The theatre that I watched is Odisi Romansa, written and directed by Ridhwan Saidi. I managed to watch it on 16th May 2026 in Damansara Performing Arts Centre. Odisi Romansa stars Lee Qi as Android Y-002 in the future, Aliya Marissa as Android Y-002 in the past and Rosafiq Roslee as Android Z-001.
Odisi Romansa is set in the future, where humanity has long vanished, leaving androids to inherit the debris of memory, love and time of humans. It is a story about two androids: Android Y-002 and Android Z-001, and their pursuit of finding new memories that can be kept in their systems. Android Z roams around the cosmos, heading to Uranus. However, Android Y stays on Earth. Both of them keep in touch by sending messages through voice messages via Komputer.
In terms of aesthetics in the performance itself, Odisi Romansa captured its genre and issue clearly and uniquely. The scenography and the usage of multiple symbolisms helped strengthen the plot and storyline of the play a lot more, in accordance with Semiotic Theory by Ferdinand de Saussure. Saussure argued that language and culture are systems of signs: not inherent in the object itself, but rather socially constructed through a system of relationships and differences. The theory's concepts include the Dyadic Model of the Sign (Signifier and Signified) and the arbitrariness of both signs. The theatre itself is denoted as normcore: a style of theatre that strips away theatrical exaggeration in favor of minimalist to emphasise the text, intimacy and raw performance, in which Odisi Romansa has managed to tick all the checkpoints, but quite lack in a few aspects.
The set of the play captured the performance’s overall genre: science fiction. It is mainly built with the usage of projectors and screens, giving the advanced technological look which suits the play itself that is set in the future. There is also a distinct prop of a plant vase, where the green plant is in a screen rather than an actual plant, that glitches in crucial parts of the play when Manusia appears: during the turmoil between Android Z and Manusia (along with Android Y as Android Z's hallucination) in manipulating Android Z to be completely human by killing everyone. The glitching of the plant from the vibrant green to a monochrome black and white signifies a lot about the relationship between humanity and human will, greed and desire, where vibrant green is humanity as a whole, while black and white represents the dark side of humanity, which represented by this specific excerpt:
ANDROID Z: Untuk membunuh….adakah ia sifat manusia?
ANDROID Y(Past) + MANUSIA: Yang membezakan manusia dengan android.
ANDROID Z: Aku tak mahu jadi manusia dan aku tak akan membunuh.
This relates a lot to the Dyadic Model, where Signifier (the virtual plant) and Signified (the idea and meaning behind the plant) cannot exist without one another. It was a small yet impactful detail in this play, as it is mostly present on stage, signifying the status of humanity to the two androids from the beginning until the end of the play.
There is also a big hand with an arm made from wires that is puppeted by the Puppeteers(Ensemble) during the scene between Android Z's turmoil about the meaning of humanity with Manusia. The hand slowly grabs Android Z, as the arm wraps around him when he was being manipulated to kill him and Android Y. The hand itself does not just mean that it is a literal hand, but rather the sign of Android Z being engulfed by human intention as stated in the play. This refers to how arbitrary the Signifier and the Significant is, having no natural and inherent connection between the sign and the actual object that it represents. From this scene itself, the director managed to invoke and spark questions about what exactly defines humanity, not from the text itself, but also from the symbolism of the props that gives a different meaning entirely while being quite vague.
In terms of the entire scenography and set itself, the composition blended together very well, with a lot of unique approaches. Komputer being an actual non-human character (represented with a monitor instead of an actor) and the mini monitors changing according to the scene is very impressive and unique. The most unique aspect of the scenography is the usage of projectors and live recording during the performance itself, where it is shown multiple times where Android Z is watching Android Y’s old video recordings while the camera is recording Android Y on Downstage Left. That itself is an incredible vision from the director, as it enhances more on the sci-fi aspects of this play. The play also includes live English subtitles being projected on the screen, allowing international audiences to understand the play better.
However, there are some aspects in terms of the aesthetics where it is quite lacking, which are the costumes. The costumes of Android Z and both Android Y of past and future did not really establish that they are actually androids. Rather, they still look more human than androids, unless it is the intended vision that it aims to achieve.
There is also a concern in regards to using more technology in a theatre, although it is supposed to be a science fiction play. The production should have a back-up plan in the case of any technical emergencies or problems that arise before and during the performance, which may disturb the immersion of the audience as a whole.
Overall, the aesthetics of the performance of Odisi Romansa fits the acting, genre, and issue perfectly about humanity. I am very thankful that I managed to watch Odisi Romansa. The actors did a very spectacular job in maintaining the role of androids in their monotonous nature yet yearning for human desire. The production crews who made the aesthetics come to life, and the director who managed to convey the issue through the aesthetics itself in good detail with very unique approaches.
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