COMMENT | Thanks for the memory, Jit
"No one that I know of in Malaysian theatre makes decadence as scintillating as does Jit Murad… Jit reincarnated the blithe spirit of Noel Coward. He seemed to have been transported from another time and mood to give us a separate peace in our present, conflict-ridden clime… he could easily become one of the wiliest, devious and subversive performers on the local stage."
COMMENT | That was drama critic Krishen Jit’s assessment of Jit Murad on his debut as a theatre performer. (A New Sundays Times review collected in “Krishen: An Uncommon Position”, Contemporary Asian Arts Centre, 2003.)
The performances were at the Fringe of the Singapore Arts Festival 1988 (after two successful seasons in Kuala Lumpur the year before).
The play was “Caught in the Middle” (commonly referred to as CiTM), written and directed by me.
I am at an age where...
"No one that I know of in Malaysian theatre makes decadence as scintillating as does Jit Murad… Jit reincarnated the blithe spirit of Noel Coward. He seemed to have been transported from another time and mood to give us a separate peace in our present, conflict-ridden clime… he could easily become one of the wiliest, devious and subversive performers on the local stage."
COMMENT | That was drama critic Krishen Jit’s assessment of Jit Murad on his debut as a theatre performer. (A New Sundays Times review collected in “Krishen: An Uncommon Position”, Contemporary Asian Arts Centre, 2003.)
The performances were at the Fringe of the Singapore Arts Festival 1988 (after two successful seasons in Kuala Lumpur the year before).
The play was “Caught in the Middle” (commonly referred to as CiTM), written and directed by me.
I am at an age where news of the loss of a friend joins a lengthening catalogue of departed family and friends. Thanatos will take his toll. I am numbed, but that just means the hurt is submerged, not gone.
My salve for the pain is whatever memories I can dredge from the archives of my mind of the good times, the adrenalin-highs we had.
“Caught in the Middle” was my first effort at a script, a multi-lingual comedy of life in the suburbs in Malaysia, after years of directing British, American, South African, Marathi, Japanese scripts. Scary, never been done before. And would not have been done if the Special Branch had had its banning way.
Right from the start, I wanted the script fluid, and a cast capable of improvising, contributing humour. Laughter springs from performer and audience sharing circumstances. So I was looking for a multi-racial cast who was quick on the wit.
Jit (above) showed up for the auditions with his friend, actress Liza Othman. He said he had no experience in theatre. I said I don’t care, the auditions are simple, just tell me something funny about Malaysia, about being Malaysian.
I don’t remember his audition, but he was in. And soon after that, it was Jit approaching me: “Thor, I wrote this sketch I can do with Liza. See if you can use it.”
It was in, and Jit and Liza brought the house down every night with that scene.
After two successful seasons, we got an invite to perform at the Singapore Arts Festival. Board and per diem for food and performance fee, transport our problem. MAS didn’t want to know, till a friend got KTM to sponsor sleeping (impossible) berths in the rattling, noisy night mail to Singapore, arriving at the crack of dawn, to droop exhausted around the hotel lobby for five hours because our rooms had not been vacated… (another time for this story.)
I am certain that Krishen’s rave review of Jit had nothing to do with the fact that on the evening of our opening night, a phone call led to me meeting Krishen in the lobby of the hotel. Krishen had come to review the play with literally just a toothbrush in his shirt pocket, no place to stay. Can he crash with the group?
We were all three to a room, except for a two-roomer - Jo Kukathas and Jit.
“Jit, Krishen Jit is here to review the play. He needs a bed. He’s crashing with you and Jo tonight.”
“What? No! I have plans for my bed tonight. Jo’s agreed to nurse a coffee in the coffee-house downstairs till I am done.”
“Jit, may I remind you Krishen is the leading theatre critic in town? His columns are a Sermon from the Mount, they can make or break…”
I reiterate: I am certain that the fact that Jit and Jo gave sanctuary to Krishen that night had nothing with the positive review that was penned subsequently.
Rest well, Peter Pan
There is no gainsaying Jit’s subsequent stellar career as performer and writer with his friends/collaborators in Instant Café Theatre, and with Zahim Albakri.
Nowadays, lazy journalese labels popular personalities and stars as “icons”. The artists I know, have known, like Jit, were iconoclasts, irritants always questioning, challenging the given order. They may, will have their faults, but their passions were writ large. Who wants polite, boring art?
I last worked with Jit in an ensemble (a wild bunch of manic explosives that included Patrick Teoh, Joanne Kam Poh Poh and Gavin Yap) for an Actors’ Studio production “Life Sdn Bhd.” We each had a routine that was about Malaysia, a fragmentary glimpse of us as Malaysians.
Jit’s routine started the show, about his identity as a Malay, about the smorgasbord of multiple ethnic blood-strains from all over Asia and the West that have mingled in his family through the generations, ending with the punch-line: But I’m a bumiputera.
That routine encapsulates the impossibility of confining that quicksilver mind and protean self in one box.
Unprompted, the news of Jit’s passing clicked on a song in my mental jukebox that became a theme for Bob Hope, not exactly a natural choice for someone brought up on the Beatles, Dylan and rock – “Thanks for the Memory”.
Many's the time that we feasted
And many's the time that we fasted
Oh well, it was swell while it lasted
We did have fun, and no harm done
So thanks for the memory
Of … nights in Singapore
You might have been a headache, but you never were a bore
I thank you so much
Thanks for the memory
Awfully glad I met you
Cheerio and toodle-oo
Thank you
Thank you so much.
Rest well, Peter Pan (the name I teased him with for a while because it came up in conversation with Krishen after the show.) I will always remember…
THOR KAH HOONG is a veteran journalist.
The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.
