The Komedie Stamboel: Popular Theater in Colonial Indonesia,
1891-1903 by Matthew Isaac Cohen
Originating in the eastern Javanese port city of Surabaya
in 1891, Komedie Stamboel, or Istanbul-style theater, was
Indonesia’s very first cross-ethnic performing art and
the first theater form to be staged throughout the archipelago.
Walking the streets of small towns and large cities in Java
at night in the beginning of the 20th century, it was not
unusual to come upon the squeals and loud guffaws of this
raucous popular entertainment. Professional troupes, with
casts and crews numbering fifty or more, regularly toured
all over colonial Indonesia by rail and steamship, performing
tent shows for paying spectators for upwards of five hours
per night.
These lively stamboel theater companies most often performed
musical versions of The Arabian Nights, Ali Baba, European
fairy tales such as Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, the operas
Aida, Faust, as well as Indian and Persian romances, Southeast
Asian chronicles, true crime stories, and political allegories.
Integrated into the rhythms of everyday life, komedie stamboel
plays were put on to raise money for charity, to mark social
occasions, and as a rallying force behind political rallies.
Songs from this theater form, known as lagu stamboel, were
sung and whistled on the streets, blared from music boxes,
and found their way into native Javanese musical genres like
kroncong, gambang and gamelan. Reviews and stories based on
stamboel plays were regularly published in local Dutch and
Malay-language newspapers. As in Java’s wayang theater,
the ethical and moral strengths and weaknesses of the characters
were emulated and hotly debated.
The actors were primarily Eurasians, the financial backers
were Chinese, and audiences were made up of all races, ages
and classes – drunken Europeans, middleclass Muslim
families, Chinese shop owners, prostitutes, sailors and soldiers.
Men and women fell madly in love with the actors and actresses
and lavished gifts upon them. Scores of children, who could
not afford the price of a ticket, tried to sneak in or stood
craning their necks for a look inside the tent. Komedie Stamboel
served as an amusement and distraction from the drudgery of
urban life.
The book The Komedie Stamboel explores how this new hybrid
theater had such a great influence on the social and cultural
life of the colonial East Indies to the point of even sparking
debates on moral behavior and mixed-race politics. While audiences
marveled at spectacles featuring light-complexioned actors,
the stirring music and the rambunctious comedy also ignited
public outrage, racial frictions between actors and financiers,
sex scandals, rowdy fights among actors and patrons, bankruptcies,
imprisonments, and a murder or two.
The author Matthew Cohen is a senior lecturer in Drama and
Theatre Studies at Royal Holloway University of London. His
articles on Southeast Asian performance arts have appeared
in New Theatre Quarterly, Asian Theatre Journal, Journal of
the Royal Asiatic Society, and Archipel. To boot, Cohen is
a practicing shadow puppeteer (dalang) and has performed in
the United States, Europe, and Asia.
He has written an evocative and meticulously researched social
history which positions Komedie Stamboel in the culture of
empire and in the colorful world of late nineteenth-century
itinerant entertainment. The theatrical form soon outgrew
its roots in Surabaya, spawning dozens of amateur and professional
imitators, to become a common cultural possession of the whole
Netherlands Indies. This publication is, in effect, a pioneering
study of 19th century Southeast Asian popular culture, giving
a new picture of the region’s arts and culture at the
time.
The book also explores theatrical innovations and the interplay
of currents in global culture. Written in a clear and concise
style, the author shows how this type of theater was used
as a symbol of cross-ethnic integration in postcolonial Indonesia
and as an emblem of Eurasian cultural accomplishment. What
makes the book particularly readable is that it is chock full
of juicy anecdotes describing the scandalous cultural life
of the Indies at the turn of the last century.
The Komedie Stamboel: Popular Theater in Colonial Indonesia,
1891-1903 by Matthew Isaac Cohen, Ohio University Press 2006,
ISBN 0896-802-469, 473 pages, paperback, appendix, notes,
glossary, selected bibliography, index.
Available for Rp300,000 at Periplus Bookshops in the Bali
Galleria, the Matahari in Kuta, the Bintang supermarket in
Legian, Warung Made in Seminyak, Ngurah Rai Airport, in Gramedia
Bookstores, in the Ary’s, Ganesha and Periplus bookshops
of Ubud, or directly from the University of Ohio Press (www.ohio.edu/oupress)
For comments and suggestions, please write :
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Copyright@2007 PakBill
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