57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall

Annual General Meeting Report

KING EDWARD VII HALL
National University of Singapore

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
Reports from the Productions Cluster
8.30pm, 10
th
September 2014
Dining Hall







57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
Annual Report from Chinese Drama 2013/2014
For Chinese Drama, AY 13/14 is a year full of challenges and changes. Based on the
previous years of performance and feedback from our peers, we believe that KEVII Chinese
Drama has built up a reputation for excellent performances and a well-known CCA in the
student community. Looking forward, we tried to introduce Chinese Drama and KEVII Hall to
new audiences. With this in mind, the Steering Committee decided to focus on revise on
some of our current activities and look into some new initiatives.

Summary of Activities in AY13/14
1. Summer Vacation:
Activity Action By
Selection of Script Director
Proposals and Venue Booking Producer and Production Manager
Outsourcing for Sponsors and Supporters Steering Committee

2. Semester 1:
Activity Action By
Stage Design & Script Discussion Steering Committee
Recruitment & One-day Orientation All
Masters Class Steering Committee and Hall Play
Acting Workshop (7 sessions) & Drama Screening
(6 Sessions)
Freshmen and New Seniors
Community Service (with Beyond Social Service) Selected Members
Night of Art Performances Freshmen and New Seniors
Costume and Sets Workshop Costume and Sets Department
Outsourcing for Sponsors and Supporters Public Relation Department

3. December Vacation & Semester 2
Activity Action By
Preparation of Publicity materials Publicity Department
Outsourcing for Sponsors and Supporters Public Relation Department
Sets and Dcor Building Sets and Dcor Department
Preparation of Lighting and Sound Effect Lighting and Sound Department
Intensive Cast training Directors and Casts
Dry Runs & Full-Rehearsals All
Final Production(12
th
& 13
th
Feb) All





57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
New Initiatives& Achievements
1. Master Class

Acting workshop and drama screening was introduced in the last academic year to provide
an opportunity for all KEVII residences for drama exposures. From watching Chinese Dramas
done by professional drama groups and also our seniors, and through guided discussions, we
believe better appreciation of theatre arts can be nurtured. New seniors and freshmen
joining Chinese Drama can take this opportunity to familiarize with drama art and prepare
themselves for Night of Art and Final Production.

To take this step further, we proposed a Master Class, where a professional theatre artist,
Mr. Alvin Chiam, was invited to conduct a 2 day workshop for selected members who are
keen on acting. Mr. Alvin Chiam has a rich experience in coaching students from different
junior colleges and has also been directing a few of his own dramas, such as the Cat Men
(Black Box Theatre Festival 08, Macau). Participants of this event feedback to the steering
committee that they have learnt a lot from this class and hope they can have the
opportunities to participate in more events like this workshop.

This workshop also promoted bonding among Chinese Drama and Hallplay members. After
two days of interaction, many have become friends and learned to appreciate each others
effort in their preparation for the annual production.

2. A more diverse representation in Chinese Drama
To break the misconception that Chinese Drama is only for people who are fluent in
Mandarin, this year we tried to engage students from different backgrounds. We also
believe that a more diverse representation in Chinese Drama will be able to generate new
ideas and create more sparks on stage.
To attract more residents who are non-native Chinese speakers, all steering committee
members were encouraged to speak English during CCA Fair. Our official webpage, Renren
and Facebook page used both English and Chinese. Also, we used QR code for registration on
for easier navigation on our website.
As a result, this year we had a quite diverse representation in Chinese Drama. We
managed to recruit 2 more Singaporean and 3 more Malaysian as compared to last year. In
addition, exchange students from Hong Kong, Australia, Sweden and Canada also joined
Chinese Drama. What is more heartwarming is to see they enjoyed themselves and were
very active in Chinese Drama though most of them are not able to speak Chinese. For
example, this years Night of Art Drama item Romeo and Juliet script translation was done
by a Hong Kong exchange student.
We hope in the future Chinese Drama can have more members from different
backgrounds and bring in some new elements to enrich each others experience in the CCA.



57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report

3. Community Service
As one of our new initiative, we coordinated with Beyond Social Service for a one day
charity event. Jointly organized with KEVII Wushu, together 18 members went down to help
out to clear an activity center for children from underprivileged families in Whampoa
Community.
Initially we were planning to perform a few drama and wushu items to entertain small
kids, as it would be more relevant to our CCAs. However, due to the conflict with timing, we
decided to go for this alternative instead. Beyond Social Service organize a wide range of
community service events and hopefully with better planning, we can participate in more
activities in the future.

4. Highlights during Final Production
This year, one of the biggest challenges we face is how scene changes should be executed
effectively. For those who have seen our production this year, our script involves very
frequent transitions between two houses that have very contrasting settings. Our casts,
especially our actresses, need to change their costumes in very limited time. In the limited
space of backstage, how can we make sure all props can be taken off and put on stage in
time, how do we minimize the number of stage hand, how to achieve each set-changing
without any traffic jam, were always discussed in our production meetings.
Our solution is to keep all transitions visible to the audience. This concept is rarely used in
drama productions but it has a very direct impact on audiences experience. More implicit
message can be delivered through the facial expression and acting of mass actors (stage
hands). To achieve this, all of our production departments have to work closely with each
other. Costume, sets, lighting and sound department has undergone countless rehearsals on
set changing to ensure a coherent transition between two acts. Our final production would
not be as impressive without their hard work.



5. More Collaborations with other Hall/NUS CCAs:
This year, Chinese Drama steering committee tried to collaborate more with other CCAs in
hall. With hallplay, together we organized Masters Class, Sets and Costume Workshop. With
Wushu, we participated in a community service activity. With Xinyao, we came up with a few
songs that may be used as our CCA song or part of the background music for the final
production in the future. All these collaborations have tightened the bonding between
Chinese Drama with other CCAs in hall.
Externally, as only Hall CCA supported by ExxonMobil Campus Concert, we see the urgent
need to collaborate with the NUS CCAs. Thus, we have actively approached two CCAs under
the Center for the Arts, NUS Harmonica Orchestra and NUS Rondalla. They have actively



57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
helped us to publicize our annual production and shared their connections with Chinese
Drama. In return, we also encouraged our members to support their productions.
We would advise the next batch of steering committee to be more active in networking
with more NUS CCAs in the future. NUS Student Union President Mr. Yida has also
emphasized the importance of collaborations between hall CCAs and NUS CCAs when we
applied for NUSSU Fund. Though hall CCAs and NUS CCAs are usually seen as under two
different systems, there are a lot of resources and connections we can share. More
cooperation with other CCAs also will help us to source for sponsors and talents.
6. Outreach and Media Coverage for Publicity

In the past few years, Chinese Drama has always tried hard to attract more talents who
are interested in drama productions and Chinese language. This year, we contacted Chinese
Drama groups from different Junior Colleges, such as Raffles Institution, Hwa Chong
Institution, and Victoria Junior College. The teacher-in-charge and chairperson Raffles
Institution Chinese Language and Culture Society attended our first day of production as
VIPs. Hopefully by having this outreach initiative, we are able to attract more interested
students to apply to KEVII.

In addition, the Chinese Drama producer from Hong Kong University of Science and
Technology (HKUST) also came and watched one of our full dress rehearsals. She shared
how her Chinese Drama team prepare for the final productions and offered us her
suggestions during production meeting. HKUST Chinese Drama is also a student-run drama
interest group. The experience she shared is very relevant and may be borrowed by us in
the future.

In terms of media coverage, we continued to work closely with Lian He Zao Bao. In the
Bao Mi Hua (popcorn) section, it featured our December holiday preparation for Sets
department. Lian He Zao Bao also sponsored us an advertisement for our final production.
These advertisements drew the attention of the public and many students and elderly care
organizations called us to find out more, which in turn brought our presence to a larger
audience.

Summary and Recommendations for the future
Our final production <Mnage 13> happened on 12th and 13th February.
For the first day we had full house and for the second performance we had full house
including the second floor. From the feedback forms collected, we can see our audience
enjoyed this years performance and they are looking forward for our next years
production. Dramabox, a well-respected modern theatre company also extended their
invitation to our members for drama trainings after seeing our performance. One of the
senior production managers has also encouraged us to bring our performance up one more



57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
level by performing in esplanade in the future. Overall, we believe we have presented a
successful production this year.

In the coming years, we hope to see more breakthroughs. Chinese Drama has been
presenting dramas from the same author in the past few years. While his dramas were
proven welcomed among the audiences, we hope the future batches can jump out from this
comfort zone and be more daring to explore different styles of theatrical arts. We advise
the steering committee to communicate more with local professional drama groups and
seek for new elements that can be brought into our final production. We are also looking
forward for more extensive collaborations with other CCAs, regardless in hall or in NUS.
Hopefully, by working with diverse partners, we can generate more exciting ideas.

In addition, we also recommend the next steering committee to keep and improve on our
current measures, such as Master Class and Acting Workshop to deepen members
understanding of theatrical arts and cultivate their passion through practice. With enough
support and funding, hopefully such activities can be open to all interested KEVIIans.

Acknowledgements
We would like to express our deepest appreciation to our Hall Master, the SCRC, 57th
JCRC, Hall Office staff for their generous support throughout the academic year. We
would also like to sincerely thank other hall CCAs for their cooperation and help, especially
Hallplay, Wushu, KE Vision, KE Motion and XQRJ.

We would also like to extend our appreciation and apologies to all sports CCAs for their
understanding and kindness. Many a times, there were conflicted bookings for the
Communal Hall and they would not hesitate to offer it for our rehearsals instead.

And last but not least, a big thank you to all our devoted members. Without any one of
you, the achievements of Chinese Drama would not have been possible. Thank you!

Prepared by Ms. Ma Danna
Producer/Chairperson
King Edward VII Hall Chinese Drama AY13/14




57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
Annual Report from Hallplay 2013/2014
General comments
Hallplay this year was a resounding success. Not only did we have a capable executive committee
and sub-committees, we also had talented cast and a play which entertained people of all ages.
Besides continuing the legacy by emulating what had been done last year, we incorporated rigorous
use of the social media into publicity, such as actively engaging fans and netizens on Facebook and
pouring more effort to bond Hallplay as a CCA, a task none too easy for a large CCA with nearly 90
members.
Another key point of our success was the drastic reduction in budget consumption, where we spent
far less than we had foreseen. Thanks to our marketing teams resourcefulness, we also gained a
new main sponsor, SASA, which provided us with not only makeup artists and makeup for our cast,
but also complimentary face masks for the audience.
The production, held on 24
th
and 25
th
January 2014, featured The Odd Couple by Neil Simon from
Broadway, where two best friends of conflicting characters attempt to live together, resulting in
hilarious consequences. A light-hearted comedy, it was a hit with the audience, especially for
students and people in their twenties, who were our target audience.
Table 1: Details of The Odd Couple (Male Version)
Cast Size 8
Approximate Runtime 2 hours, divided into 3 acts
Copyright Agent Samuel French Inc.
License Cost $510
Although Hallplay was split into two general work phases, many departments had to work in concert
to bring the play to fruition. The section below highlights main details of what the departments have
done during the period leading up to the production.
Steering Committee
Comprised of 18 adept and responsible people, the steering committee worked closely together as a
team and proficiently guided the individual departments of Hallplay. Every so often, it met up to
ensure that everything was proceeding well and to troubleshoot any problem which arose. As the
core of Hallplay, the steering committee performed their duties exceptionally and its meticulous
planning was key to ensuring that the production ran smoothly without problems.
Cast
Directed by Grace Cheah, the cast was brought to their full potential and worked hard relentlessly
throughout semester one and the holidays to master the play. With a strong cast of 8 actors and
actresses, the rehearsals this year were easier to organise and manage, especially since the play
focused more on the two leads, Felix and Oscar. Although the cast comprised of mostly new blood
actors, with only two returning seniors, their acting skills were none too shabby. They all did KE
proud during the show and brought much laughter and tears to the audiences eyes.



57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
Notably, one of the seniors had been last years producer while the other, who had acted in previous
years, possessed a wealth of experience, attesting to the long-living continuity of Hallplays talents. It
is with much hope too that the new batch of actors and actresses will continue to contribute to the
Hallplay scene and make KE proud again.
Publicity & Ticketing
Publicity, headed by Ricky Xaiyasak, took a step further this year by actively engaging the audience
with social media activities, as well as centralising all publicity content into one website generated
on Wix.com. The consistent updates about the production process also allowed constant excitement
about the play and clear communication with non-residents, thus opening the market further to
more potential viewers. A publicity game was also organised to promote more awareness about the
play, but due to inadequate time for publicity, the turnout was quite low; nonetheless, those who
participated had enjoyed it. Ways to improve publicity in future would include encouraging the
members of Hallplay to be more proactive in promoting the play to their friends and family as well,
so that the effects of publicity will be more far-reaching.
Meanwhile, ticketing faced a slight problem with ticket sales, with total sales reaching slightly over
80% of total tickets available. This was because of lower than expected sales by cast compared to
the previous year and poor awareness of the production to other halls, as well as less tickets sold by
other Hallplay members. This can be remedied by urging members to promote the play to their
families and friends via more internal publicity and morale encouragement, while actively liaising
with producers of other hall productions and JCRCs to help promote and market the production.
Costume
Led by Tee Shiyun, the costume team collaborated closely with each member of the cast,
communicating individually with them to source for suitable costumes and utilise clothes the cast
member already own to reduce unnecessary expenditure. They also acted as the main liaison with
SASAs make-up team and built good relations with SASAs representatives, making future
agreements possible.
Welfare & Marketing
As feedback from last year highlighted the relatively low levels of activity and interaction between
members within CSLW and the marketing team, we decided to combine the two departments so
that manpower quantity can be reduced while more opportunities for interact amongst members
will be introduced. Headed by Shi Yang Yang and Avery Linn, its main accomplishment was clinching
SASA as a major sponsor for the production, whereby cosmetics, make-up artists and face masks
were provided by the cosmetics franchise. The team also organised several welfare suppers, which
involved procuring good food for the members in their bid to maintain good morale amongst the
Hallplay members.
Set Building, Set Dcor & Stage
Set building encountered some setbacks when Meng Hwee, our set building head, had to report for
reservist. Consequently, after a week of delay, set dcor lost some precious time for set decoration.
Fortunately, our set dcor heads Chia Chia and Livia, along with their dedicated team, were willing to



57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
toil day and night, often well after midnight, to complete the structures painting and finishing.
Without their relentless hard work and unending dedication, the set would not have been the
wonderful and aesthetically pleasing setup it was. Similarly, the set builders had poured in much
effort and time into building the sets, and without them, a good, viable and sturdy background and
set would not have been possible.
Lights & Sounds
Lights and sounds were led by Cheyenne and Joyce Wong respectively, and were an efficient team
which truly brought out the full potential of all the scenes during the production. Cheyenne, a
veteran of the productions scene, transformed the stage with amazing light designs, allowing the
audience to fully immerse itself into the story while Joyce provided timely and efficient sound effects
which spiced up the play further. Their familiarity with the technical systems also facilitated the
smooth running of the dry runs and full runs, causing minimal problems so that more time could be
spent on other aspects of the preparations.
Major events for the year
Major Event Date
Acting Workshop (Combined with Chinese Drama) 23
rd
& 24
th
Sep
Viral Games
Week 9-10
Early-bird Sales
Group Sales Booth Sales (28 Oct 8 Nov)
Online Sales (21 Oct 8 Nov)
Booth Sales Week 10-12
FB Ads (promotion to non-residents) Week 11
Poster and Miscellaneous Publicity Promotions Week 12 Jan 25
th

Dry runs & Full runs Dec - Jan
Bump-in Jan 23
rd

Production Dates Jan 24
th
& 25
th


Recommendations for the future
The individual sub-committees of Hallplay should be promoted to committees level for more KEIPS
points for members, in order to match the level of time and attentions contributed to Hallplay and
provide an incentive for the amount of hard work and effort put in.
Acknowledgements
We would like to express gratitude to Hall Master, the SCRC, KEVIIs non-residential fellows, JCRC,
Office Staff, Hallplay members and everyone who has shown us unending support and contributed in
any way to the success of Hallplay.
Prepared by
Sherene Tan
KEVII Hallplay Producer 2013/14




57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
Annual Report from Xin Qing Rong Ji (XQRJ) 2013/2014
General Comments
The 16
th
XQRJ has embraced another fruitful and exciting year filled with new initiatives, challenges
and successes. The department heads started to revise last years progress and plan for the new
academic year during vacation and came up with new objectives and initiatives of the year. 16
th

XQRJ successfully fulfilled all three objectives of financial sustainability, wider publicity and less
workload in AY13/14. New events like Facebook Campaign and New Word Order were initiated and
turned out to be great successes.
This year, structures and job scopes for both members and department heads are redefined and
reorganized to increase working efficiency and lighten workloads. A new department, Public
Relations, was formed, and is responsible for publicity, program planning and ticketing. Together
with Marketing and Design, the three departments worked closely during Semester 1 and December
holidays for funding, publicizing events and the Prelim Round. After the Prelim Round, new roles
were allocated to each member. We formed our Production Team and worked hard for Grand Final
through numerous rounds of dry runs. Members are encouraged to try out different roles from
events to events so that they can obtain various experiences.
XQRJ has been renowned for our close and extensive collaborations with our prominent sponsors in
their respective industries. This year is no exception. Besides the funds we received from our cash
sponsors, our service sponsors has also offered us great help in the process. Our sponsors include
Ocean Butterfly, Audio Technica, Cristofori, Y.E.S. 93.3FM, Perfect 10, Lightedpixels, Yellow Box
Studio, Camwerkz and School of Make Up. All sponsors attended our Grand Final and showed great
interest in collaborating with XQRJ again in the future.

Major events
Major Events Dates
New Word Order @ The Arts House Sep 24, 2013
Open for Entries Oct 28, 2013
XQ Solution Dec 20, 2014
Prelim Round Dec 27, 2013
Member Photo shoot and Overseas Trip Dec 29 31, 2013
Top 10 Finalists CD Recording and Photo Shooting Jan 6 9, 2014
Music Without Boundary Charity Concert@ Renci Hospital Jan 9 ,2014
Live House Concert @Cristofori, Funan Digitalife Mall Jan 12, 2014
Grand Final @UCC Hall Feb 17, 2014

New Initiatives
-New Word Order
New Word Order is a new publicity event for XQRJ. It is also our first time collaborating with The Art
House. We invited the Top 3 participants from 15
th
XQRJ for song performances and a sharing



57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
session about original song writing experiences with the pubic crowd in The Art House Chamber. This
event helped to bring XQRJ to the general public and allowed the crowd to know better about
original songwriting.
-Facebook Campaign
In order to tap on the online crowd, XQRJ has been working hard on online publicity through various
social-network services. Facebook Campaign was our first attempt to try to attract more audiences
and reach out to the public online. The Lucky Draw prizes were three Ukuleles and were generously
sponsored by Cristofori. Participants had to Like XQRJ Facebook page and answer three simple
questions about XQRJ. The winner was selected randomly and was announced during our Live
House concert. This Campaign was a great success as it not only helped to promote XQRJ online and
increase our reach, it also allowed us to collaborate with our sponsor in new ways.
- Collaboration with Other Hall CCA
Our charity concert, Music Without Boundary, was held in Renci Community Hospital this year in
order to bring happiness and joy to the elderly patients and give back to the society. Besides
performances by our Finalists, our KE Wushu team members also put up a magnificent show of
Chinese martial arts for the audiences. This is the first time XQRJ has collaborated with Wushu.
Collaborations between CCAs help to solve some resource problems and provide an opportunity for
members from both groups to understand each other better.

Highlights and Achievements
-Financial Sustainability
Financial sustainability has always been the biggest problem faced by XQRJ because the high
expenditure of using University Cultural Center Hall and publicity costs due to the large audience
size. But this year, 16
th
XQRJ has achieved a financial surplus of $1586.42 and successfully turned
the past year losses into gains. This was achieved by sourcing new sponsors and cutting unnecessary
costs.
Our marketing team led by Siqi has done a splendid job and brought in cash sponsorship more than
$12000 from various organizations. The amount of cash sponsorship is more than any other previous
years and provides XQRJ with solid ground to progress and develop.
In order to control expenditure, we decided to eliminate unnecessary costs. We managed to save
$1000 on recording our CD as our Marketing Department member managed to secure a studio that
is willing to provide the service for free. Thanks to Yibo, our Production Head, we managed to avoid
some costs during our production such as the overtime cost of UCC Hall. Her thorough planning and
wise decisions made sure our production team was able to bump out of the venue on time thus
helping to avoid the hefty overtime charges. In addition, we also saved a few hundreds of dollars
from strategically planning the amount of publicity materials by referring to the situation from
previous years.



57th JCRC, King Edward VII Hall
Annual General Meeting Report
-Publicity Reach
XQRJ is always been well known for its wide and publicity and extensive media coverage. The
department head of Public Relations, Yuan Yi and Design, Jing Heng, have been working together to
bring the Publicity of XQRJ to greater heights. We tapped closely on both conventional channels of
distributing hardcopy publicity materials and working with media partners, and online platforms of
our very own XQRJ official website and popular social networking sites. Our XQRJ Official Facebook
pages reached 2,700 likes and our online reach peaked to about 30,000 people during the week
before our Grand Final. In addition, XQRJ was also frequently featured on popular Radio stations like
Y.E.S. 93.3 FM and established newspapers like Lian He Zao Bao.
Moreover, the number of submitted entries also shows a 40% increase compared to last year. We
received more than 140 entries from both Singapore and Malaysia. The increasing number and
coverage of submitted entries indicate the increasing influence of XQRJ in the region.

Problems Encountered
Though the whole committee has been put in lots of effort and time preparing for our Grand Final,
not everything was plain sailing. We encountered tickets sale problem as only 65% of tickets were
sold one day before our final show. We finally sold about 75% of all our tickets of Grand Final.
Though the loss on ticket revenue did not affect our finances much, the number indicates there is a
lack of sustainable channels of selling XQRJ Grand Final tickets. Our target audiences are mainly
Finalists friends and family, young people who are passionate about music, committee members
friends, Hall residents as well as the general public. More effective and sustainable ways of selling
tickets are needed to reach to these groups of audiences in order to ensure the developments of
XQRJ and eventually bring it to a greater height.
Recommendations for the Future
After analyzing the ticket sale and comparing it with previous years, we realized that the Top 10
Finalists sold less than last year by 102 tickets. We should encourage the Finalists to sell more tickets
to their friends and family in the future probably by providing them with bundle sale discount and
complimentary tickets for their parents. In addition, to boost ticket sale, the future committee can
also consider having early bird sale or special offer to Hall residents.
Acknowledgements
The journey has not been easy. We would like to express our deepest gratitude to our Hall Master,
the SCRC, KEVIIs non-residential fellows, the 57
th
JCRC, Hall Office staff, XQ Lao Ren, KEVIIans and
our dedicated XQ members. 16
th
XQRJ would not be possible without anyone of you. Thank you for
your support and contributions!
Prepared by
Ms. Liang Yi
XQRJ Chairperson AY13/14