The late Syed Alwi, a beloved National Laureate and pioneer of Malaysian theatre, will have his classic plays revisited at 'The More We Get Together' event at KLPac on Oct 25, part of the What The Elders Left Us festival. Photo: The Star/Filepic
THEATRE: 'THE MORE WE GET TOGETHER'
Venue: KLPac
Date: Oct 25, 5.30pm
Another treat awaits theatre fans with the second satellite event of the What The Elders Left Us festival, a brand new community arts event organised by Instant Cafe Theatre.
This Saturday at KLPac, Dr Rosdeen Suboh, a celebrated SEA theatre scholar, director and actor, pays tribute to the late playwright Datuk Syed Alwi Syed Hassan in a performance titled The More We Get Together - borrowing the name of Syed’s very first play in 1969.
Syed Alwi, who passed away in December 2008, was a National Laureate and pioneer of Malaysian theatre, as well as a founding member of the Malayan Arts Theatre Group and Kuala Lumpur Film Club in the 1950s and 1960s.
Taking inspiration from KLPac’s history as a train depot, the The More We Get Together performance - featuring Syed Alwi plays - unfolds like a journey northward from Kuala Lumpur to Perak (Menuju Utara), with the audience as fellow passengers. Along the way, they’ll meet familiar figures from three of Syed Alwi’s beloved works - Mariam, the impetuous dreamer from Menuju Utara; Tok Perak, the wise yet weary medicine seller from Tok Perak; and Alang, the playful trickster from Alang Rentak Seribu.
Syed Alwi’s plays Alang Rentak Seribu and Tok Perak earned him the National Literature Award (Drama) in 1972 and 1974, respectively.
At KLPac tomorrow, all festival collaborators - and audience members too - are invited to bring photos, images, texts, banners, or instruments to join the procession and honour the artists who paved the way.
The evening event (starts 5.30pm) begins with a traditional Buka Panggung ceremony to mark the opening of the festival. It’s an outdoor performance, but if it rains, the journey continues indoors.
Free admission.
More info here.
The six finalists of the SEA Slam - from left - are Lim, Aliff, Adeena, Yogan, Ameerul and Shafiq. Photo: Handout
POETRY: SEA SLAM 2025 FINAL ROUND
Venue: The Grey Box, GMBB, Kuala Lumpur
Date: Oct 25, 2pm
The SEA Slam Poetry Final Round brings six poets to the stage, each competing for the title of SEA Slampion. The finalists - Emmanuel Yogan, Aliff Awan, Mohammad Shafiq, Ameerul Hazeeq, Abigail Lim and Adeena Salimee - represent diverse backgrounds and poetic styles.
With RM5,000 awaiting the champion and cash prizes for the runner-ups, the competition is fierce but festive. Beyond the contest, the slam becomes a shared space where rhythm, rhyme, and storytelling celebrate South-East Asia’s diverse cultures and identities - each performance personal, yet together forming a collective regional voice.
As part of Riuh x Asean 2025, the event, co-ordinated by Jalan Dalam, also marks the final chapter of this year’s SEA Slam before the festival continues with its next series.
Free admission.
More info here.
EXHIBITION: CHENG YEN PHENG'S 'SALT OF THE LAND'
Venue: Wei-Ling Gallery, Brickfields, KL
Date: ends Nov 8
Artist Cheng Yen Pheng's new solo exhibiton Salt Of The Land gives new life to the classical Chinese phrase “salt of the earth”, reimagining it through a lens that feels both ecological and deeply personal. With a series of immersive installations, she transforms the main gallery into a quiet space for reflection - and for sensing the delicate balance between people and the land they inhabit.
Working from Batu Arang, Selangor, a former mining town shaped by its industrial past and ongoing struggles over land, Cheng gathers materials from her surroundings to create works that speak of continuity, transformation, and care. Through the four elements - water, fire, earth, and air - she explores the natural cycles that sustain life: pulp becomes paper, ash purifies, clay hardens into brick, and air gives breath to the whole.
Her process mirrors a kind of resistance - a gentle but firm insistence on renewal and resilience in the face of change. By merging traditional craft with contemporary concerns, Cheng roots her art in the politics of place, honouring the fragile ecosystems and communities that continue to nurture life. Salt Of The Land reminds us that, like salt itself, renewal is essential - a small but powerful element that sustains both land and spirit.
Cheng will be at the gallery every Saturday from 2pm to 4pm to take visitors through the exhibition. Free admission.
More info here.
The Riuh x Asean 2025 Marketplace takes place this weekend at Stadium Merdeka in Kuala Lumpur. Photo: The Star/Low Lay Phon
FESTIVAL: RIUH X ASEAN 2025 MARKETPLACE
Venue: Stadium Merdeka, Kuala Lumpur
Date: Oct 24-26
Riuh x Asean 2025's Marketplace will take place at Stadium Merdeka this weekend, featuring over 100 retail and F&B brands, along with creative workshops and live music performances from the region.
Held in conjunction with Malaysia’s Asean Chairmanship 2025, the event is supported by PNB Merdeka Ventures under the Warisan KL initiative.
Local entrepreneurs from the Merdeka 118 Community Grants Programme will showcase their products, including Hanuni Halim’s handcrafted decoupage, Hara Maker’s upcycled plastic crafts, and stingless bee honey from IIUM’s community enterprise. Photography by Jamal Tommy Gallery and official Stadium Merdeka merchandise will also be available.
Creative workshops, including coffee painting and wau-making, will run throughout the three-day event.
The marketplace also opens Stadium Merdeka to the public, offering a glimpse of the historic landmark and photo opportunities within its grounds.
Admission is free.
More info here.
Liew's new work titled 'The Confession Of A Foodigion', now showing at the 'Orang-Orang Suka Makan' exhibition. Photo: The Back Room
EXHIBITION: 'ORANG-ORANG SUKA MAKAN'
Venue: The Back Room, Zhongshan building, KL
Date: ends Nov 16
The Back Room has put together a group exhibition featuring food motifs in art, with works by Chin Kar Yern, Hoo Fan Chon, and Liew Kwai Fei. The title is inspired by a 2012 painting by Liew and can be read in multiple arrangements.
The exhibition is an exploration of food and our relationships to food told through the idiosyncratic lenses of each of the three different artists.
Chin’s multi-media installation themed around pineapples is a quirky way of exploring this dynamic fruit - which is also commonly associated with prosperity and luck - through all of the senses except, ironically, taste.
Hoo’s I have never seen a swimming salmon in my life (2022) is a humorous installation of an aquarium with a swimming salmon fillet that speculates on how it would look like to domesticate a fish species such as the salmon, an imported fish that is commonly used in food dishes and regarded as a sign of class in Malaysia.
Liew’s wall of paintings presents food as a tactile playground of symbolic objects, playing with the springy, stretchy, and evocative delights of different foods like eggs, noodles, fishballs, and fruits, while also touching on the decadent and graphic pleasures of food as visual objects in our optical age.
More info here.
The 'Don Giovanni' cast at KLPac features Cao Yixiao (in black) as Don Giovanni, Chi Hoe Mak (in white) as Leporello. Photo: KL City Opera
THEATRE/OPERA: 'DON GIOVANNI'
Venue: Pentas 2, KLPac
Date: ends Oct 26
KL City Opera returns with its flair for giving classic opera a local twist, presenting Mozart’s wickedly funny Don Giovanni at KLPac this weekend. This time, the infamous seducer trades 18th-century Europe for the sleek, high-stakes world of modern corporate Kuala Lumpur.
Directed by Heather Tan and conducted by Bernard Tan, the production remains faithful to Lorenzo da Ponte’s original libretto, performed in Italian with English and Chinese surtitles.
Yet, true to KL City Opera’s inventive spirit, this Don Giovanni reimagines the timeless tale through the lens of ambition, desire, and downfall in a setting closer to home.
Audiences can look forward to sumptuous music, bold staging, and a sharp contemporary edge that keeps Mozart’s moral reckoning as relevant as ever. Produced by Danny Chen and Ho Soon Yoon, the production reminds us that power, excess, and consequence never go out of style - only the backdrop changes.
The cast features Cao Yixiao as Don Giovanni, Chi Hoe Mak as Leporello, Victoria Seungri Kim as Donna Anna, and Alan Lau / Heo Yueh Ren as Don Ottavio. Saori Suzuki / Lim Yee Fen appear as Donna Elvira, with Angie Cheah / Bui Yik Ling as Zerlina, Joseph Ng / James Long as Masetto, and Dennis Lau as Il Commendatore.
More info here.
