Modern Indonesian Drama

Beyond Bali
 Good News!
Although it is possible to study every major non-English speaking
Western culture through its translated literature, this has not been the
case with the literature of Indonesia. This is one of the reasons why
Lontar was established: to ensure the ancient literary tradition of
Indonesia, and its thriving contemporary literature, are more accessible
to international scholars.
Aware of the need abroad for text books, Lontar is publishing several
multi-volume anthologies of Indonesian literature: one on the history of
Indonesian drama, the other two on poetry and short stories.
In 2001, with financial assistance from the Luce Foundation, Lontar began
to collect modern Indonesian playscripts. Hundreds were collected and
scanned. With advice from Lontars editorial advisory board, 50 plays,
representing the range of issues that were aired on the Indonesian stage
in the twentieth century were chosen for transcription and publication in
Indonesian. Of these, 35 were then selected for translation into English.
Early Developments in Modern
Theater
Traditional dramatic forms such as wayang in Java and
Bali had been performed for their ritual and/or religious
significance.
A modern, secular theater, Malay Opera, emerged in
the late nineteenth century. The audiences as well as
playwrights, directors, and actors, of Malay Opera
included Europeans, Chinese, peoples of mixed-racial
ancestry (the peranakan), and indigenous peoples of
the Netherlands Indies (e.g. Javanese, Sundanese, and
Balinese). (Rafferty 10). The development of this
multi-ethnic, secular, though still non-scripted, drama
was an important transitional stage for Indonesian
theater.
 Malay Opera
In 1891, August Mahieu, a Eurasian of French descent
born in Surabaya (c.1860), established the first successful
Malay Opera group in the Indies. (Rafferty 10)
Improvisational theater, with no written script and
performed in the open, it combined tales from many
culturesEuropean, Chinese, Indian, Persian, Javanese,
and Malay. The merging of multi-ethnic stories also
enabled the establishment of modern national identities
and sensibilities.
For a historical perspective on Malay Opera in Borneo, see
http://www.hicsocial.org/social2003proceedings/nur%20a
fifah%20vanitha%20abdullah.pdf
See also Tan Sooi Beng, Bangsawan: A Social and Stylistic
History of Popular Malay Opera.
Origin of Modern Indonesian Drama

The publication of Rustam Effendis play,

Bebasari, an allegorical verse drama about the
struggle against Dutch colonialism, is
considered to be the foundational moment of
modern Indonesian drama.
It was the first original play written by a native
Indonesian in high Malay, and was intended
for an urban, educated elite.
Other playwrights following in this tradition
both glorified the past and attempted to
include contemporary issues.
 Realistic drama
After independence, two major theatrical
institutions were established: Cine Drama
Instituut in 1948 in Yogyakarta, and Akademi
Teater Nasional in Jakarta in 1955. Both taught
a realistic style of acting.
Translations of Western playwrights (Poe, Ibsen,
Shakespeare) became popular in the 1950s.
Serious plays, featuring representation and
analysis of contemporary Indonesian society
flourished.
 Lontar Anthology 2: 1926-
1965
Synopsis: The first four decades of the national art theater in
Indonesia (1926-1965) were a period of fascinating experimentation
undertaken by elite intellectuals heavily influenced by, and attempting
to come to terms with, the forms and styles of western theater. These
experiments ranged chiefly from hybrid anti-colonial allegories and
grand historical epics to psychological and social realisms. This volume
contains a selection of plays representative of the main currents of this
exciting and pivotal era in the construction of Indonesias modern
national art theater. The volume begins with nationalist allegories, then
moves to psychological and social-realist works, and finally to plays that
typify the dominant currents into which the theater of the New Order
period, beginning in 1966, would later flow.
Authors: Roestam Effendi, Sanusi Pane, Armijn Pane, Saadah Alim,
Usmar Ismail, Utuy Tatang Sontani, Muhammad Ali, Motinggo Busye,
Misbah Yusa Biran, Agam Wispi, Yoebar Ayoeb, Iwan Simatupang,
Mohamad Diponegoro.
Utuy Tatang Sontani, Awal and Mira (1951)

Sontani was Sundanese and used both the local language

and Indonesian in his writings. He was famous during his
lifetime for his novels, short stories, as well as plays. The
plays were published in the 1950s and earned him high
praise. He chose to frame his vision in one act plays in short
story form as a way of exploring human problems at a
specific time during mans long life. Awal and Mira focuses
on the physical and psychological victims of revolution in a
newly independent nation (Rafferty 14) by portraying the
love of a nervous aristocratic man for a beautiful common
coffee house owner who turns out to be handicapped.
For an article on Sontani, see
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2002/04/14/utuy-tatang-
sontani-a-tragic-end-a-literary-great.html
Iwan Simatupang,
Square Moon and Three Other Plays
Simatupang was a journalist, novelist, actor, director, and
playwright. For a brief biography, see
http://www.lontar.org/index.php?page=author&id=96&lang=en
Born in North Sumatra, he fought for freedom from the Dutch, and
was later on the staff of Siasat, a journal on the forefront of
intellectual life in the struggle for freedom and post-independence
Indonesia.
He was associated with Theater 2000, an avant-garde theater
company, and was heavily influenced by Existentialist writers ,
believing in the possibility of autonomy and independence for all.
Square Moon (1957) focuses on an old man who has spent his life
tying to build the perfect gallows and whose philosophy is I kill,
therefore I am.
His works deal primarily with issues of death, freedom, social
disenfranchisement and conflict.
 Lontar Anthology 3: 1965-
1998
Synopsis: As Soeharto's New Order government became
increasingly authoritarian, censoring and crushing public
opposition openly and often brutally, there was a clear shift
in playwriting style from allegorical fairytales of wordplay,
humor and oblique reference to a more direct engagement,
interrogation, and call to arms. All in all, Indonesian drama
during the New Order provides a fascinating window into a
society in transition caught between the legacy of tradition,
the challenge of repression, and a strong desire for
democratization.
Authors: Arifin C. Noer, Rendra, Putu Wijaya, Noorca
Marendra Massardi, Akhudiat, Wisran Hadi, Saini K.M.,
Yudhistira ANM Massardi, N. Riantiarno, Aspar Paturusi,
Afrizal Malna, Emha Ainun Nadjib, Ratna Sarumpaet.
 New Tradition
The governor of Jakarta, Ali Sadikin, was instrumental in the
foundation of a Cultural Arts Center, Taman Ismail Marzuki (TIM) in
1968, which provided a Western-style, government subsidized venue
for the staging of modern drama.
The plays staged at TIM have seen various degrees of merging of
local and Western forms and techniques. The use of regional
elements in modern genres is central to the New Tradition and is in
direct reaction to the forced social realism of the Soehartos regime.
In order to keep the theater relatively free of political pressures, an
Arts Council was formed. For the most part, it was an autonomous
body with a free hand (Mohamad 3).
TIM organized an annual festival of theatrical groups run by young
artists and featured traditional theatrical forms as well as modern
plays, making it possible for traditional and modern forms of drama
to co-exist in post-independence Indonesia.
W. S. Rendra: Struggle for Cultural
Independence
Indonesias most famous playwright, he was also an actor, essayist, translator, critic,
and poet.
He was openly anti-Establishment, and was arrested in May 1978 for his seditious
writings.
Rendra wrote satirical, experimental plays, known for their innovative form combining
Javanese wayang and ketoprak in modern Indonesian productions. He borrowed
elements of music, costume, dramatic structure, acting style, and joking routines from
traditional drama, breaking down boundaries of low/high theaters.
Struggle of the Naga Tribe (1975), while influenced by Western ideas, incorporates
many traditional Javanese theatrical conventions, including the use of the figure of the
dalang, the puppet master, to provide a social critique. Rendra valorizes the rural
poor, and an non-cosmopolitan, folk lifestyle.
Rendras Bengkel Theatre group initiated a new performance style, mini-kata, using
movement and music but minimal dialogue, in response to the prevalent slogalization
of the Indonesian language in the late 1960s (Mohamad 8).
For an article on Rendra, see
http://www.insideindonesia.org/edition-97/w-s-rendra-1935-2009-16081231
For an interview of Rendra in Australia, see
http://www.insideindonesia.org/edition-86/rendra-speaks-1507094
 Putu Wijaya: Theater of
Surprise
Worked with Rendras Bengkel Theatre group from 1967-69.
Putus tontonan theater similarly emphasizes spectacle over narration, and reflects
his commitment to improvisation, creative adaptation, openness and flexibility.
The plays are both visually and aurally busy, at times verging on the chaotic
(Rafferty 16).
Plot is minimal; characters are stylized and remain on stage for most of the play
resulting in a crowded, noisy stage; humor tends to the bawdy and the grotesque
and is used as a distancing device; and action is non-realistic.
As in traditional Balinese drama, there is no obvious closure, and the central issue
remains unresolved.
Putus theater seeks to incorporate spirituality, bringing the traditional
religious/ritual element back into a secular model.
According to Putu Wijaya, Indonesian actors act without analyzing; they are
reluctant to question the meaning of actions or situations in the script.
For an article on Putu assessing his life and works, see
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2001/04/08/putu-strives-save-theater.html
For a video of Putus tribute to Rendra, Monolog 'Merdeka'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7qLSBk7uzI
N. Riantiarno: Commercially Viable
Modern Theater
His blending of indigenous and Western forms is
influenced by the example of Malay Opera.
High ticket prices and an entertainment model make
Riantiarnos company, Teater Koma, a much more
capitalistic enterprise, catering to an affluent middle class.
However, the plays, with their graphically literal
representation of the dark underside of elite prosperity,
subvert rather than affirm middle class assumptions. On
the set of Time Bomb (1982), directly below the chairs of
a group of oblivious restaurant diners, sits a slum on the
banks of a fetid canal (Hatley xi-xii).
For an article on Riantiarno, see
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2008/02/24/playwright
-n-riantiarno-visionary-mission.html
 Women Playwrights:
Activists
Actress and playwright, Ratna Sarumpaet, has her work included in the
Lontar Anthology, and comments incisively on issues relevant to women
in contemporary Indonesian society, though she sees herself as a
champion for all underprivileged people rather than as a feminist.
Her play, The Prostitute and the President (2006), focuses on the lack of
choices available to women who are forced into prostitution. The main
protagonist, Jamila, has taken to murder as a way of dealing with her
oppression: hate that keeps building inside me, forever ready to explode
and make me kill againto make me kill again. On her attempts to
film this play to raise awareness about child trafficking in Indonesia, see
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2007/07/24/ratna-sarumpaet-agony-se
nior-director.html
A clip of the film, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtsgSL0fDiY
Her most famous work, Marsinah: Songs from the Underworld (1994)
directly accuses President Soeharto.
For an article on her life, beliefs, and her arrest, see
http://www.insideindonesia.org/edition-55/ratna-accused-and-defiant-29
09767
 Putu Wijaya: Geez!
Only two characters have stable names: Bima and Sita. Both
names go back to the Indian epics, Ramayana and
Mahabharata.
Bima or Bhima is the second Pandava brother, known for his
strength and bravery: "Of all the wielders of the mace, there
is none equal to Bhima; and there is none also who is so
skillful a rider of elephants. In fight, they say, he yields not
even to Arjuna; and as to might of arms, he is equal to ten
thousand elephants. (Mahabharata, Book 5, Section 22).
Sita is famed for her marital fidelity and devotion in the
Ramayana. Despite her abduction and imprisonment for ten
years by Ravana, she remains impervious to his sexual
advances and is able to remain chaste.
http://www.britishmuseum.org/images/puppet_m.jpg
 Three Worlds in Geez!
The worlds of the mourners, the corpse, and
the dancers are kept separate in the
beginning, though we expect them to
collide. There are also tiered platforms on
stage: the top with the gamelan orchestra in
a four-pillared temple; the middle with the
corpse and the mourners; and the bottom
with Putu himself. No world subsumes,
destroys, or dominates another as the action
progresses (Zarrilli in Rafferty 42).
 Characters
Putus characters do not behave in causal,
psychologically consistent ways. He
establishes characters though monologues
which start out by isolating a single motive
or emotional tone for the character but
which unfold by contradicting or subverting
the original stance. Putu: My manuscripts
and my style of directing are neither anti-
psychological nor do they support
psychological reality (Rafferty 44).
 Use of humor and the
unexpected
The gravediggers, reminiscent of the ritual-clowns of
wayang, are not the only characters who joke
inappropriately; the mourners also indulge in
incongruous, exaggerated behavior that belies
expectations, leading one gravedigger to comment,
Hey, is this a burial or a party! Their bawdy humor as
well as their inter-changeable names give rise to
laughter. The rising of the corpse multiple times also
contributes to the macabre humor. Putus intention is to
jolt the audience but also to convey a Balinese
sensibility. Putu: In Bali people joke all the time, even
at funerals. They play cards at funerals. People are
naturally prone to joking (Rafferty 39).
Use of Indigenous Javanese
elements
In Madison, he used gamelan,
Javanese court dance, and a shadow
puppet but in Jakarta, he has never
used traditional techniques. Even in
Madison, he subverted their
traditional use, often breaking the
conventional rule that guide both
orchestra and dance. Dance
movements were speeded up and
changed; at times gamelan broke up
 Questions for discussion
1. Bima is the only character in the play whose speech and
motivation remain consistent. What is the significance of
this consistency attributed to a supposedly dead person
who remains in limbo at the end?
2. To what extent is Putu intentionally supplying an
exoticized spectacle in using traditional Javanese theatrical
elements in his Western productions? How necessary do
these elements seem for an understanding of the play?
3. Analyze the ways in which Geez! functions both as a
satire and as an absurdist commentary on the human
condition.
4. How are confusion and distancing used in the play to
subvert conventional theatrical narrative and expectations?
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