Tunku without his right hand

On Wednesday's run, which is the opening night of the YTL run (which went swimmingly well with a very appreciative audience, thankfully), Tony Eusoff conducted himself incredibly well on stage, and was the epitome of professionalism. Fella comes in to KLPac clutching his stomach, saying that "if this were I rehearsal I wouldn't be here" - believing himself to have indigestion of some sort, or something like that. On stage, he is Syed, Tuan Syed, Tunku's political aide. The slightly pained expression suits his character, who undoubtedly goes through a lot of stress in his role as Tunku's aide. Off stage, he is in agony. Even moments on stage where he needs to remain still, milliseconds drag out into endless eternity. By the end of the show, he is on the floor; resting, recovering, and allowing the pain to give him a serious smackdown.

Come Thursday, he is in hospital - eventually diagnosed with acute appendicitis, duly removed. Crazy bugger, I salute you. Good show. Rest well and have a good recovery - we're seriously missing you mate.

Come Thursday night, and Joe is a wreck. His cast have only had 3 hours of rehearsal with a frantically revised play that does not include Tuan Syed. His cast are a mild wreck too, especially Douglas who carries the burden of conveying some of Tony's more important lines in song. Thankfully, everything turned out great - and no one misses the irony of doing Tunku not just without Tunku on stage but without his aide as well. So good job all round guys and gals, that was just nutty balls.

So, as an interlude. We funnily had this fly / flies who drove some of us mental on stage. Let me tell you that this fly had an uncanny sense of theatre timing - here is a list of locations it landed DURING THE SHOW:
- my hand
- Tony Leo's forehead
- Nicole's nose
- Zamil's hair (with a serious Free & Easy tour included)
- my hair & face
- other places I can't remember / don't know about
Now 2 things about this fly. 1) by "landed", I mean "landed and had a nice stroll around". 2) this fly is one big bitch that is damn slow and stupid. The only way it could survive that long in Malaysia (ranked #1 fly-swatting country by the Book of Records) was by being on stage during a show, where no one could've made up a real enough story quickly enough to whack it in character. So, to make up for that lack of imagination then, here's my story now (with added embellishment for those versed in RPG lore):


Once upon a time, there was a boy. A very young and special boy. He was in line for apprenticeship for a very important role in his village - a doctor. But no ordinary doctor, oh no; for this was a special village too, located in a remote jungle in the exotic island of Borneo. He was to become a witch doctor, and the journey of learning was a long and arduous one.

But young Tony (for that was the young boy's name) proved a most adept and able pupil, and learned rapidly. For example, he quickly learned a spell most important to Bidayuh (for that was the tribe the young boy belonged to) culture: Grow Hair - most crucial for jungle survival. Body hair can ward off undesirable pests, it can camouflage the natural luminescence of human skin, and it can disguise a human as a nondescript native jungle dweller. Young Tony promptly cast the spell on his face, which proved useful for looking not-so-young.

Another spell he learned at a young age that bore fruit further in the future was Sharpen. Now this spell was important for the village doctor to know, as it meant that the doctor could bless the weapons of the village warriors before they went hunting. Young Tony, astute to the ways of the modern world taking shape outside his village, again promptly cast the spell on his face. One side effect of casting that spell on his face, as he would later find out, was that it came with an Aura of Gay Magnetism +10.

15 years later, and not-so-young Tony has put his knowledge to good use. He had grown powerful and expanded his repertoire, the most useful being Charm Director and Charm Producer. This, over time, landed him several roles in musical theatre but conjuring such witchcraft took its toll. 3 days before he was to end his most recent performance, his weakened body was attacked by A Cuter Bendy Sytis (a malicious foe indeed, by Bidayuh folklore), which overwhelmed him and landed him in hospital.

Poor Tony, who sorely missed his beloved cast-mates, decided to send an agent, a representative, an avatar if you will - over to KLPac to see how things were going.

"Lat tali lat BAGI LALAT!"

Thus went the Summon Fly spell ("Lat tali lat" being a lesser deity in the Bidayuh pantheon, the God of Small Things). So Tony sent his underling forth and eventually found the cast of Tunku the Musical hard at work, reworking the play without him. It conveyed Tony's well wishes physically to as many people as it could - but unfortunately its senses weren't acute and it landed on a certain Johann's hand in between songs. Johann, in a fervour of passion and adrenalin, promptly whacked Fly (Fly was slow to react as it was burdened with Bluetooth equipment to communicate with Tony) dead.

Tony cried out in pain as a small essence of his power was struck down with a cry of "Separation!" Undeterred in his love for his favourite people in the world, he again Summoned Fly:

"Lat tali lat BAGI LALAT!"

"Dengan SENSE OF TIMING!!"

"Dan RHYTHM!!!"

And so it was. Fly 2.0 reached out to members of the cast; during songs, on stage, and always safely.

Fly 2.0 now lives happily with the ducks at KLPac.

Tony recovers well and happily lies in bed all day.

THE END.