Parallel Threads - An Interview with Miriam Cheong

From March to June 2025, Centre 42 ran our Creation Residency, Grand Theft Theatre (Singapore Edition) by Miriam Cheong and Adeeb Fazah. The residency officially ended on 15 June 2025 with a work-in-progress showcase at the Black Box, 42 Waterloo Street.

Over the course of two interviews, we spoke with lead artist Miriam Cheong about her journey creating and staging Grand Theft Theatre, her takeaways from the process, and the next steps for her, the team, and the work.

What inspired you to create Grand Theft Theatre? 

When I went to the Melbourne Fringe in 2023, I saw a show from this collective called Pony Cam that blew my mind - it talked about burnout, and how much artists and independent makers in the arts have to go through. It was done in such a fun way that made me go, “oh my God, I want to look up their other work” - which included a show that swept the awards in 2022, called Grand Theft Theatre, which was a piece about people retelling their experiences that impacted them in the theatre, and talking about how, in theatre, because it’s such an ephemeral medium, the only way we keep it alive is by retelling these stories to other people. I went, “wait, that’s so Singapore theatre coded”, because here in Singapore, our runs are a weekend, unless you’re Shakespeare in the Park, then it’s a month - and it started coming to a point where I’d be like, “oh, I’m going to catch a show. Wait, what do you mean finish already?!” And we have so much original work that never gets published, and there’s just so much work that is passed down as legends. I was like, “this is such an adaptable show. Let me go and try and contact them and figure out how we can get this sort of collaboration going”. I thought it was a great way to do something tongue-in-cheek, but also educational at the same time, and paying tribute to Singapore theatre - especially this year, during SG60, because we love retrospectives during these anniversary times.

How did you put the team together? What was it like working with them?

When I went to Melbourne again in 2024, Lim Shien Hian, who’s the producer for this show, was there with me for a lunch meeting with Pony Cam, and afterwards, he said, “if you want me to help produce this, I can” - so that’s how he came on board. We were thinking about how to create a cast, and I decided that my starting point was going to be people with very different entry points into Singapore theatre. So there’s five of us - me, Adeeb Fazah, Mitchell Fang, Jo Tan, and Shannen Tan - and our entry points into theatre are very different. Mitch is from the Singapore Poly applied drama track; Jo is the last bastion of the NUS Law to theatre pipeline; Shannen is from NUS Theatre Studies; Adeeb is from the Wee Kim Wee to theatre pipeline; and I’m from the LASALLE pipeline.

It was a good experience - we’re all very easily distracted people, but I think it worked, because the yaps would give me an idea of what these people are. I think one of the critiques I got for the script was - how do we differentiate these characters, rather than making them feel like mouthpieces saying different segments of one whole monologue? And it was about trying to use those parts where we weren’t rehearsing to figure out what our characters are, based on us as real people.

You also have a dramaturg on the team, Ethel Yap. What made you bring a dramaturg on board?

I knew that, as somebody who was both writing and acting, and with my director [Adeeb] acting as well, I wanted there to be someone to help oversee the structure of the play and be a first audience - that’s what I like and always use dramaturgs for. I actually did TNS’ Devising with Actors and Playwrights 2023, and Ethel was there, and she said that she was interested in dramaturgy. I’ve always wanted to work with Ethel in some capacity, and I thought, if she’s interested in dramaturgy, maybe this is something that we can both figure out together. 

It was really lovely - she really gave it all that she’s got. She was the one that helped to push the structure of the birthday party, and she gave us prompts to reminisce about birthday parties that we've experienced, and we brought that into the show. She’s been a very good first audience for us - there’s a lot of interactive segments, so she’d say, “I’m going to do this how I think a realistic theatre audience would be like,” and it was a very good gauge for us as actors. 

What was your starting point when conceptualising the script for Grand Theft Theatre? 

I started by gathering material from the devisers - asking them what plays or moments in theatre live in their brains rent-free, moments that made them go, “oh my God”. And when I told Ethel that this was in celebration of SG60, she went, “dramaturgically, a birthday party format would fit”. That’s how the format of ‘this is taking place as a birthday party for Singapore theatre’ came about. Afterwards, we just started with improv, which I would record and transcribe, and I did a lot of shuffling to try and find a structure, have it make sense. One example - Mitch talks about his experience playing Lee Kuan Yew in Kwa Geok Choo, so I wanted to make him sing something from The LKY Musical later. 

I was trying to tie those threads together to make it a little bit more of a throughline. That’s how the writing process went - taking vignettes and making it a whole, complete arc.

What was the workshopping phase like? 

It was really fun! We’d come in, and then we'd play some drama games as a warmup, like playing theatre charades, where we’d guess a show based on the clues. After that, I’d go into giving the cast a prompt - for example, ‘describe the experience of watching the worst show on Earth’. And we wouldn’t even bother hearing it once - we’d just have the speaker there, and then we’d reenact what they were describing. It helped me think about which shows were more active, and thus I could put on stage to have improv behind. There was also a lot of, “these are what I remember to be the Hall of Fame of Singapore plays - is there anything I’m missing?”, and a lot of brainstorming from the cast about that.

I think putting it all together was very tough. I’m very good at material generation; material synthesis, not so much. That's why I always like bringing dramaturgs on to help me figure out what's necessary and what's not. Figuring out what exactly is ‘Singapore theatre’ was also a big thing - where it started, figuring out the timeline, and figuring out what informs the timeline. There's a lot of complicated history on what theatre becomes the ‘best of’, and what doesn’t. 

Tell us more about the rehearsal process. 

Going into rehearsals, I had to do quite a lot of rewriting to make things a bit more active. There was one section that was going quite slow; as an audience, you’d check out very easily, so I needed to fix that. I think we were trying to find ways to make it rah-rah, but also have the silent moments, so that the audience wasn’t overwhelmed.

We had two weeks of rehearsals, and things happened so fast. I felt that it was a very experienced Avengers ensemble that I put together, so they were very good at contributing - one of those where I can just give a suggestion, and then it works. With these sorts of actors, you don't really need time for them to think - they can just do and snap into it and lock in. It was quite assuring, even when we hadn’t done a full run, that the work still felt quite complete, and I felt confident in the show, that everything would fall together because things were working very fast, but these people were also working really fast, in a very amazing way. I think because they are all creators in their own right - they all knew how to come together to help create this vision; while giving the steering wheel to Adeeb, they still had the GPS in their hands, you know? So it was really assuring to have that sort of energy in the room.

How did you feel about the showcase? What was the experience of finally presenting Grand Theft Theatre in front of a public audience?

It was great! It was nice to see that, for the most part, the show works. I’m very proud of the show in its current iteration. I know where I want it to go, but for now, with the goal of this being a proof of concept, I think I hit it. One of my ex-students from Zhonghua came, and she said that she didn’t know any of the plays, but she had so much fun. And someone else said that it was the first theatre show she’d been to, and she enjoyed it! So it was nice to see that those who don't know much about Singapore theatre could still have a fun time. 

We got quite robust feedback from people as well. Most people knew the plays during the charades section, so it was nice to see that these really were the Hall of Fame of Singapore plays. I got feedback that people wanted more, after the monologues and stuff, to keep the energy high.

One of the questions I also got was how I’m planning to expand the work from 60 minutes to 90 minutes. Someone did say, “you talk about the SG70 version of this show - why don’t you do a scene where you all speculate what theatre looks like at SG70, 80, 90, 100? And that can be part of your well-wishes for Singapore theatre”. Another audience member also mentioned that, currently, the play starts off on one thread, and ends on another thread, and if I can find a way to develop those two parallel threads and stitch them together, the 90 minutes will actually come quite naturally.

What did you want audiences to take away from the showcase?

I had two audience goals in mind. One, for the Singapore theatre audience to go “aww” with us. I wanted them to have a bit of a laugh about the absurd things that have happened in our theatre history - but I also wanted them to have a lot of reverence for Singapore theatre, and for the people within it, and the grit that I think our artists have, and what a long way we’ve come. 

I did also want the showcase to be for the general public, who might usually only pay money to watch Hamilton, to realise that there is so much beautiful and ballsy homegrown stuff. I don’t think I hit that goal as much yet - I think they found it fun, but maybe not educational; I think a lot of people walked away from our charades going, “that was fun!”, but I don’t think any of them walked away going, “I need to look that up”. I want to develop the play so that they will want to look up those shows.

What was the most unexpected thing that you encountered during this residency? 

Something quite heartwarming that I reflected on was that, through celebrating Singapore theatre, we are also celebrating our careers. For every birthday that Singapore theatre passes, it’s a birthday that we have continued to stay in Singapore theatre. Grand Theft Theatre started off with me wanting to do a retrospective - a Singapore Theatre History 101, but fun - and it became more of a reflection of what it’s like to be an actor or an artist in this industry. Who is the industry but us, the artists in it, right? And if we are celebrating Singapore theatre’s birthday, we must also celebrate us, because we are the ones keeping it alive. 

There were also these lovely, full-circle moments that will stick with me - Jo being in the show that impacted me and made me want to contribute to local theatre; Jo pulling Mitch out of his jaded slump, and then there she was, helping us to do the show. Ethel as well - when you watch a Singapore musical, she’ll always be in it, and usually as the lead, right? And then here she came so generously, being all, “of course I’ll come work as a dramaturg with you”. It made me fall in love with the community again. I think it’s best summed up with the scene in the show where we all cut the cake together, and yes, it’s small, but we are all willing to share - the resources we are given are not a lot, but we are still willing to share and help each other. 

You've had to wear a lot of different hats during this process - you were the lead artist, producer, deviser, and performer. What was that experience like? 

I’m used to it lah. This is the independent life in a nutshell, right, that you have to wear multiple hats. That said, I do wish I had more time to dedicate as a writer, especially because I was in the midst of people who are writers in their own capacity; I felt like I had to write a script that would do right by them, because they know how dramatic structure works. That’s why I thought it was very important to have a dramaturg on board to help us be a third pair of eyes - because things were going really fast. We needed that feedback now - we couldn’t have Adeeb watch the video, then give us feedback.

I think it was a very rushed but fulfilling process. I always think about how works where I’m so-called ‘just an actor’ allow me to focus on deepening my acting craft, but this work allowed me to deepen my artistic sensibilities - and both are very important, so it was nice having the space to do that. Between Grand Theft Theatre and Lotus Root Support Group, I’ve crystallised wanting to focus on creating these sorts of tongue-in-cheek, bombastic works, because I think, for me, in an era where theatre is very self-serious, what is the countercultural? It’s tongue-in-cheek, right? Or maybe that’s what I tell myself so that I don’t have to do serious stuff. But that’s what I’ve experienced.

What are your takeaways from working on this piece under the auspices of the Creation Residency?

I think the Archive is so important. I still remember when we were gathering the Hall of Fame plays, Shannen went, “we’ve got to look at the C42 Archive, let’s GO”. I was thinking about how, in Singapore theatre, our memories are archives, yet there are definitely things that I’ve misremembered - I thought the girls from Normal were Normal Tech, but they’re actually Normal Acad, and that’s actually a big part of the show, because they’re in secondary school for five years, not four, and that’s a big part of Amanda Tee’s monologue when she talks about the Barbies. And I was like, how did I miss this? So I think it was really lovely that Centre 42 agreed to take us on, because I think we need this sort of archival and outreach and education right now. 

What advice would you give to another practitioner who is keen to pursue this residency, or keen to create a similar devised cross-cultural tongue-in-cheek kind of work? 

To tackle the first question - don’t be afraid to ask for help! The people at Centre 42 are very friendly and very willing to support you if they can. As somebody who has done work in the independent circuit, we’re so used to doing things on our own - but when you’re taking part in a residency, it’s okay to lean on the people supporting you for help. 

For somebody who wants to make tongue-in-cheek work, the number one piece of advice that I’d give is that you must always come from a place of love, in which case your tongue-in-cheekness will never be poisoned by the well of spite and bitterness. At the end of the day, we may all have our gripes with the industry, but I think what makes Grand Theft Theatre work is that we are coming to it with so much love and passion that it overshadows the fact that we reduced seminal texts to two lines!

What are your next steps for Grand Theft Theatre?

We’ll be talking to producers and pitching to them, asking if there’s space in seasons, or whether we could bring this to a festival. I think if we get an incubation space to expand it to about one and a half hours, which is our ultimate runtime, that would be very good. We’re hoping to eventually stage the full production within the next two years - so, everyone, stay tuned, because more original Singapore scripts are coming in, and thus more charades and scenes to come! 

Published: 11 July 2025