Predicting winner in theatre competition

So pada 25-26 Okt ada Pesta Teater Runcit 2024 (PTR2024) kat Aswara. Ini sejenis pertandingan teater pendek tahunan anjuran Fakulti teater Aswara. Tahun ini mereka anjur bersama Institut Integriti Malaysia, so surprise surprise, temanya Integriti! Integriti! Integriti! Art-Integriti. Kau rasa temanya panjangggg betullll. Tapi intinya ialah Integriti la. Takyah pening2 fikir. 

Integriti: 1. kejujuran; 2. keadaan sempurna dan utuh, keutuhan; berintegriti mempunyai integriti (kejujuran, ketulusan dan sebagainya): pengarah yang berintegriti pasti akan mempertahankan nama baik mereka daripada sebarang bentuk penyelewengan. (Kamus Dewan)

So, Malaysia pergi on the 26th, sebab they all main semua team on both days, so Malaysia datang sehari je la. Ada 10 teams, 10 naskah. 

• Unit T

• Wheelchair Oh Wheelchair

• Jalan Ke(benar)an

• Pentas

• Masjid Mukim Padi Sebutir

• Rahsia Suraya

• Piagam Tok Dukun

• Kau-sa(r)

• Realiti

• Kebaya Yuna Jones

Lepas tengok show, ada hamba Allah ckp kat Malaysia nak tunggu review, and kalau la ada list prediction Malaysia. 

So, Malaysia pun mcm, why not la kan. So habis socializing with some of the team members, Malaysia balik, jumpa nujum la apa lagi. Nak mintak prediction. 

Walaupun dah zaman moden, jangan underestimate keperluan nujum dalam kehidupan seharian ok. 

So lepas jumpa nujum gedebak gedebuk semua, Malaysia up la list top 5 fav pick kat story IG.

• Piagam Tok Dukun

• Pentas

• Rahsia Suraya

• Kau-sa(r)

• Jalan Ke(benar)an

Pastu, tunggu je la resultnya. Berikut ialah anugerah2 yang diterima oleh Malaysia punya pick

Except for Pentas, those in the top pick list menang all the possible anugerah. And those not in the list tidak menang any anugerah.

Not bad la kan prediction Malaysia?

Hah, you think?

Actually, hakikatnya tak impressive mana pun. Sebabbb….

Sebab it's all just mathematics. Hah? Maths. Jadah apa tu maths? 

Let me introduce you to PROBABILITY.

Probability ni walaupun bunyi macam carut2, sebenarnya sejenis disiplin math. BMnya kebarangkalian. Secara mudah dia berkenaan kebarangkalian sesuatu perkara tu berlaku. Boleh jadi ke? Tak boleh jadi ke? Mustahil tak? Kalau boleh, berapa boleh? So on so forth.

So, secara mudah, in maths, kita ukur probability sesuatu perkara berlaku seperti ini

Dia dalam julat ni je. Takde maknanya kebarangkalian sesuatu berlaku tu 200%. Awas la eh. Unless untuk tujuan exaggeration mungkin la kot kan. 

So, berkenaan predicting for PTR2024 ni, Malaysia tanya diri sendiri:

Berapa banyak team Malaysia should pick (shortlist) so that keberangkalian team yg Malaysia pick ni ada banyak pemenang atau dapat anugerah?

Kiranya Malaysia nak cari bilangan team yg Malaysia kena pilih, supaya dapat kebarangkalian yang tinggi senarai team yg Malaysia pick match (kena) dgn result. 

Contoh, kalau ambil kira Tempat Pertama, Ke-2 dan Ke-3 sahaja,

Kalau Malaysia pick 3 teams daripada total 10 teams,

Probability ada (kena)

0 pemenang= 29%

1 pemenang= 53%

2 pemenang= 18%

3 pemenang= 1%

Kalau Malaysia pick 4 teams, 

Probability ada (kena)

0 pemenang= 17%

1 pemenang= 50%

2 pemenang= 30%

3 pemenang= 3%

And tak terhad kepada 3 teams, or 4 teams sahaja. So nujum Malaysia tabulate the probability distribution mengambil kira berapa team yang Malaysia shortlist and berapa kebarangkalian ada 0,1,2 atau 3 pemenang yang kena:

I won't bother you with the calculation. In fact, this can be left as an exercise to the readers. 

So, roughly from this table, kalau Malaysia shortlist 3 team sahaja, ada 29% chance none yang Malaysia shortlist menang either tempat pertama, ke-2 atau ke-3.

If Malaysia increase the number of team yang Malaysia shortlist kepada 4, I reduce the chance of my shortlisted teams takde yang kena langsung top 3 placing kepada 17%, which is quite low.

But, if Malaysia shortlist 5 teams, chance tekaan Malaysia tak kena langsung any of the top 3 placing is just 8%. But more importantly, there’ll be a total of 92% chances dalam tekaan Malaysia, akan ada at least 1 team yang dapat top 3, compared to 71% and 83% kalau Malaysia pick 3 and 4 teams respectively.

Well, of course I can shortlist more teams to get a better chance, but then kalau Malaysia shortlist banyak sangat, takde la impressive sangat kan predictionnya?

Contoh, based on the table, kalau Malaysia shortlistkan kesemua 10 teams, obviously any 3 of them akan dapat top 3, so that’s why it’s 100% chance of getting all 3 winners kalau Malaysia shortlist 10 teams. But if I did that, laku prediction ke tu?

So that’s why Malaysia went with shortlisting 5 teams, in the hope that there’ll be a 92% chance that at least, one of the team dapat placing top 3.

Hah! Siapa kata benda yang kita belajar dalam kelas maths dulu tak pakai pun in real world? Tiber.

The result turned out better, all top 3 teams are in the pick, and also bonus, pemenang2 anugerah2 lain pun all from this pool of 5 teams I shortlisted.

But now comes the question, how do I know which 5 teams should I pick? 

I mean, there’s still an 8% chance that the 5 teams I shortlisted takde yang kena langsung. In this case for example, what if I was to choose the following teams

• Unit T

• Wheelchair Oh Wheelchair

• Masjid Mukim Padi Sebutir

• Realiti

• Kebaya Yuna Jones

The result will then be, none of the team I shortlisted kena. So, there must be another factor to be considered when shortlisting teams for the prediction, kan?

Meaning that I can’t really pick totally random. I must pick those that have a better chance in closing the gap of the predictions to the real result.

Of course the best way is to read the mind of the juries. Sebab apa2 pun keputusan di tangan juri. Unfortunately I can’t. So I have to resort to a different approach.

Pretending I was the jury. Semua biasa je kan buat ni. Kalau pergi pertandingan, waima kau bukan juri, tapi kau mcm judging peserta juga. Mudahnya kau jadi juri awam.

But takde la Malaysia beriya buat rubric apa bagai.

I just need to eliminate 5 teams. And to do that, Malaysia resort to the greatest weapon that human has since creation: Instinct.

Ah tiber. Anticlimactic tak?

To be fair, I’m not good at judging people’s acting, apatah lagi nak judge people’s directing. But one thing yang Malaysia yakin Malaysia boleh judge is story.

Walaupun tak se-glamour acting and directing, story atau mudahnya the script for the theater is really important. 

Pelakon akan berpandukan skrip dan arahan pengarah. Pengarah pula dalam mengarah pelakon and team akan berpandukan kepada skrip. So, don’t underestimate the importance of having a good script, having a good story. Dia macam batu asas kepada pementasan.

Good story termasuklah yang jelas dan kena pada tema. Dia kena sesuai dengan construct pertandingan. In this case, tema integriti and construct pertandingan teater pendek.

So, first tema. Make sure what you convey about integrity is clear. Integriti berkenaan apa? How do you portray this theme in the story? Jelas tak apa yang nak disampaikan?

Kedua, teater pendek. Dah nama pun teater pendek, construct cerita tu mesti la sesuai dengan dengan durasi yang dibenarkan. You can’t cramp too much, but at the same time the story cannot appear to be too empty. Where do you put the climax of the story? How is it resolved? Can this be done in that short period of time?

I know people akan hate me for saying this, but the ones which are not in my top 5 favourite picks, bagi Malaysia, ceritanya perlu dilihat semula dan ditambah baik. Ni personal opinion je tau, for me there are things lacking in the story they used. There are ones where the theme of integrity, although arguably there, is not easily accessible, obscure or not spelt well. There are ones yang apa yang disampaikan tak jelas (story-wise). There are ones yang bit flat.

Recalling the moment Malaysia tengok Gerobok Lakon 4.0 di Lantera Seni Studio, Malaysia tertarik dengan naskah Perang by Srikandi Emma, the same person yang tulis script Kau-sa(r) (Skrip terbaik PTR2024). She is a good writer (putting all my personal bias aside). Lepas show tu, sempat berbual sekejap dengan dia, tanya proses dia menulis apa bijik semua. Kemudian Malaysia suarakan kpd dia, something needs to be done, untuk create more theater practitioners yang can write.

The reason I said that is because, there appears to me quite a number of emerging actors/directors that have a tendency to write his/her own script, but quality tu belum capai keadaan baik. So, for me, they need exposure or guidance on how to produce a good script.

Sifir dia mudah, these actors/directors spent years belajar berlakon or belajar mengarah supaya boleh berlakon dengan baik or boleh mengarah dengan baik. So, untuk hasilkan penulisan yang baik, you must go through the same process. You can’t cheat. In my experience, there are only few practitioners yang Malaysia yakin can tulis skrip and direct sendiri.

But this is in no way I’m saying don't write, find other people who can write to write for you. No la. Yang Malaysia nak highlight ialah menulis tu, seperti skill2 yang lain, ialah suatu proses, so you will need to treat it equally the way you treat your acting, directing.

Equal weightage, equal effort must be given to writing. 

Writing ni bukan benda sampingan yang you can top up with great directing and acting. Again, skrip tu batu asas, kalau skripnya rapuh, mcm mana pengarahan and lakonan nak berpijak and berdiri?

All of this is my personal opinion. Apa yang Malaysia rasa story yang kurang baik mungkin di mata orang lain baik. And the prediction is just based on my personal thought, preference. It just so happened these shortlisted team menang anugerah and all. I in no way want to offend the other 5 teams yang Malaysia tak shortlist. Mereka ada kekuatan tertentu, but of course ada room for improvement.

Tahniah kepada pemenang-pemenang Pesta Teater Runcit 2024. I personally looking forward for PTR2025. Apa temanya? Team-team mana pula yang akan bertanding. Hope ada la peluang nak tengok.