Pandemic era’s first essential Singapore play

THE rhythms and routines of daily life in Singapore rarely look more genuine than when they’re depicted by playwright Faith Ng. Her new play, The Fourth Trimester, is her most ambitious and articulate yet.

Set in HDB flats and void decks, this comedy-drama depicts the joys and compromises of young married couples as they negotiate the challenges of living together, raising young kids, and dealing with parents and in-laws. It’s never been easy for anyone to exchange the freedoms of youth for the responsibilities of starting a family. And a costly and competitive country like Singapore only piles on the pressures. 

As if these themes weren’t enough, Ng also takes on the stresses of pandemic living, the rivalry between the haves and the have-nots, the hostilities between the smugly-married and the defiantly-single, the complication of an inter-religious relationship, the archaic-but-still-very-present strain of misogyny in Asian societies, the obsession with real estate, and half a dozen other peculiarly Singaporean or universal issues.