Rule book, or human kindness? Where do you draw the line between right and wrong, and how close do you have to be to death to do it? The Necessary Stage’s Good People tells the story of three people in a hospice, a nurse, the medical director, and a terminally ill patient struggling to deal with her pain. The good people (lame pun intended) -- Sukania Venugopal, Siti Khalijah, Rody Vera, Haresh Sharma, and Alvin Tan sat down with me for a few minutes to describe what it takes to pull off a production with The Necessary Stage, and share some secrets along the way.

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Tell us about yourselves and who you slept with to get involved with Good People.

Sukania: My name is Sukania, Suki for short, and I play the role of Radha. My age is … never mind, but my character is 62 years old. I used to teach but now I’m a full-time theatre practitioner. I sing-dance-act, so I’m a performer instead of just an actress. I’m going to give a number instead of a name of who I slept with -- three. Or would you prefer nine?

Siti Khalijah: My name is Siti Khalijah, I’m 23 this year, but the character I’m playing is 24. I do theatre in Singapore, mostly acting. In terms of who I slept with, I’ll name a place instead of the person. Marine Parade CC.

Rody: I’m Rody from the Philippines. I write, I sing, I act, I swim. And I sleep. And, well, I slept with a guy, no name, but I’ll tell you that that was after I got the part. [Everyone looks at Haresh and Alvin] My role is Miguel, the medical director of the hospital.

Haresh: I’m a playwright, and I’m the Resident Playwright for The Necessary Stage. I’ve been with them for … a long time. I don’t want to say how many years! But I’ve been with The Necessary Stage since the company started.

Alvin: I’m Alvin, and I’m the director of the play.

Tell us about the play.

H: Well, the play is set in a hospice, so naturally there’s a lot of laughter. There are three people whose lives we chance upon in this hospice -- the medical director who is newly appointed to the hospice and likes to rule by the book; and Yati, the jaded nurse who has been there for more years than most; and you have Radha, a terminally ill patient who has been given a prognosis that she has less than three months to live. But Radha, being Radha, lives more than three months. She has bone cancer, and because of the nature of her illness, she is in a lot of pain that is not location specific, and she finds that her medication is not working for her, so she is addicted to marijuana.

That’s when the journey begins. Will they find out? Will they tell on her? The play is set in Singapore, but it could just as well be set in KL, because the same laws apply here.

What was the rehearsal schedule like?

H: We worked over three phases. In the first phase we met for a week, and we had a skeleton, or an idea, of what the play was going to be, and of the different characters that were going to be involved. But at that time we didn’t know who was going to play what. I thought Sukania was going to be the medical director, and Siti would be the patient. But then we tried out different characters, and in the end we went for this formation.

In phase two, we met for another 10 to 14 days where we rehearsed everything, because at that time a draft for the script was down, and we staged it for a preview audience, and then we had a discussion, got feedback and everything. And then more drafts came about, and a couple of months later we had our final three-week rehearsal.

How has it been like, working together?

All: [Mumble and nod]

No drama at all?

SK: No, lah. But for me, I’ve worked with The Necessary Stage before, but I’ve never worked directly under Alvin and Haresh before, so it’s been interesting.

If every play had to have a subliminal message, other than the typical moral of the story, what would the subliminal message in Good People be?

R: A joint a day keeps the doctor away.

What, above all else, inspires you?

A: For me, I think it’s when I get an ideal cast. And I think the cast of Good People is so far in my career my most ideal cast. To me, an ideal cast is when you get intelligent actors who can easily access emotions. It’s very hard to find, in the small talent pool in Singapore, actors who can actually think and feel and be creative, and figure out their own idea of who their character is. That’s very inspiring, to me.

H: Same! Ok, well, I don’t

R: I don’t get inspired too often, so I don’t subscribe to any particular source. I get excited for certain projects, but I don’t look for inspiration, it just comes. So I don’t need to get to the source of it, because, if I do that, I’ll be expecting certain things from a project which may not be appropriate for that particular project. For Good People, by inspiration sort of grew. At first I wasn’t quite sure where it was going, I wasn’t even sure whether I’d be really committed, but it grew, and it became more engaging.

SK: Yeah, I agree with Rody. Because at the beginning we started out with nothing, so we didn’t really know where it was going or how it was going to bloom. So, as we carried on, we did a bit more research and found out a bit more, and from there we started to get excited.

A: They are playing characters that are quite far from themselves. Like Rody has a great disagreement with his character. So, for an outsider it’s quite inspiring to watch this struggle, and realizing that they’re not playing themselves. They actually have to objectify and defend the motivations of the characters that they are playing, and still look convincing on stage.

S: Stories on the Krishna… These stories tell a lot about life, and they give me a high.

R: As opposed to a joint a day?

H: I’m inspired by the sea.

SK: I get inspired by older people. The way they are grounded and strong, with all their life experiences behind them. It’s very difficult to find anyone like that in my generation.

Care to share some secrets nobody else knows about you guys?

A: Siti really likes those multi-dip things. I bought them once, and her eye went huge! It was scary.

H: I can’t swim. I can do one lap without putting my head in the water even once.

R: I don’t have any secrets. My life is an open book.

S: Once a motorcyclist tried to steal my handbag out of the backseat of my car when I was stuck in traffic, but my doors were locked.

How did you guys decide which actor would get which role?

A: Well, at the beginning we hardly knew the actors, especially Sukania. Originally we had wanted Anne James to be involved, but she had other commitments, so she suggested Suki. But we didn’t know what their chemistry would be like, only that they were Good People.

H: We did a lot of improvisation work with different characters, and then we’d rotate them around. In the end it was up to Alvin and I. We sort of just had a feeling who would be right for which part.

A: We made the decision at the end of phase one.

Any parting words?

R: If you want free samples of you-know-what, please call.

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Yasmin Zetti Martin writes for Kakiseni.

Good People runs at KLPac’s Pentas 2 from Wed 14 - Sun 18 May 2008 (Wed-Sat: 8.30pm; Sat & Sun: 3pm). Tix cost RM35/ RM20 (students, senior citizens & the disabled).