Theatresauce presents Come Home and Eat

Theatresauce returns to Kuala Lumpur Performing Arts Centre (klpac) for its seventh-year anniversary, presenting an exciting line-up of seven newly devised projects.

The first show of the 2023 season, Come Home and Eat, directed by Artistic Director Kelvin Wong, is a sequel to Don’t Like It Here? Then Leave, which was presented in May last year. Come Home and Eat explores the theme of home and its anxieties through Malaysian food.

The production team comprises a diverse ensemble, some of whom have lived in various locations around the world but have yet to find their homes. Others have been under the same roof their entire lives but have not felt at home in a long time.

Some believe that home is where their feet take them, while others see it as a state of mind, where chosen families feel closer than the ones they were born into.

Come Home and Eat takes its title from the phrase many Malaysians grow up hearing from their parents and guardians. While food serves as a unifying denominator on a national scale, it has also been used to segregate, oppress, and exploit communities.

The production asks how one finds a sense of belonging and self through eating trends, passed-down recipes, and rising food prices, in the kitchen, and at the restaurant table.

The performance combines various immersive storytelling approaches, from monologues and satire to expressive movement and multimedia, mixing up real and fictional narratives. Real food is incorporated into the theatrical experience, and the audience is invited to interact physically and through their phones.

The production caters to Theatresauce’s target audience of younger viewers with shorter attention spans, a preference for the visual over the textual, and fluency with technology.

Come Home and Eat features an eclectic ensemble of Farah Rani, Kamini Senthilathiban, Nabil Zakaria, Nephi Shaine, Nicholas Augustin, Ryan Yap, and Sharanya Radhakrishnan. Syamsul Azhar designs the lights, and Theatresauce’s multimedia designer Jazzie Lee returns with projections. This project marks the director’s swansong and precursor to his PhD, which he intends to pursue in the UK in September.

The production is presented in collaboration with klpac and will play in Pentas 2. Dhinesha Karthigesu directs the next show, They All Die At The End, from May 25 to 29, also in Pentas 2.

COME HOME AND EAT plays from April 13 – 16 in klpac’s Pentas 2. Performances run from 8.45 pm Thursday till Sunday, with additional weekend matinees at 3.00 pm. Standard tickets are RM55. RM45 per ticket for bulk purchase of four tickets. Each performance runs for about 120 minutes with an intermission. FOR MATURE AUDIENCES.

To purchase tickets, visit Cloudjoi. Bulk purchase deals at RM35/ticket with pre-
performance workshops available for university/college bookings.