This ticket stub carries some pleasurable memories for me. That's why I have immortalized it here on my blog. I first stumbled on the intriguing poster below on Patrick Teoh's Niamah blog...
What phenomenal inspiration, I thought, to present three stand-up comedians - all Chinese, of course - as the Malaysian Association of Chinese Comedians. I was determined to catch the show, even visited TicketCharge to try and book online... but was put off by the fact that TicketCharge charges an additional RM12 as a "service fee." That's way too much, I thought. I mean, if I were booking a RM375 ticket to see Beyonce, I wouldn't blink an eye at a RM12 service fee. Nobody minds paying up to RM5 extra for the convenience of booking a theater ticket online - but RM12? That's 33% of the ticket price! What if I were buying TWO tickets? RM24 could easily buy a very fine dinner for two...
Fast-forward to 24 October. I get to Jaya One around 8:20PM and, after asking a couple of people, manage to locate PJ Live Arts. As I stand in line at the ticket office, I notice a poster for MACC 1st EGM that has "Sold Out" scrawled over it in black marker. True enough, it was a full house - not even one seat left! But a girl named Lulu was really helpful. She told me to hang around till just before 9PM - in case somebody cancelled out. Just then I bumped into Patrick Teoh and his lovely wife Min Chan with heartthrob actor/director/playwright Gavin Yap in tow. They were downing some beers and awaiting the arrival of more friends. We had a quick chat and then I headed back to the ticket office where more friends were assembled - including a few prominent bloggers I had never met in person (Nathaniel Tan and Khoo Kay Peng to name but two). They were waiting around for cancellations too.
But as it turned out there was only ONE cancellation... and since I was alone I got it! I wasn't going to miss MACC 1st EGM after all :-)
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| Pic courtesy of Grant Corban |
Well, that promise has been totally fulfilled. Douglas Lim at 32 is a world-class act. I never would have believed a Chinaman could do stand-up comedy the way Douglas does it. Back in the mid-1980s my friend Thor Kah Hoong gave it a shot and he did pretty okay - but I still preferred Chris Rush, Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, even Robin Williams. Thor was simply too cerebral, too cynical, too dry (and too skinny) and for my taste.
Along came the irresistible Jit Murad and the inimitable Harith Iskandar, followed by the untoppable Alan Pereira and Indi Nadarajah (of Comedy Court fame). Amazing talents - but not Chinese mah, that's why so funny. Before long, Patrick Teoh and Nell Ng joined the luminous cast of The Instant Cafe Theatre and both proved to be extreme hoots on stage and always entertaining - but while Patrick and Nell are fantastic comedians, they don't actually do stand-up stuff. Riveting pub entertainer Rafique Rashid acquired a loyal following as a singing stand-up comedian whose specialty was "Weird Al" Yankovic-style spoof songs - but his only claim to Chineseness was his predilection for Chinese girls with nice legs. And then, of course, there's the supercool Afdlin Shauki - but also not Chinese, so not counted.Well, I tell you, this fella Douglas Lim can hold his own on the same stage with all the great names in stand-up comedy - including, possibly, the late great George Carlin. You know why? Because if you can do stand-up comedy with a typical Chinaman accent and not make everybody cringe... you've got to be absolutely fantastic!
Watch Douglas Lim in action, expressing the frustration some of us must feel because we happen to be born yellow instead of black...
Stand-up comedy is perhaps the most challenging form of performance. Apart from your voice, your brain, and your own body - all you've got is a microphone. No fake mustache, no funny hat. The ones who make it in this incredibly challenging medium must also be equipped with brains that can process data at a million times average speed. In short, unless you qualify as a Grade A mutant genius, don't even bother auditioning as a stand-up comedian.
I wish I could upload a few more clips of Douglas doing his thang. But they don't exist on YouTube yet. The kind of rapid-fire multi-layered humor he trades in can't really be transcribed as text because one has to see his face and watch his moves. Suffice to say, Douglas Lim found a new fan in me that night.
The MACC 1st EGM poster featured two other board members of the Malaysian Association of Chinese Comedians: Phoon Chi Ho (listed as an "intern") and Kuah Jenhan ("sacked - pending appeal"). Phoon had to cancel out at the last minute because he was down with chicken pox. That put the onus on 22-year-old Jenhan (left) to work doubly hard since it was now a two-man rather than a three-man show. I'm happy to report that Jenhan's performance was truly outstanding, no doubt because he picked the best sifu (guru) in the business - Douglas Lim, whose masterful tutelage Jenhan acknowledged more than once during his routine.What impressed me most was the sheer sophistication of the material presented at MACC 1st EGM. Douglas and Jenhan effortlessly negotiated the squiggly boundary between heavyweight cutting-edge political satire and lighthearted pop trivia and kept the audience rolling in the aisles without a moment's letup.
The audience, about 75% Chinese I'd venture, left the theatre feeling it's actually quite okay to be born yellow instead of black or white. That's really no mean feat - to make being Chinese look funky, funny, sexy and lovable all at once!
Douglas and Jenham fully earned the standing ovation they received that memorable Saturday night.
