Miss Tjitjih's theater strives on

Miss Tjitjih's theater strives on

By Johannes Simbolon

JAKARTA (JP): The lamps in the 200-capacity hall were turned
off. The play would soon begin. The red curtain covering the
eight-meter-wide stage slowly opened to reveal the living room of
a bygone king.

Close to the ceiling, on the upper part of the stage's facade
hung a wooden notice reading "Miss Tjitjih".

It was the name which made the theater group a legend.

Miss Tjitjih died long time ago, but the folk theater her
husband founded still exists. Unfortunately it is in throes of
death, deserted by its fans, like many other folk theaters across
the country.

"Sometimes the audience is only five people. If that happens
the show is canceled," said Wilyam Sundariah, chief of performing
affairs of the theater.

On the night The Jakarta Post visited, the show drew a crowd
of around 30 people, slightly above the average of 20.

All the spectators, including the Post, came on invitation of
an eccentric woman, Very Hardjono, a securities agency' worker,
who celebrated her birthday at the theater in order that her
friends develop an appreciation of the group. Attendance was a
far cry from expected as she invited at least 200 people.

Only a few of the guests could follow the play because it was
presented in the Sundanese language. Many left before it
finished.

Jakarta has painfully changed. Decades ago the group's name
was on everybody's lips, and their performances drew hundreds of
people every night. Now just a memory of its heyday colors the
dreams of the group's members.

Miss Tjitjih was first a Valencia opera before it changed into
a Sundanese theater in 1928. The name was taken from the name of
its prima donna, a Sundanese, who married the group's founder
Sayid Abubakar Bafaqih. Miss Tjitjih died in 1936, but her name
was retained as the group's title.

They performed at place after place which led to their fame
throughout West Java before the Japanese occupied Indonesia in
1942. The Japanese were impressed with the group's popularity and
used them to disseminate their "Greater Asia" propaganda. In
reward, the group received lots of facilities from them.

In the 1950s, after the revolution, the group initially tried
their luck in Jakarta and set up a base in Princent Park (now
Lokasari), then moved to Jl. Kramat Raya, from where they reached
the peak of their success.

Hundreds came to see them every night. They even received the
prestigious Wijayakusuma award from President Sukarno.

Their glory started to wane in the 1970s following the death
of Abubakar Bafaqih. The group's auditorium on Jl. Kramat Raya
was sold during a dispute among Abubakar Bafaqih's descendants
over his wealth.

After that the group, led by his son Harun Bafaqih, went
downhill, moving from one place after another, winding up in the
Angke district, near the railway station and brothels. The
audience numbers dwindled.

In 1987, the city administration built them an auditorium and
a dormitory on 5,400 meters of land on Jl. Kabel Pendek, Cempaka
Putih, Central Jakarta, and allocated them an annual subsidy of
Rp 30 million. The management of the group was transferred from
Harun to the newly-founded Miss Tjitjih foundation.

Unfortunately, the location lies in an area where few, if any,
Sundanese live.

"The audience comes from such distant places like Krawang.
Sometimes they come in a big group by bus," said Wilyam.

About 120 people from 27 families now live in the dormitory,
each family squeezing into a three by four meter room. Every
night, except for Friday night, the adults, sometimes together
with several children, play their roles in performances.

Throughout the day the children are at school, while the
adults work at their side jobs in various parts of the city. The
income from the stage is too small.

Despite their financial difficulties, the group's members
still view their profession with pride.

"This is my life. I'm proud to be involved in preserving one
of our cultural heritages," said Eko, 40, director of the group's
performances, who moonlights as a billboard painter.

They also take pride in the fact that several stories
originating from the theater have been adapted into motion
pictures, like Beranak Dalam Kubur (Childbearing in Tomb) and Si
Manis Jembatan Ancol (Pretty Girl from Ancol Bridge).

Yet pride is not the only thing that keeps the group's members
together. There is also a sense of belonging deeply planted in
the heart of the people. This feeling is felt by Eko, who was
born into the group and reared by it. After graduating from a
technical high school in Bandung, he did not try to find a job
outside the theater as he felt the theater needed new talent to
preserve it. Eko happened to be the most talented of all the
theater's younger generation and was later elected to be the new
director of plays.

Some of the group's youngsters are not very talented in acting
and already have good jobs outside the theater. Still, they
contribute as much as they can to the group.

"I can't leave this group. I was born here. I am a child of
this theater," said Gatot, 24, a university graduate, who has an
accounting job with an airline company in Central Jakarta.

At night, he works as a ticket boy at the theater.