Curtain Call

Introduce yourself!
I’m Yi Wei, I’m 27 this year, I’m a stage manager, and I freaking love a lot of things! I love walking, reading, my cats, tattoos, musical theatre, my friends, people, and I fucking love my job!

We love how much joy and love you have towards life! What do you love most about your job?
I love that I continue to learn, that it’s fulfilling yet challenging, and that I get to be in the same room as all these talented, creative people who care about what they do. So it’s not just about me and what I do—it’s about the wider environment I’m in, the people I get to work with, and I guess the shows I get to do. It’s very exciting.

Have you ever thought about being in front of the camera?
Yeah, I used to be actually! I was actor-trained at the School of the Arts, but I eventually realised that it gave me too much anxiety. It felt like if I wanted to be an actor, a lot of the relationships I formed with people would feel a little bit forced and a bit surface level, like I’ll always be trying to get something out of them, you know?

And also, I’m a freaking Chinese girl, and 90% of the people who are actors are my casting type—I’m not special! The competition is tough and they’re all fucking good, whereas I’m just some secondary school O-Level drama kia (kid). Like who am I? And just nice, at the same time, I discovered stage management and I realised that even if I wasn’t onstage, I could still be in the room, contributing towards this thing that I really love, and things that I feel are important, and I get tio grow with it. How lucky am I?

What part of stage management particularly fulfils you?
I love being challenged, and as a person, I just have a lot of anxiety. My brain’s very loud all the time, but when something goes wrong in the show or in the room, it’s the quietest my brain will ever be, and that shit drives me. I also love the people aspect of it because I do a lot of reflection and introspection, and I always want to get better as a person, and I feel like this environment allows me to do it. It allows me to be openly reflective with people who are also trying to get better themselves, and I always walk away from work more energised than when I enter the office, and I think that’s rare.

How rare indeed! That said, what are your hopes for the theatre industry in Singapore?
I feel like there’s a lot of commercial pressure to do what people want to watch, and while there’s always room for that, my dream is that will also be more room for people to create works that matter to them, and that matter to the communities that they’re a part of, and I hope that audiences will support these kinds of shows.

And what sorts of stories would these entail, you think?
I mean, there are so many, right? If you throw a stone, it’ll hit an important topic that people should be talking about. But if you ask me, I wish people would talk about what’s personal to them, and be vulnerable with their work. I think works nowadays are very intellectual. I see a lot of works where people are trying to prove that they’re smart and capable, and we know babes, you’re in the arts, you wouldn’t be successful if you weren’t smart and capable (laughs). But I wish people would be vulnerable and trust that the community will be there to catch and support them, even if I don’t know this for a fact (laughs).