Who: Theatremaker Krish Natarajan, 29, is a name to watch in the Singaporean theatre scene. An actor as well as a director and scriptwriter, Natarajan is the director of theatre company Strawberries Inc, which produced The Secret Life Of Haw Par Villa (2022), and its subset theatre collective Patch And Punnet.
He starred as Puck in Singapore Theatre Company’s staging of A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2023) and Dev in Brown Boys Don’t Tell Jokes (2023).
He is returning as the scriptwriter for Crack The Case: Backstage Betrayal, which opens at KC Arts Centre on April 24. It is his second immersive murder mystery show with production company Sight Lines Entertainment.
“During my perfect weekend, every day would be spent with my fiancee Nadya (Zaheer) and my family.
On Saturday, my dad goes to the market and comes back around 10am with prata from Ariff’s Restaurant Authentic Indian And Muslim Cuisine in Bukit Batok East Avenue 5. My family eats the prata then, but I always wake up around noon because I am a night owl, so I’ll have my cheese prata and coffee with oat milk and no sugar for brunch.
In the afternoon, I will play board games – such as Settlers Of Catan and Bananagrams – with my family and Nadya at home. Recently, we’ve been into a two-player game Splendor. I like strategy and resource management board games – nerdy stuff. I’m pretty competitive and so are the others, so sometimes, it can get intense when we play.
At night, I might go to Thai Gold Food at Sunshine Plaza for olive fried rice. I have been going there since I was 13 because I went to School of the Arts Singapore and Lasalle, so they know me. But they still ask for my order every time.
I also love mala. It is the only thing that is close to Thai food for me, and Green on Earth Vegetarian Cafe at Rail Mall has the best mala. Nadya and I will go once every two weeks at least. We will get three noodles, tofu skin, monkey head mushrooms, brinjal, broccoli, corn, seafood tofu and, sometimes, spinach.
Then I might go to a theatre show – Checkpoint Theatre and Wild Rice productions are my favourites – or play Magic: The Gathering with my friends.
On Sunday, my dad will cook. He is an incredible cook and we are a vegetarian family, so he experiments a lot. His nasi lemak is one of my favourites. He makes the shiok-est, spiciest sambal with mock fish or mock pandan chicken. Sometimes, he will use monkey head mushrooms to make rendang or mushroom ikan bilis with peanuts.
After lunch, I will play football and then come home to chill with my family while watching a good movie or binge on Netflix. I also enjoy going to the pool or beach in the afternoon, but it depends on my mood.
I will put on a psychological thriller or Love Island (2015 to present). I am a huge sucker for reality TV – Survivor (2000 to present) is my favourite show, I have been watching it since I was 10. Right now, I am watching Love Island Australia (2018 to present) – it’s something I can turn my brain off to watch.
If I am going out, I would sit on Fort Canning Green and listen to a nice blend of local musicians. I have not gone to a concert in a long time, but it would be a dream to have Kendrick Lamar, J. Cole or Damien Rice come.”
Book it/Crack The Case: Backstage Betrayal
Where: KC Arts Centre, 20 Merbau Road
When: April 24 to May 11, various times
Admission: From $68
Info: sistic.com.sg/events/backstage0524
