Note: Vic Owen, a friend Des caught up with 50 years later, is in the cast of actors.

Willis Toogood and Henri Ecoma act in this program: to see them dressed up in their finary go to ‘Caricatures & Portraits’ on this site. Willis Toogood also wrote the lyrics, a talented man.

 ‘I began this paragraph by writing of lighter things and before mentioning incidents which have amused us tremendously I would add that half a dozen and more concert parties tour several open-air stages. They are reminiscent of the seaside show on the pier; one is aptly named the ‘Kokonut Grove’. These shows are enormously popular.’

Source: Down To Bedrock (the diary & secret notes of a Far East prisoner of war Chaplain) by Eric Cordingly, Pg 96; permission by Louis Reynolds, daughter.

‘There was no quality so touchingly likeable in prisoner of war psychology as the childish capacity of everyone for enjoying pantomimes. Each Christmas, without fail, thousands of haggard, misshapen, disillusioned men went galloping down to the theatre to see the pantomime and , unashamedly, to enjoy it.’

Source: Unknown Author, ‘On with the Motley: The Changi Concert Party’, in Lachlan Grant (ed.), The Changi Book, Published by New South in association with the Australian War Memorial, 2015, pg. 143