Dear Governor Bao

Comedians Workshop (Taiwan)
Esplanade Concert Hall
Feb 23, 8pm

At the end of this crosstalk production, Feng Yi Gang, art director of Comedians Workshop from Taiwan, spoke of a pre-1980s Taiwan, when entertainment on television was limited and the high point of programming was one showcasing the exploits of Governor Bao at 8pm.

Everyone would watch, he said, and then come together to discuss it the next day, partaking in a moment of intimacy, as if they were an extended family that had shared in this communal entertainment the night before.

Dear Governor Bao, Comedians Workshop’s crosstalk choreography inspired by this iconic Northern Song Dynasty figure, is in part a tribute to this simpler time.

Its humour, like crosstalk’s street origins, is easy and at times juvenile. Why does a dog start peeing with one of its legs lifted up when it is grown? Could Chinese emperors, known as tianzis, or heavenly sons, be in fact aliens?

These are the sort of questions it teases – nonsensical and crowd-pleasing – the well-rehearsed five-member cast rotating seamlessly into various leading and supporting pairs to exhibit their craft.

Governor Bao, or Justice Bao, is a famed judge in Chinese history in the 11th century, renowned for his keen sense of impartiality and fearless prosecution of both the high-born and common.

His reputation has led to his becoming a mythologised figure. Stories of Bao have penetrated even the West, especially with German playwright Bertolt Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle (1948), which tells of the judge Azdak’s wise handling of two women claiming to be the biological mother of a child – a story the troupe reproduces here with a fairy-tale twist.

Some of the scenes should play well to Singapore’s bicultural audience, like the references to Harry Potter to describe Bao’s magic tools.

There are re-enacted stories of some of Bao’s most famous cases and a morbid commentary on the sharpness of the blades of his three guillotines, each reserved for criminals of particular stations.

The foppish Hugh Shih and Wu Ming-Ju, the only woman, are given the best lines, though all five hardly miss a beat and are excellent.

But there is also a certain repetitiveness to the vignettes after the first hour or so of the 105-minute production. The wit felt a little tame, perhaps lacking in contemporary resonance and political bite that the sharpest crosstalk can incorporate.

Still, the light banter and humorous outlook had some entertained, the melodiousness of the Chinese language plain for all to hear. Without sets, props and serious character arcs, storytelling in its most elementary form – two people shooting the breeze – can be effective and satisfying.