Fire at heritage shophouse in Waterloo Street cost The Theatre Practice $200,000 in damage

SINGAPORE – A fire which broke out at a heritage shophouse at 56 Waterloo Street after midnight on July 24 has caused more than $200,000 in damage to the occupant, The Theatre Practice (TTP).

Kuo Jian Hong, artistic director of TTP, said she was alerted to the fire slightly before 4am and was the second person to arrive on the scene.

The Singapore Civil Defence Force was alerted to the fire on July 24 at about 4am and extinguished it quickly. The fire was confined to a small area in a storeroom on the first floor, and preliminary investigations indicate that it was likely caused by an electrical source from the storeroom.

There were no reported injuries, although the adjacent buildings that TTP occupies at 54 and 58 Waterloo Street were filled with soot and existing sets and props were badly damaged.

The theatre company will soldier on with the Aug 4 opening of Four Horse Road, a walking theatre show around Waterloo Street which uses the affected units as its theatre set.

“The show must go on,” says Kuo, emphasising that the company is determined to get the show on the road, given that its last planned run in 2020 was scuppered when Four Horse Road became the first casualty of the Covid-19 pandemic shutdown of theatre in Singapore.

The three consecutive and adjoined apartments in Waterloo Street were constructed in the early 1900s. TTP, which was founded by Cultural Medallion recipients Kuo Pao Kun and Goh Lay Kuan in 1965, moved into the residence in 2016.

The financial cost of the fire is in addition to the $650,000 loss the company suffered in 2020 for Four Horse Road, a show which Kuo Jian Hong told The Straits Times has never made any financial sense.

“There is no question that everyone has to work doubly hard now,” she says, adding that “all we can do now is to buckle up and hunker down and get everything cleaned up”.

“It was a very long night because we just had our run-through of all the scenes on Sunday night. The night ended on a high note for the entire company working on Four Horse Road. The real work is just getting harder,” she says.

Those who are interested in donating to TTP can go to

www.giving.sg/thetheatrepractice