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1944, Changi by the Sea, Changi POW Camp Concert Parties, Featured, Rice and Shine

Shocking Events

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By Sears Eldredge

On 28 and 29 April, the remainder of “H” and “F” Forces who had been in hospital Up Country arrived back in Singapore “looking tired and dirty after their long train journey.”[i] Some were in such poor shape at the start of the rail journey that they did not make it and were buried beside the tracks enroute.[ii] 

On the 29th, the POWs in Changi got word that they would be moving soon—to the Gaol. The civilian men, women, and children who had been interned in the Gaol since the surrender of Singapore, were moving to Sime Road Camp outside the city. “Heavy sick” British and Australian cases in Roberts Hospital would be sent to a new hospital at Kranji in the northern part of the island, while “light sick” patients would go to a small hospital being established outside Changi Gaol. With all these changes, it appears the production of Macbeth was cancelled.

Playbill for May ’44. On 1 May, the murder-mystery, Suspect, opened at the Little Theatre, which Huxtable thought “a very good drama indeed.”[1][iii] On 6 May there was a concert with Denis East (violin), Cyril Wycherley (piano) and Doug Peart (tenor), followed by one on 13 May 1944 by the A.I.F. Orchestra. These concerts were meant to lower the POWs’ anxieties about their upcoming move. For Australian Stan Arneil, it was, “[a] glorious night of music . . . It is so easy, via music, to fly back home, that the jolt of returning to hard facts is softened by the memory of a good night’s music.[iv] That same night Leslie Buckley’s musical comedy, I’ll Take You: A Musical Review produced by John Wood, opened at the A.I.F. Theatre. In light of everyone moving elsewhere, the title was significant. No one would be left behind.

This would be the last show produced in Changi POW Camp.

I’ll Take You

Removal of the POWs to Changi Gaol and its immediate environs, and to Kranji, commenced in early May. By the 14th, Wilkinson observed, “Theatres and churches all knocked down in this area [Area 1] ready to be transferred [to Gaol]. More officers and men moved to Jail today. Weather exceptionally hot.”[v] Looking at all the commotion around him, Murray Griffin wrote, “Can you imagine the work involved in moving some ten thousand people with their furniture and belongings, their hospitals, workshops, churches, theatres — and all by manpower.”[vi]

On 31st May, 1944, Stan Arneil wrote in his diary:

Today we, so far, will be moving to the gaol. It is a simply glorious morning and the Straits of Singapore look all the more delightful for the fact that we are leaving them.[vii]

Author note:

It’s not possible to follow the POWs directly from Changi POW Camp to Changi Gaol without first checking out the entertainment activity in Sime Road Camp, as many of the prominent musical and theatrical producers and entertainers in the Gaol come from this camp.

RICE AND SHINE WILL CONTINUE IN OUR UPCOMING “SIME ROAD CAMP” BLOG SERIES.

[1] He went on to note that “A young Lieutenant, John White (British Army)—who had been the Princess in Aladdin—was one of the female impersonators: a few weeks later his sore lips and mouth extended suddenly to the throat and he died within a few days.” Huxtable, Diary, 154.

[i] Nelson, 135.

[ii] G’s Greyhounds, 334-335]

[iii] Huxtable, 153.

[iv] Arneil, 13 May ’44.

[v] Wilkinson, Diary. 14 May ’44.

[vi] Griffin, 71.

[vii] Arneil, 31 May 1944.

Note that all the documents in this series of blogs reside in Sears A. Eldredge Archive in the De Witt Wallace Library at Macalester College, 1600 Grand Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota, 55105

Sear’s book, Captive Audiences/Captive Performers: Music and Theatre as Strategies for Survival on the Thailand-Burma Railway 1942-1945, was published by Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota in 2014, as an open-access e-book and is available here: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/thdabooks/22

1944, Changi by the Sea, Changi POW Camp Concert Parties, Featured, Rice and Shine

Worsening Situation

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By Sears Eldredge

In late March, Wilkinson got involved with theatre again in a production of John Galsworthy’s one-act play, Loyalties. By early April, he reports that the POWs in Changi began to experience further food deprivations and that malaria was rampant in the camp—a result of the worsening ration situation.

Rice rations have been reduced! I am permanently hungry! . . . Malaria is extremely troublesome here. In No. 1 Area, Officers and men go down with it time and time again. We are still rehearsing “Loyalties” but Malaria is hitting us hard and there is always at least two of the cast in hospital all the time. We have recast it three times owing to illness and it will be a miracle if it ever goes on as we have used up all our original understudies. Bill Auld is producing. . .. We’ll never be fit as so long as we are P.O.W. as this food is only just enough to keep us alive. One cannot really risk any sort of illness as there is no means of building up again. It’s still a case I’m afraid, of the survival of the fittest or the luckiest! It makes one quite anxious at times as things get gradually worse and here we are now beginning our third year![i]

Playbill for April ’44. All At Sea, at the A.I.F. Theatre, would play through April. On The Spot, a “Super, Do[o]per, Thriller” at the Phoenix Theatre was produced by Vere Bartrum, while the revue, Swingtime, produced by Forbes Finlayson, opened at the Little Theatre. Loyalties, it appears, never did go on.

Program cover for Swingtime. Desmond Bettany.
Courtesy of the Bettany Family.

Swingtime

Swingtime by Mick Walker and Freddy Binns, was billed as a “‘moosical extravaganza (with apologies to the Great American Public).” Directed by Hugh Elliot, with the orchestra conducted by the American, J. J. Porter. Its huge cast of 22 characters was played by 18 actors with some doubling. All four acts took place in the USA and moved from “Placidville, DG,” (Act One) to “Studio of the ‘Miracle Sooper-Kolossal Films, Inc.’ NYC. USA.” (Act Four). But why this sudden salute to the U.S.A., unless their “dickey-bird” (secret radio) was telling them that the tide of the war in the Pacific had turned and the Americans were now taking the upper hand, and this was the subtext their audiences were intended to understand?

[i] Wilkinson, Diary. 3 April ’44.

Note that all the documents in this series of blogs reside in Sears A. Eldredge Archive in the De Witt Wallace Library at Macalester College, 1600 Grand Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota, 55105

Sear’s book, Captive Audiences/Captive Performers: Music and Theatre as Strategies for Survival on the Thailand-Burma Railway 1942-1945, was published by Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota in 2014, as an open-access e-book and is available here: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/thdabooks/22

1944, Changi by the Sea, Changi POW Camp Concert Parties, Featured, Rice and Shine

Rations

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By Sears Eldredge

It is about this time that there is an increase in the mention of hunger in POW diaries and memoirs.[i] Wilkinson compared their rice allotment to what they received Up Country: “We get less rice than we had up country consequently we get less bulk and are always hungry and ready for the next meal. It has become increasingly difficult to buy extras for augmenting our meals.”[1][ii] Obviously, the Japanese supply chain was being severely disrupted by American submarines.

Playbill for March ’44. On 1 March, All At Sea: A Nautical Farce written by Slim De Grey and produced by Keith Stevens, with music by Bill Middleton, and setting by Bert West, opened in the A.I.F. Theatre. The Little Theatre put on Stardust: A Musical Revue 1900-1944 devised and produced by Ken Morrison. March 4th saw the play, Love On The Dole, produced by G. Kenneth Dowbiggin and Martin R. English, open at the Phoenix Theatre in Hanky Park. At the end of the month, the A.I.F. Concert Party performed their Second Anniversary Show.[2]

All At Sea

When the Japanese authorities saw All At Sea, they promptly announced they were going to film it for viewing elsewhere (propaganda purposes), which they did on 6-8 March. As Stewart reports, “A compulsory parade was made to the A.I.F. Theatre, where scenes from the current “All At Sea” were [reenacted] by the cast, photographs taken.[3][iii]

Love On The Dole

Walter Greenwood and Ronald Gow’s gritty three-act drama[4] takes place in Hanky Park,[5] a slum neighborhood of Salford (in Greater Manchester) during the Great Depression and has a strong socialist message—an unusually serious play for POW audiences. Charles Dolman, playing the lead role of the daughter, Sally Hardcastle,[6] who becomes a prostitute in order to help her family survive, was given star billing as his name is above the title on the program cover. Familiar names among the largely unknown cast were Graham Sauvage and Desmond Bettany.

Program cover for Love On The Dole. Desmond Bettany.
Courtesy of the Bettany Family.

Australian O.R. Stan Arneil thought it “a rather sordid play magnificently acted by a group of English players.”[iv] But he was so taken with the show, he saw it a second time five days later. And then decided, “but I had best not see it any more. I dreamt about it all last night and woke up with a boomer cold (almost my first in the tropics).[v]

[1] This must have been while Wilkinson and others were recuperating in Kanburi Hospital Camp Up Country where the Japanese wanted to fatten them up before they were sent back to Singapore.

[2] This is the last entry in Val Mack’s list of their shows in his exercise log books.

[3] As far as is known, no propaganda film of this show has ever been found.

[4] Based on Greenwood’s documentary novel of the same name.

[5] That the play takes place in Hanky Park, England, and the POWs were in Hanky Park, Singapore, may have carried some significance.

[6] Besides its metaphoric significance, the family’s name, “Hardcastle,” must be a reference to the family in Oliver Goldsmith’s famous 18th cent. play, She Stoops to Conquer, in which the daughter, too, saves the family.  

[i] Thomas, Fax. 31 March 01, 9.

[ii] Wilkinson, Diary. 5 Feb. ’44.

[iii] Stewart, Leonard. extracts from A.I.F. ROs, Changi ’44. AWM PR01013.

[iv] Arneil, 10 March, ’44.

[v] Arneil, 15 March, ’44.

1944, Changi by the Sea, Changi POW Camp Concert Parties, Featured, Rice and Shine

Changi Concert Parties: January–May ‘44

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By Sears Eldredge

Because of the huge resettlement of the POWs into a smaller perimeter that had taken place during the latter days of 1943, the number of performance venues in Changi were now limited to five: The A.I.F. Theatre, Command’s indoor and outdoor theatres, and the Con Depot’s outdoor theatre, as well as the YMCA music marquee—all in the Selarang Area. There is no mention of another performance in The Kokonut Grove Theatre in the records. But a new outdoor venue—The Phoenix Theatre— appeared in January in Hanky Park, which was, according to Huxtable, “over near the Malaya Command building half a mile away, over by No. 3 gate.”[i] These POWs were most likely from the Volunteer Forces who had been in the Southern Area and Up Country. The entertainers called themselves “The Red Rose Players.” Their orchestra was directed by Geoffrey C. Knight and their Stage Manager was S. J. Cole. The Phoenix became another of the Command Theatres.

Playbill for January/February ’44. Dick Wittington, at the A.I.F. Theatre, and Aladdin at Command’s indoor theatre, would finish their runs towards the end of the January. Meanwhile, the Variety show, Roman Rackets, written by Graham Sauvage and produced by S. J. Cole was on at the new Phoenix Theatre at Hanky Park. On 25 January, Noel Coward’s Hay Fever, produced by Osmond Daltry and directed by Chris Buckingham opened at Command’s indoor theatre.

In early February, Shooting High, a Western Farce written by Les Connell & McArthur and produced by Keith Stevens went up at the A.I.F. Theatre, followed by a Variety Show, Bits & Pieces. Huxtable, had this to say about the A.I.F. shows he saw:

The shows are always bright and amusing, if somewhat lowbrow – clever singing, dancing, female impersonations (John Woods) and conjuring tricks (Sid Piddington).[ii] 

The Phoenix Theatre’s show for February was P. G. Wodehouse’s, Good Morning, Bill, produced by John Burne.

[i] Huxtable, 153.

[ii] Huxtable, 153.

Note that all the documents in this series of blogs reside in Sears A. Eldredge Archive in the De Witt Wallace Library at Macalester College, 1600 Grand Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota, 55105

Sear’s book, Captive Audiences/Captive Performers: Music and Theatre as Strategies for Survival on the Thailand-Burma Railway 1942-1945, was published by Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota in 2014, as an open-access e-book and is available here: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/thdabooks/22

1943, Changi by the Sea, Changi POW Camp Concert Parties, Featured, Rice and Shine

Out of Bounds

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By Sears Eldredge

On 14 July, the POWs got word from Japanese H.Q. that the British and Australian units within Roberts Hospital would start moving to Selarang Barracks Square in a week. (This will eventually place The Palladium and Command Theatres out of bounds—but not their players and production staff. When they did move, they would take all their costumes, props, lighting, curtains, etc., with them to their new locations.) They would move to the Old Convalescent Depot in Selarang which had become Command and Southern Area Headquarters.

Concurrently, “30 medical officers and 200 Royal Army Medical Corps other ranks” (known as “K” Force) were sent to Thailand, which caused POW Command H.Q. in Changi to fear that some sort of epidemic had broken out Up Country.[i] How right they were. The troops Up Country were dealing with cholera.

Playbill for August/September/October ’43. In early August, the A.I.F. Concert Party shared their theatre with a N.E.I. concert party. What they staged was a musical comedy in Dutch seen by Huxtable:

. . . about two young bloods touring the world.[1] They were smart, well-groomed and clever, and the female impersonators were good. One of the latter, in fact, was quite ravishing in a long, blue evening gown, blonde, beautiful and languorous . . .. I was sitting with Smith-Ryan, and next to him sat a Dutch officer who helped a little with translation.[ii]

Over at the Kokonut Grove Theatre, which was about to go out of bounds, the N.E.I. POWs stationed there produced, Faust: An Operetta in Three Acts. The last show at the Palladium, which was also going out of bounds, was Alan Bush and J. J. Porter’s The Little Admiral. Meanwhile both the musical, Everybody Swing, produced by John Wood, and the revue, In The News, were performed at the A.I.F. Theatre.

Programme cover for Everybody Swing. Des Bettany.
Courtesy of The Bettany Family.

In September, the Aussie’s produced Let’s Have a Murder, a musical mystery play written by Slim De Grey. They were also given word that the Japanese planned to record their shows for short wave radio broadcast to Australia— “as an indication to the world of how happy we all are here at Selarang Barracks,” thought Huxtable.[iii]

October saw the opening of The Time of Your Life, produced by British POW, Ken Morrison, at the A.I.F. Theatre,[2][iv] followed on the 19th by The Fleet’s In, produced by Bennie McCaffrey, which featured a “Toe Dance” by Charles Wiggins to a trumpet duo playing music from the West End musical, Mayfair. At The Little Theatre, Osmond Daltry produced Sutton Vane’s thought-provoking mystery play, Outward Bound.

Program cover for Outward Bound. Desmond Bettany. [3]
Courtesy of the Bettany Family.

Outward Bound is a serious play about the passengers on a boat headed to an unknown destination. What an audience discovers is that the passengers have all died from various causes, and their unknown destination will be either to Heaven or Hell. Only the young couple, appearing on the boat as they prepare to commit suicide are saved from death by the barking of their dog. It was directed by C. J. Buckingham (prior to this he had only functioned as Stage Manager). Former actors from The Palladium Theatre were in the cast. Huxtable, who saw the play on 10 November, thought it “a difficult play to produce successfully before troops, but in spite of that it was most successful. [F. W.] Bradshaw and [Osmond] Daltry are both professional actors. Daltry lost an eye and a leg (thigh amputation) [in the Battle for Singapore] and has to get around on crutches. Bradshaw, young and handsome, has been in Hollywood, I believe.”[v]

On 17 October, David Nelson records that Command was opening a “new theatre.”[vi] According to Huxtable,

[this would be the] former building where Smokey Joe’s restaurant used to be. The walls of the big entertainment hall still carry the cartoons in black and white, painted by Private Rogan of the Convalescent Depot, depicting Walt Disney figures and similar characters. This hall, being in the original NAAFI building, had a proper stage and they have enhanced the effect by rooting up the floor in front of the stage and constructing a pit for the orchestra.[vii]

It, too, would be known as “the little theatre.”[4] Now the Command Players had both an indoor and an outdoor theatre.

[1] Interesting enough, this was the same plot of a show, Zijn Groote Reis (His Big Journey), produced by Dutch POWs in Chungkai POW Camp, Thailand, on 15-16 September 1944.

[2] In mid-August, Morrison, a compere and leading player in shows at the Palladium, received a letter from his mother that told him his wife had been killed in an air raid the previous December. [Capt. A. Smith-Ryan diary, PR00592]

[3] Bettany got the playwright wrong on his program cover.

[4] “Little” refers to the limited number of audience members that could be accommodated in the auditorium. Outdoor theatres could accommodate a lot more.

[i] Nelson, 100.

[ii] Huxtable, 132.

[iii] Huxtable, 137-138.

[iv] Mack, Show Log.

[v] Huxtable, 141.

[vi] Nelson, 116.

[vii] Huxtable, 144-146.

Note that all the documents in this series of blogs reside in Sears A. Eldredge Archive in the De Witt Wallace Library at Macalester College, 1600 Grand Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota, 55105

Sear’s book, Captive Audiences/Captive Performers: Music and Theatre as Strategies for Survival on the Thailand-Burma Railway 1942-1945, was published by Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota in 2014, as an open-access e-book and is available here: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/thdabooks/22

Changi by the Sea, Changi POW Camp Concert Parties, Featured, Rice and Shine

The New A.I.F. Indoor Theatre

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By Sears Eldredge

Neither the sudden reversal regarding their gymnasium playing space, or the “Selarang Incident,” stopped the Aussie concert party from performing the show that had been in its final rehearsals. On Sept. 30th, Keep Singing—their first original revue written by Slim De Grey and Ray Tullipan—opened at a hastily arranged venue somewhere in the Selarang Area. This was also the first appearance of the troupe under their new leadership and name, “The A.I.F. Concert Party.”

It wasn’t long before they found another location in Selarang for their permanent theatre: a bomb-damaged garage. Frazer Harvey and his construction crew went to work and quickly got the new space transformed into a theatre that would seat close to a thousand audience members. 

 The A.I.F. Theatre in Changi. Wash drawing by Murray Griffin.
AWM #38598.

In Murray Griffin’s drawing you see the new A.I.F. Theatre built into the garage. It was completely open on one side but curtains could be pulled across this opening to shut out any daylight or rain when necessary. Audience seating was in two sections: on the level main floor and in the stalls at the back. All seats were made from split palm logs, but the stalls were supported by large posts made from rubber trees. At the far end is a proscenium with a raised stage built on a foundation of solid oak rifle racks; an orchestra pit in front. Scenery would be improvised from old tenting and anything else they could scrounge or steal. Compared to their old gymnasium theatre, the acoustics in this new theatre proved to be excellent even without a microphone.[i]

Playbill for October ‘42.

The month of October found Prom Concerts still being presented every weekday evening at the Pavilion Theatre in the Southern Area; the “P.O.W. WOWS” continuing with their latest show in the 11th Div. Area and on tour; The Dream still playing at the Command Theatre, and I Killed The Count running at the New Windmill Theatre until another diphtheria outbreak temporarily closed the theatre.

[i] Boardman, J. “Notes,” n.p.

Note that all the documents in this series of blogs reside in Sears A. Eldredge Archive in the De Witt Wallace Library at Macalester College, 1600 Grand Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota, 55105

Sear’s book, Captive Audiences/Captive Performers: Music and Theatre as Strategies for Survival on the Thailand-Burma Railway 1942-1945, was published by Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota in 2014, as an open-access e-book and is available here: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/thdabooks/22