Asian Pirate Musical at Upstairs at the Gatehouse Review

Reviews

30 Jul

Set in 2049, Asian Pirate Musical is a queer, sci-fi, time-travelling adventure. It follows a pirate who sails into a time-bending storm which causes other seafarers from different time periods to board the same ship.

The staging consists of a thrust playing space which is surrounded by three seating banks. The set resembles a futuristic-looking pirate ship with three large sails and nets and a ship steering wheel as well as lots of light-up buttons and keys to help portray that futuristic feel. On one of the sails, there was also a projection of captions. It was great to see such well-integrated captions for accessibility in the production.

The book, music, and lyrics are all collectively written by Zhui Ning Chang, Frey Kwa Hawking, Jade Leamcharaskul, Sarita Lewis, Nemo Martin, and XANA. The story of this musical felt a little muddled at times, particularly in the first act, but by the second act, we had reached the climax and had a clear direction to head in to get through the storm and conclude the show nicely. The music was probably my favourite element of this show as it’s like no other musical I’ve heard before and has such a fresh sound to it. It features Japanese taiko, Javanese gamelan, and other traditional Asian instruments. It also weaves together the Asian 5-7 microtonal scale and Western 12-tone scale. All of these musical choices result in a distinctive sound and identity. I do, however, feel that at points the lyrics don’t flow and feel a little clunky and sometimes take you away from the brilliant music underneath them.

The cast of five, consisting of Yñaqui Tuason-Inocian, Amanda Maud, Ashley Goh, Rai Endah, and Nabilah Hamid, all give great performances and made the music sound great. It was also great to see so much queer Asian representation on stage.

Overall, I think “Asian Pirate Musical” has some brilliant material with a lot of potential but could use some tightening around the edges, such as some of the book, lyrics, and pacing in act 1. I’m excited to see what future life this musical has!