SINGAPORE – In writer-lawyer Amanda Chong’s upcoming play Psychob***h, audiences meet protagonist Anya Samuel as she is preparing to deliver a professional slide deck explaining the reasons for the four times she has cried in public during her relationship with her boyfriend.

He has accused her of being too emotional, and she is determined to prove she is not a psychob***h.

This plot McGuffin comes from Chong’s own experience. The 34-year-old says with a laugh: “In my 20s, I was also in a situation where a former boyfriend asked me to explain the four times I cried in public during our relationship.

“And because I’m a lawyer, I brought my full legal expertise to bear on this task. I wrote 30 pages of colour-coded submissions to explain the four times.” 

The inherent comedy of her actions inspired her to write the play, which was developed in 2022 as part of The Necessary Stage’s developmental playwriting programme.

The monologue, directed by Pam Oei, will be on at Wild Rice @ Funan from Aug 3 to 19.

From the kernel of her own experience, Chong went on to interview women about their experiences in toxic relationships and their struggles with self-worth and identity. One of these is Psychob***h actress Sindhura Kalidas, 34, Chong’s friend since their days at the Raffles Girls’ School drama club.

“I knew her relationship history and naturally drew on that. A lot of the content of the play is drawn from real life. It either happened to me, Sindhura, or somebody I know,” says Chong.

Actress Oei, 51, says of the work: “The issues Anya has to deal with are very familiar issues that women in their 20s and 30s face.”

The director brings with her the experiences of having performed in the long-running one-woman show Faghag, which had three productions from 2018 to 2022.

She adds: “Psychob***h is fiction, unlike Faghag. Faghag was my story, but in Psychob***h, the actress has to craft her narrative within the play. She has to create her own story.”

Chong, who frequently writes on themes of gender and power, says the monologue form is integral to her story. “I wanted one woman actor to embody all characters, because I wanted even the men in the play to be refracted through a woman as a way of exercising agency over her own story. 

“I want to create complex characters for women actors, and to put the experiences of women on the stage, with all their tensions, ironies and contradictions.”

She hopes the play will inspire audiences of all genders to question the concessions they make in relationships, and to hope for a kind of love that is unconditional.

“But also, it’s about giving us permission to laugh at ourselves for the mistakes we make. It’s part of everyone’s journey,” Chong says. 

Book It/Psychob***h

Where: Wild Rice @ Funan, Level 4, 107 North Bridge Road
When: Aug 3 to 19; Tuesdays to Fridays, 7.30pm; Saturdays, 3 and 7.30pm; Sundays, 3pm
Admission: From $20
Info: str.sg/iwua