Let me just try to summarize the whole 2 hours of play for you.

It started with a husband, Pak Ali who got married with two women, Mak Labu (who is the older wife) and Mak Kundur. Basically both of the wives were pregnant at the same time. Mak Labu gave birth to Merah (the protagonist) while Mak Kundur gave birth to Puteh (the antagonist). One day, after Merah and Puteh grew older their dad decided to go into the forest to look for something when a storm came and hit a tree. That tree somehow happened to fall onto Pak Ali and he died.

After that Mak Kundur (the bad wife) decided to kill Mak Labu (the nice wife) while she was washing her clothes at a well, Mak Kundur pushed her into the well. The thing is she didn't die yet. Merah, who were worried about her mother not returning home when it was almost dusk, fell asleep and had a dream about her mother saying that she died and turned into a fish after she fell into the well. Merah then was asked to bring some rice and veggie to the well to feed Mak Labu, who is now a fish. Without realising, Puteh was spying on her and when she found out about Mak Labu still alive she immediately told Mak Kundur about it. Then they went to the well and caught Mak Labu and cooked her (in fish form). When Merah got back from somewhere (maybe the well but that won't make sense cause Mak Kundur and Puteh was there after she left), Mak Kundur served Merah a fish with rice and told her that she can finish it all by herself. If you haven't figure it out already, the fish is Mak Labu. Yes, so Merah ate her own mother. Yay.

So Merah was an orphan living with her stepmother and stepsister. One day, Merah was singing at a garden when a prince passed by. He obviously heard a beautiful voice and asked his followers to find out about the girl. Then after some drama happened like when the prince's followers mistaken Puteh instead of Merah, the prince and Merah finally got married.

On one of the night after they got married, the king (or in this play Sultan) caught Merah and one of the prince's followers, Awang in a room... together... alone. The Sultan was angry and kicked Merah and Awang out of the village forever. It was then revealed by the prince that Puteh and Mak Kundur planned all of this and of course the Sultan became angry once more. But before he could sentence their punishments Merah defended her stepmother and stepsister so they were (unfairly) escaped from their punishments.

It ended when the Sultan held a royal event to welcome Merah back to the palace.

Can't believe I managed to summarize it. Btw, this play uses Malay language fully throughout the whole play. Also, the summary is BASED ON MY UNDERSTANDING and of course I didn't tell the WHOLE story but believe me I told you most of it.

Xx,
Melynn.