Asian blood brothers embrace success

When Ekachai Uekrongtham decided to dramatise the lives of the original Siamese twins, he thought he would be writing a dark vision of exploitation. Instead - to his surprise - he ended up with a bright stage musical.

'I thought it would be the Thai version of Elephant Man, but instead I found this positive, colourful story that was more about privacy and individuality than about anything else,' said the founder of Singapore's Action Theatre, who has managed, with a little help from his friends, to bring Asia's first English-language musical to the big stage.

And the result is good.

The musical premiered at this summer's Singapore Asian Arts Festival and finished a second sold-out run in the city-state's renovated Victoria Theatre earlier this month. Between the two runs there was heavy editing.

There is a bit more tweaking to be done - the script occasionally loses the energy created by the music - but it is a highly watchable and thoughtful piece.

It might have been mostly written, performed and designed by people whose cards label them as students, soldiers and business people, but the energetic Chang And Eng easily beats some so-called professional shows like the rather muffled The Sound Of Music which arrived at the APA Lyric Theatre last month.

The story of the twins is well-documented. Chang and Eng, who later adopted the American surname Bunker, were born in the village of Meklong in Siam, now Thailand, in 1811.