been organic expression had become a dead mask. I was in a Catholic church school in the Bronx, run by the Sisters of Charity. These women dressed in black, believed in Hell, obeyed their male counterparts, and educated us. The faith, which held us together, went beyond the precincts of religion.
It was a shared dream we agreed to call Reality. We didn’t know it, but we had a deal, a social contract. We would all believe the same thing We would all believe.
Looking back, it seems to me, in those schools at that time, we were an ageless unity. We were all adults, and we were all children. We had, like many animals, flocked together for warmth and safety. As a result, we were terribly vulnerable to anyone who chose to hunt us. When trust is the order of the day, predators are free to plunder. And plunder they did. As the ever widening Church scandals reveal, the hunters had a field day. And the shepherds, so invested in the surface, sacrificed actual good for perceived virtue.
I have never forgotten the lessons of that era, nor learned them well enough. I still long for a shared certainty, an assumption of safety, the reassurance of believing that others know better than me what’s for the best. But I have been led by the bitter necessities of an interesting life to value that age-old practice of the wise: Doubt
There is an uneasy time when belief has begun to slip but hypocrisy has yet to take hold, when the consciousness is disturbed but not yet altered. It is the most dangerous, important, and ongoing experience of life. The beginning of change is the moment of Doubt. It is that crucial moment when I renew my humanity or become a lie.
Doubt requires more courage than conviction does, and more energy; because conviction is a resting place and doubt is infinite - it is a passionate exercise. You may come out of my play uncertain. You may want to be sure. Look down on that feeling. We’ve got to learn to live with a full measure of uncertainty.
There is no last word. That’s the silence under the chatter of our time.
The state of modern outrage is a cycle: We wake up mad, we go to bed mad, and in between, the only thing that might change is what’s making us angry. The one gesture that could offer substantive change, or at least provide a way forward — forgiveness — seems perpetually beyond our reach.
In the public sphere, we’re constantly being asked to weigh in on the question of forgiveness as a cultural process. The consensus thus far has largely been that 21st century society has no room for the concept. In a tweet from March 2021, Atlantic writer Elizabeth Bruenig wrote, “as a society we have absolutely no coherent story about how a person who’s done wrong can atone, make amends, and retain some continuity between their life/ identity before and after the mistake.”
In other words, everyone wants forgiveness, but no one is being forgiven, and no one knows how to negotiate forgiveness at a cultural level. In an era of polarized politics, cancel culture, and the obsession of social media users to conduct informal modern tribunals without due process, seeking and granting forgiveness – public or private - is increasingly complicated.
The questions involved get harder by the day: What use is an apology if people are unwilling to hear it? Whose forgiveness matters most? Why do we as a society feel that the wrongdoers owe an apology to us, and not to the victim alone? And what’s the point of agreeing on answers to any of the other questions if all we really want is to hang onto our moral high ground, scoring points online rather than moving on?
Bound up in the handwringing over cancel culture is the idea that lurking on the internet is a potential vigilante justice mob, out to insist that a score must be settled. In this messy context, on such a public stage, there’s little room for humanization between offence and vengeance.
The idea of “cancelling” turns every potential interaction into a bad-faith nightmare, reframing earnest calls for accountability as witch hunts and often derailing the possibility of penitence before the question of forgiveness can ever arise.
Those who sound the cancel culture alarm do have some significant concerns, namely: How is anyone supposed to attain lasting forgiveness at a cultural, societal level without
having their past offenses permanently held against them?
To which there is the valid response: does every offence require forgiveness at a cultural, societal level?
What if the offender privately seeks and attains forgiveness from their victim — do the rest of us have the right to insist that the offender be named and shamed in public? What is the ultimate aim of this, and what does it say about our collective sense of entitlement? When has a wrongdoer been sufficiently “punished” by society through being publicly called out? Is public atonement for a private offence necessary or even morally sound? When is it okay for the offender, the offended and the rest of us, to “move on”?
If things are at such an impasse, is public forgiveness even a worthy goal? Perhaps not, but surely it is preferable to either a public figure’s summary cancellation or a furious, endless standoff between offender and offended. In practice, rather than becoming an alternative to outrage and wariness, the idea of forgiveness can fuel just as much outrage and wariness as anything else these days.
That’s all thanks to the nature of modern outrage itself — the self-perpetuating cycle thrives on never letting go and turning every attempt at moving past it into another source of anger, another element to distrust: the hysterical belief that a wrongdoer does not ever deserve redemption, forgiveness, a second chance, the opportunity to atone, the freedom to live the rest of their life in the pursuit of peace, happiness and success.
If we applied a positive road map to a typical outrage cycle, what we would hope to find after that initial period of outrage is discussion, apology, atonement, and forgiveness. That process almost never happens on the modern public stage.
Instead, far too often, a single offence becomes part of a litany of wrongs that follow the offender around, with the long tail of their sins — imagined, real, or alleged — trailing behind them forever, ready to be brought up the next time they draw attention, leading them to look over their shoulder for the rest of their lives, and endure still more damnation every time they make new mistakes, or a public reminder of their sin if they have the audacity to find contentment.
Internet researcher Alice Marwick’s investigations into morally motivated networked harassment found that when groups of people on social media believed their moral code had been somehow collectively violated by an offence to one individual, they felt so justified in their harassment of their targets that they refused to acknowledge it as harassment.
“When you think of somebody as being immoral, that shuts down the ability to have a conversation,” Marwick said in a 2021 interview. “It really does encourage dehumanization and seeing other people as the other, rather than as actual people. There are places where our sense of morality is so strong that we don’t believe the other person can be redeemed.”
Fundamentally, this means that a group’s sense of “justice” becomes more about punishing the offender than it is about the real needs of the offended party. As far as they are concerned, even if the offender has been privately made accountable, justice is not seen to be done until the he/she is publicly “taken down”, not ever again deserving any good in their lives.
Imagine facing down this kind of collective movement. A person who starts out willing to listen and learn from their critics can become so badly burned by toxic harassment that they lash out at their critics and dig in their heels instead. That has a bunch of ripple effects. It can make the harassers feel even more validated in their actions and anger. It fuels the idea that the offender was never sincerely sorry to begin with, which can lead to more anger and retribution. It also can make the target even less likely to listen and learn the next time someone accuses them of doing something wrong because they’ve already been burned and they have less reason than ever to trust their accusers.
The idea of “bad-faith engagement” has become kind of a buzzy shorthand for the messiness of this process, but it really is the key to any conversation we have about forgiveness.
To reach a point where anger and toxicity are diminished, we have to engage with each other sincerely and respectfully, believing that the people on the receiving end of our anger have the best of intentions in engaging with us. We have to replace bad-faith engagement with good-faith engagement.
We’re a long way from knowing how to do that.
It doesn’t help that a sincere apology — the thing society requires to move forward, presuming a threshold of good faith can be met at all — is often a disaster when it happens on a public stage. If it happens at all.
But once again is the question – does every wrong, even a wrong done to an individual, require a public apology to the rest of us? Is it not enough if the offender has made peace with the victim? Are we so sanctimonious to believe that we are vicariously also owed an apology?
Who are we to say that not enough atonement has been privately made?
The classic apology, as described by social psychologists in 2004, involves “admitting fault, admitting damage, expressing remorse, asking for forgiveness, and offering compensation.” Yet while plenty of research has been done on the perfect apology, we’ve had very few cultural examples of one being delivered effectively and sincerely, certainly by those who chose to do so publicly.
We’ve had even fewer examples of such an apology being followed up with a process of actual atonement.
Whether someone possesses the ability to make a thoughtful, heartfelt apology and then apply those learned lessons to avoid other similar mistakes may seem like an apology side quest. But it’s a further consideration for those who’ve been victimized: When experience teaches you that some people can and do hide bad behaviour under a mask of contrition, it only increases your mistrust.
The fact is, we really don’t know who forgiveness is for. Is it for the alienated, hurt victims of an act, or is it for everyone? Is its aim to heal the injured? Or to allow the general public to move on? Who says we the public are even owed this?
Consider Roman Polanski. Plenty of major Hollywood figures over the years have publicly called for Polanski to be forgiven for raping a 13-year-old girl in 1977. As an adult, his victim publicly forgave him herself. In the absence of any serious accountability for Polanski, however, many refuse to move on. “Forgiveness is not enough,” Julia Baird wrote for Newsweek in 2009, in a piece stressing the importance of holding Polanski accountable for his crime rather than treating his victim’s forgiveness as a form of absolution.
What about the Will Smith/ Chris Rock Oscar slap saga?
Yes, it was messy; yes, it took Smith ages before he made an apology to Rock; and yes the rest of the world felt that we needed to hear that apology – in other words, we insist on being corecipients of the expression of remorse. Why? Because Smith is a “public figure”, who committed a very public offence? Or because modern society believes that atonement and redemption cannot be achieved without the public’s endorsement?
This raises a side question: what precisely constitutes a “public figure”? Perhaps that’s an easy question, with predictable answers. But what modern culture and social media is now doing is making even non“public figures” public; outing “everymen/women” who have committed offences, and forcing them to publicly beg for forgiveness.
And once again, even if the offender does submit to this trial-by-Twitter, when is enough really enough? Because there’s no way to collectively arbitrate accountability for unaccountable individuals, there’s no definable start and end point for forgiveness.
Asking everyone who’s invested in the process to give up and move on, or to collectively agree that someone has atoned, is impossible.
That brings us to what is arguably the most difficult aspect of the forgiveness conversation: letting go.
Perhaps the most important takeaway from Marwick’s research is that the social media dynamics that cause us to feel morally justified in
harassing one another also reward holding onto our outrage. So much of the genuine fear of cancel culture involves this idea that once you’re “cancelled,” nothing you can do, however wellintentioned, will be enough to satisfy the people baying for your blood. It’s easy to see why that fear exists.
Social media rewards pithy, angry takes rather than nuanced, balanced discussions, then boosts those takes so they attract more angry, non-nuanced takes. It can feel good to be part of that collective anger, especially when you feel righteous. It’s often extremely difficult to let that anger go, to forgive, adjust, and move on. Social media has provided a platform for us all to display the most spiteful and sadistic instincts, under guise of righteousness.
Most moral and spiritual authorities teach us that the cycle of repentance usually involves grace. Grace, the act of allowing people room to be human and make mistakes while still valuing them and affording them a second chance, might be the most precious concept of all in this conversation about right and wrong, penance and reform—but it’s the one that almost never gets discussed.
That’s understandable. Grace relies on some huge assumptions: that people mean well and that their intent is not to be hurtful; that they are capable of selfreflection and change; and, of course, that we all possess equal shares of dignity and humanity.
These are all big asks in a world that has become increasingly divisive and hateful. It’s easy to say we shouldn’t assume that every anonymous internet stranger or every person on the other side of a debate is bad, sure. Still, when you’re meeting people only in the limited context of a username, a profile pic, and a few angry statements on social media, it’s not easy to stop and remember there might be a whole, well-intentioned person behind the avatar.
That’s what makes the concept of grace so powerful. It forces us to contend not only with other people’s
human frailty but with our own: to remember how good it feels when someone, out of the blue, treats us with respect, empathy, and kindness in the middle of an angry conversation where we expect nothing but hostility. To be shown the kindness of strangers when we expect cruelty, and then bestow that gift in turn—that’s the remarkable quality of grace. But there’s little room for it when we’re barely able to handle the concept of forgiveness, and equally unable to stop being angry with the offender after all is said and done.
And so, we arrive back at the beginning of the cycle: We hang on to our anger, and all this anger puts the possibility of grace even further out of reach. There is, and always will be, so much grey areas, so much doubt, that we will never be able to differentiate right from righteousness and distinguish wrong from wrong-headedness.
Perhaps there’s a perverse commonality in knowing that no matter what “side” we’re on, we’re all bad at this. Being generous and gracious to each other is a difficult, gruelling process for everyone. We all struggle at it, together.
— Excerpts from: https://www.vox. com/22969804/ forgivenessgibson-loganpaul-jk-rowling.
Sister James
Shu Yi is a bilingual actor, singer, dancer and host. Shu Yi graduated LASALLE College of the Arts with a BA(Hons) in Musical Theatre (2016).
She has been actively involved in the local theatre scene and the TV/Film scene. Some of her recent theatre credits include: Hare & Tortoise (Singapore Repertory Theatre – SRT); A Dream Under the Southern Bough: Existence (Toy Factory); Electrify My World (Nine Years Theatre).
Some of her recent TV and Film credits include: #LookAtMe; Reunion; 20 Days; Mount Emily.
Mrs. Muller
Sharon Frese is a British AfroCaribbean Arts Practitioner and a BA(Hons) graduate of Rose Bruford College, UK.
Malaysia is her present home after a decade in Singapore working in education (NUS) and on the local arts scene with several local companies. Works in Asia include: Singapore (The Necessary Stage); The Extraodinary Travels of Miss British (The Orange Playground The Necessary Stage); The Mountain (The Art of Strangers); The House of Bernada Alba (Wild Rice); Scents of Josephine (Belle Epoque); This Placement (Teater Ekamatra); Ma’ma Yong (Esplanade Studios).
Sharon was last seen in the M1 Fringe Festival commissioned work Ayer- Hitam: A Black History of Singapore and an Esplanade Studio work Miss British in 2019.
TV/Film Credits: Whispers of The Dead; The Faith of Anna Waters.
Jason Godfrey is a writer and actor who is most recognizable from his time playing James Shelley in the long-running drama series Kin. Jason has also appeared in the TV series Third Rail and The Girl He Never Noticed, and has finished writing for the second season of the children’s show What On Earth.
Neo Swee Lin trained at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. She also has a law degree from NUS.
Plays include: Devil’s Cherry; The Truth; Missing; Dark Room; Hotel; Circle Mirror Transformation; Falling; Romeo & Juliet; Cooling Off Day; Nadirah; Poop; Postcards from Rosa; Beauty World; Cogito; For the Pleasure of Seeing Her Again; Mama Looking for her Cat; The House of Bernada Alba.
Her local TV and film work include Sleep With Me; Avenue 14; The Blue Mansion; 12 Storeys; PCK Pte Ltd.
Swee Lin has also voiced many documentaries for National Geographic & Discovery. These include the Korea Next series; Samurai Spiders of Japan; Body Snatchers of Bangkok.
She is married to Lim Kay Siu, together they form The NeoKeleLims & live stream on Twitch.tv/TheNeoKeleLims.
Jason Godfrey
Father Brendan Flynn
In New York City, Timothy has worked as an Assistant Director at Lincoln Center Theater and Manhattan Theatre Club, held a Fellowship at Playwrights Horizons, and directed thesis plays at NYU’s Graduate Department of Dramatic Writing. Other US experience includes work with Scott Rudin Productions, Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, and the Lucille Lortel Awards.
In Singapore, he is the Associate Director of Pangdemonium, where he helms the New Works Lab and the Very Youthful Company. With Pangdemonium, he directed Muswell Hill and assistant directed The Mother; The Glass Menagerie; End of the Rainbow; and People, Places & Things
Training: New York University Tisch School of the Arts (BFA Theatre), College of Arts and Science (BA English and American Literature).
John Patrick Shanley was born in The Bronx, New York City on October 13, 1950. He grew up in a working-class family, and was profoundly affected by his crime-ridden neighborhood. He later enrolled in New York University, but he took time off to serve as a U.S. Marine during the Vietnam War.
Shanley’s most famous work, Doubt, is somewhat based upon the writer’s own experiences and observations in his Catholic school. The character of Sister James is inspired by one of his high school teachers. While building his career as a playwright, he became commercially successful with his screenplay for the 1987 romantic-comedy film, Moonstruck, for which he was nominated for an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.
On the stage, Doubt: A Parable (2005) was one of the biggest successes of the writer’s career. The play was praised by audiences and critics, and won four Tony Awards and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Shanley later adapted and directed Doubt: A Parable for the screen. Shanley’s talent has solidified him as a revered American playwright, screenwriter, and director.
His other plays include Outside Mullingar, Prodigal Son, and The Portuguese Kid.
Eucien has been a long-time Pangdemonium collaborator since 2011. His recent sets include designs for End of the Rainbow; Muswell Hill; The Glass Menagerie; The Father, The Pillowman; RENT; and This is What Happens to Pretty Girls.
His design work with Pangdemonium has often been recognised at The Straits Times Life Theatre Awards, with nominations in the Best Set Design category for The Mother; Urinetown; Little Voice; and Spring Awakening; and receiving the Best Set Design award for Dealer’s Choice
Other Awards: ST Life Theatre Awards Best Set Design winner for The Almighty Sometimes (SRT); Company (Dream Academy); December Rains (Toy Factory)
Selected productions: for SIFAThe Commission; DisSPACEments (installation); for Esplanade Theatres - Kingdoms Apart; A Good Death; with Wild Rice - La Cage Aux Folles (2017); Boeing Boeing (2017); A $ingapore Carol; The Emperor’s New Clothes; Snow White; with Checkpoint Theatre - Normal; with Toy Factory Productions: December Rains; Shanghai Blues; Sleepless Town; with STAGES - H is for Hantu; with I-Theatre - Sing To The Dawn; The Wizard of Oz; The Arabian Nights; Fairytaleheart.
Genevieve graduated from The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, London with a BA(Hons) in Theatre Practice, specialising in Lighting and Projection/Video Design.
Design credits include People Places and Things, The Glass Menagerie, Tango, The Effect (Pangdemonium), The Soldier and His Virtuous Wife, Four Horse Road, I Came At Last To The Seas, Lao Jiu, Liao Zhai Rocks, If There’re Seasons (The Theatre Practice), ubin, Both Sides Now 2019, Missing, With Time (Drama Box), Between You and Me, Lear is Dead, Art Studio (Nine Years Theatre), Lungs, The Sound Inside, The Lifespan of a Fact (SRT), The Commission (Pangdemonium, SRT & Wild Rice).
Daniel Wong is a sound designer, composer and music producer. He graduated from Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music with a B.Mus (Hons) in Recording Arts & Science.
Sound design credits include People, Places & Things (Pangdemonium), The Almighty Sometimes (SRT), Muswell Hill (Pangdemonium), I And You (Gateway Arts), The Sound Inside (SRT), Tuesdays with Morrie (SRT), and Cafe (Wild Rice)
Outside of theatre, Daniel produces songs for various artists and organisations, including lewloh, JAWN, Vivien Yap, HubbaBubbas, Lorong Boys, and Voices of Singapore. He recently produced the main theme song for Sunny Side Up with his band, Oakë.
Leonard Augustine Choo is an international costume designer, fashion consultant, and educator currently based in Singapore. He designs costumes for dance, opera, theatre, and film, and was the principal fabric shopper for the New York City Ballet costume department for 12 seasons, working on over 75 unique ballets.
Design credits include: Muswell Hill, The Glass Menagerie, Urinetown, Late Company (Pangdemonium); The Almighty Sometimes, Guards at the Taj, Gretel & Hansel (SRT); An Inspector Calls, Merdeka!(Wild Rice), iSing International Opera Festival (Suzhou, China); ABT Fall 2018 Video, Moulin Rouge Spot, Forest Boy (New York); Imagining Madoff, Pattern of Life; Don Giovanni, and House (Boston).
Leonard worked for the Juilliard School, television shows Gotham (FOX) and Crashing (HBO), Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Ballet Academy East, Barrington Stage Company, and Opera Omaha.
He has lectured at LASALLE College of the Arts, National Library, and the Arkansas Arts Center. Holding an MFA from Boston University, Leonard is the first and only costume designer awarded the Singapore NAC Overseas Arts Scholarship in 2011.
He is currently Director of Industry Development at Singapore Fashion Council.
Leong is a hairstylist with over 30 years of experience, and is currently based at The Hair Shop, Singapore.
A veteran hair designer, Leong has been involved in many film, television and theatre productions; his hair creations have also been featured in many top magazines.
Leong loves developing signature hairstyles for each and every character & client and bringing them to life. Productions include People, Places, and Things (2023) with Pangdemonium, Blue Mansion (2011), Revenge of the Pontianak (2018), Dim Sum Dollies (2022).
Petrina is a Voice, Accents and Presentation Coach. She is the first and only Singaporean certified with the Fitzmaurice Voicework® and the Knight Thompson Speechwork® methods.
Petrina has extensive experience working with people from diverse backgrounds and organisations. She runs workshops on presentation skills, voice, and storytelling at corporate companies and has taught voice and accents at many theatre companies and institutions like NAFA and LASALLE. She is a much sought after voice actor and voice-over director for animation and commercials.
Petrina started out her career on radio and was the co-host on various top morning shows.
Theatre work includes ‘Grace’ in Waiting for the Host (Pangdemonium); ‘Da Jie’ in Lao Jiu (Theatre Practice); ‘Amy’ in Company (Dream World Productions).
Cast (in alphabetical order)
CHING SHU YI
Sister James
SHARON FRESE
Mrs. Muller
JASON GODFREY
Father Brendan Flynn
NEO SWEE LIN
Sister Aloysius Beauvier
Creative
TIMOTHY KOH Director
JOHN PATRICK
SHANLEY
Playwright
EUCIEN CHIA
Set Designer
GRACE LIN
Associate Set Designer
GENEVIEVE PECK
Lighting Designer
DANIEL WONG
Sound Designer
GUO NINGRU
Sound System Designer
LEONARD
AUGUSTINE CHOO
Costume Designer
LEONG LIM
Hair Designer
PETRINA KOW
Accent Coach
Production & Stage Management Teams
CAT ANDRADE
Stage Manager
KOH YI WEI
Assistant Stage Manager
PETER CHI
Technical Manager
DANIEL SIM
Props Master
LOO AN NI
Costume Coordinator
TABBY KOH
Dresser
RYAN NG
Sound Operator
PAUL LIM
Lighting Apprentice
SOPHIA ZHU
Stage Management Apprentice
TAN YI KAI
Lighting Board Programmer
Pangdemonium Board
RAEZA IBRAHIM
JOHN CURRIE
DEBBIE ANDRADE
LEONARDO DRAGO
DR. JADE KUA
BEATRICE CHIA-RICHMOND
TRACIE PANG
ADRIAN PANG
Pangdemonium Team
TRACIE PANG
Artistic Director/Managing Director
ADRIAN PANG
Artistic Director/Producer
RENEE TAN
General Manager
TIMOTHY KOH
Associate Director
LEAH SIM
Production Manager
SUNITHA NAYAR
Production Manager
CAT ANDRADE
Company Stage Manager
KRISTAL ZHOU
Marketing Manager
RICHIE RYAN
Digital Marketing Executive
KUSUM SANDHU
Fundraising & Engagement Manager
CLARE YURU
Business Development Manager
SHARMIN NORMAN
Ticketing Executive
GUILLAUME VAUTRIN
Accounting Manager
GUINEVIERE LOW
Company Administrator
MAN LIN
Ticketing & Marketing Assistant
LEE JIA MIN
Production Apprentice
SOPHIA ZHU
Stage Management Apprentice
JAMES TAN
Associate Artist
A major component of Pangdemonium’s mission is to nurture aspiring artists and theatre practitioners. We want to provide opportunities for emerging talents to work with and learn from industry professionals in a challenging and inspiring environment.
With these practical and instructive programmes, we aim to reach out to the community, fuel the creative instincts of young minds, cultivate the passion for the art of story-telling on stage, and share hands-on experience in the craft of theatre making. Through this, we hope to foster future theatre-makers.
Our long-running Triple Threats Musical Theatre Workshop is designed for youths aged 13 to 19 who are interested in the art of musical theatre.
The programme aims to impart the fundamentals of storytelling through music, expression through song, vocal instruction, and movement. It culminates in a special showcase.
Our alumni have gone on to perform in professional productions such as Six The Musical, Fun Home, The Great Wall Musical and Miss Saigon Vienna. Many have furthered their training in musical theatre in degree programmes both locally and abroad.
Auditions were held in April and the two-week intensive programme will occur in the final weeks of June 2023.
The Very Youthful Company (VYC) represents our youth wing, where theatre-makers aged 14-19 form a company and perform in a fully-staged play.
Through weekly Saturday sessions, they act, stage manage, and design aspects of the show under the guidance of our Pangdemonium team.
Last December, we staged Failure: A Love Story by Philip Dawkins at the SOTA Studio Theatre.
Auditions will be held on 22nd July 2023. The programme this year will run September through the first weekend of December.
We launched our New Works Lab in 2022. The Lab provides playwrights with intense dramaturgical support on a new original play.
This year, Ong Chong An was selected to further develop his play, Singapore, Michigan, through stages of redrafting, feedback, and inquiry.
The process-focused programme will culminate in a staged reading in August 2023.
Our Technical Apprenticeship programme offers a production-long, professional experience for highly motivated and committed individuals who are looking to bridge the gap between their academic experience and a professional career in theatre. We offer apprenticeships in Stage Management, Production Management, Technical Management, as well as an exclusive programme in Lighting Design.
Apprentices will work with our professional Stage Management team from pre-production through the final performance.
In the process, they will have the opportunity to maintain paperwork, take line notes, be on book, preset and run shows, among other duties.
Stage Management apprentices are required to attend rehearsals and become an active running crew member during performances.
Apprentices will have the opportunity to work with our professional Technical Management team and Creative team. The apprentice will gain hands-on experience working with professionals in the industry from pre to postproduction.
This is a 24-month apprenticeship programme for all young professionals interested in Technical Management.
Dates and hours will be determined by the needs of each production.
Apprentices will work with our full-time Production Management staff.
Production Management has the critical role of keeping a production running smoothly from conceptualization through rehearsals, set-up, performances, and eventually strike and archival.
Apprentices will assist the Production Management team in coordinating the various production disciplines – scenic, lighting, wardrobe, sound, multimedia projection, and stage management.
Production Management apprentices are required to fulfil office hours in the department as well as attend to the needs of the production during performances.
This is a 12-month apprenticeship that will give an intermediate-level lighting-specialized individual an exclusive opportunity to further develop their craft under the mentorship of Pangdemonium’s Associate Artist, James Tan.
Dates and hours will be determined by the needs of each production.
We’re looking for earlycareer professionals who meet the following qualifications:
• Have some previous theatre training and skills.
• Exhibit a strong drive to work in this field (relevant academic qualifications are a plus, but not a requirement)
• Are over 18 years old.
• Are willing to clock irregular working hours.
• Can commit for the length of the production (depending on individual apprenticeships, may be anything from 3 to 6 months)
• Word processing and spreadsheet experience is also required.
Admission by interview only. For enquiries, please email us at education@pangdemonium.com.
James Tan is an established Singaporean Lighting Designer. He holds a Master of Fine Arts in Lighting Design from UC San Diego. James recognises the significance of mentorship for young aspiring lighting professionals. James was conferred The Young Artist Award and awarded Arts Professional Scholarship by The National Arts Council of Singapore.
White Knights
Anthonia Hui & Leonardo Drago
Winged Crusaders
Holywell Foundation
Jacqueline Ho, Esq
The Diana Koh Foundation
The Grace, Shua Jacob Ballas II Charitable Trust
Crusaders
Mrs Lee Li-Ming
Priscylla Shaw
Superheroes
Desmond & May Lim
Harris Zaidi & Terry Tan
Oh Jen Jen
Russell Heng
Shiv & Roopa Dewan
Heroes Anonymous
Clarence Tan Dr Irene Lim & Prof David Stringer
Hans Joachim Joerger-Ramos
Heng Gek Hwah
John Currie & Hong Sun Chee
Katherine Krummert & Shawn Galey
Ronald & Janet Stride
Ronald Gwee
SL Chan
Sze Wei Goh
Champions
Aileen Tang
Ajit R Nayak
Angela Erika Irma Soeteber
Anonymous
Anton Lee Wei Min
Audrey Chng
Barry & YT Clarke
Brian Selby & Angelina Chang
Carolyn Lim
Catherine Cheung & Elvin Too
Chan Weng Onn
Christina & Alvin Liew
Christopher Pang
David Neo
Dr Tan Eng Thye Jason
Duncan Kauffman
Ferdinand de Bakker & Yoon Lai Cheng
Foo Yee Ling
Grace Chiam
Gretchen Liu
Kelvin & Sandy Tan
Kevin & Dina Coppel
Kwok Junfeng
Lee Eng Hin & Saralee Turner
Lim Wen Juin & Rachel Low
Melanie Tan
Musa Bin Fazalur Karim
Novus Ferro Pte Ltd
Pang Siu Mei
Ravi Sivalingam
Rita Elaine Silver
Robin Arnold
Sehr & Ashnil Dixit
Selina Chong
Serene Ng
Steve Miller & Pat Meyer
Susan Sim
Suzanne Lim
Tee Bee Tin
Toh Wei Seng
William & Teresa Neo
Yap Su-Yin
Ang Siew Hui & Hock Tan
Anonymous
Anonymous
Anonymous
Audrey Phua
Chan Wai Kin
Chia Yu Hsien & Linda Lim
Chloe Goh
Dominik von Wantoch-Rekowski
Dr Christopher Chen
Esther Khoo
Faye Kwan
Frites Digital Pte Ltd
Heng Wen Xiu
Huang Xiangbin
Hwee Suan Ong
Janice Goh
Jasmine Wong
Joee Ng
Joni Koh
Jorin Ng
Khoo Swee Koon
Leslie Lee
Lim Jia Yan
Lim Lay Keow
Lim Mingcheng
Loh Soon Hui
Lone Lee
Lydia Ong
Mark Lee
Matthew Flaherty
Maurice de Vaz
Michael Henderson
Nathalie Ribette
Ng Hua Feng
Nikko Aw
Niko Lin
Omar Sotomayor
Ong Pei San
Ong Sok Chzeng @ Su Chzeng Booth Ong
Pek Li Jin Joanne
Pierre Colignon
Rajesh Achanta
Richard & Karen Hounsell
Ronald JJ Wong
Rosalind Khor
Sabrina Amir Soh
Sandra Gwee
Sarah Mei Ismail
Siva Govindasamy & Malini Sitaram
Teo Kien Boon
Therese Nai
TwoGoods Haus Pte Ltd
TwoSpuds Pte Ltd
Vidula Verma
Wee Cathleen
Wynnii Lu
Yichun Ng
Yusri Shaggy Sapari
We would like to express our sincere thanks to our new Friends who made their kind donations after this list went to print.
Join our philanthropic friends and help us tell the stories that are inspiring, relevant and accessible for the young and young-at-heart.
At Pangdemonium, we believe in staging productions that have a global resonance and universal significance in hopes of fostering a resilient and compassionate society.
Your support will not only go towards bringing stories to the stage, but also giving opportunities to our theatre practitioners as well as nurturing the next generation of artists and audiences.
As our Friend, you will receive complimentary tickets, be the first to hear about our latest projects, receive a 250% tax deduction on your donation, enjoy backstage tours and much more!
If you believe in the work that we do, please become our Friend today!
–Pangdemonium Theatre Company Ltd is a registered charity with IPC status (UEN No.: 201229915M) and cash donations above $50 are eligible for a 250% tax deduction. Donate today at donate.pangdemonium.com.
For more information on joining our Friends of Pangdemonium programme, please contact us at fundraiser@pangdemonium.com.
PANGDEMANIAC CHAMPION HERO SUPERHERO CRUSADER
WINGED CRUSADER
$500 $1,000 $2,500 $5,000 $10,000 $25,000 $50,000
At Pangdemonium, we are able to continue doing the work we do because our corporate partners believe in us. For the past decade, Pangdemonium has shared the power of live storytelling with audiences from all walks of life. Even during unusual and challenging times, we continue to tell these stories.
We are extremely grateful to companies like DBS Bank Ltd, Alfa Tech and HCS Engineering for standing with us in solidarity and coming on this journey with us as a season sponsor and corporate donors respectively.
Corporate support is crucial in helping Pangdemonium fulfill our mission, by assisting in our day-to-day operations, keeping our high production values, and funding our education and outreach programmes.
In appreciation of your generosity, our Corporate Donors, Corporate Sponsors and In-Kind Partners get to enjoy exclusive opportunities and entitlements – from being able to demonstrate your commitment to the arts and the theatre community to connecting with clients over meaningful experiences, increasing your brand engagement, and achieving your organisation’s philanthropic and community outreach goals.
We have an exciting year ahead with productions that continue to address challenging topics and at the same time make arts accessible to more people. Arts communities all around the world are still facing many challenges in a post-pandemic world, and we welcome your solidarity and support so that we can continue to inspire and empower lives through the magic of theatre.
–
Pangdemonium Theatre Company Ltd is a registered charity with IPC status (UEN No.: 201229915M) and cash donations above $50 are eligible for a 250% tax deduction.
Consider making an online gift today at donate. pangdemonium.com or contact our Philanthropy team at clare@pangdemonium.com for corporate giving, sponsorship opportunities, and in-kind donations.
Tracie and Adrian would like to say a big thank you to the following for creating further pangdemonium with us on our production of Doubt: A Parable.
