The Ties That Bind Preview

By Han Wei Chou • UrbanWire
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From the man who produced Spice Siblings comes The Ties That Bind, a brand new Channel 8 weeknight drama.

The Ties That Bind tells the story of the eccentric Ma Family. Chen Liping (returning after a short hiatus following her epic role in Holland V) plays the bad-tempered elder sister of the family, Ma Yujia. She’s unable to get along with her hen-pecked younger brother Ma Yucai (Spice Siblings lead Tay Ping Hui) and her proud, opinionated younger sister Ma Yuwan (Jacelyn Tay). Yujia even has problems with her timid husband Xiong Weihong (Huang Wenyong).

Yucai’s spoilt wife Zeng Minmin (and Ping Hui’s Spice Siblings co-star Cynthia Koh ) repeatedly demands that he break away from his sisters. Her insistence springs from her conviction that the modern family must be separate from the family clan. This infuriates his sisters no end and leaves him uncomfortably sandwiched between his familial obligations and duty to his wife. Yuwan, on the other hand, continually quarrels with Yujia and gives her elder sister no quarter in their every argument. Things get worse when Yujia’s husband finally snaps and threatens to divorce her after she wrongly accuses him of having an extra-marital affair.

Yujia’s troubles continue when her tomboyish daughter Xiong Junjie (Joanne Peh) remains unlucky in love despite mummy’s repeated matchmaking efforts. Junjie reluctantly attends a few SDU (Social Development Unit, a local government-run matchmaking agency) functions to pacify her anxious parents. There, she meets Peter Pan Wenhui (Andrew Seow), a man who, unbeknownst to her, will soon change her life.

Speaking about his role in Mandarin during a press conference last week, Andrew thanked producer Lee for “for casting [him] opposite Joanne, a ‘mei nu’ (Mandarin for ‘beautiful lady’)”.

“It is the first time this has happened and I was really nervous,” admitted Andrew, who added in jest, “In the past, I was always the villain and [I] went around raping [the girls] instead of being their lover.”

Joanne agreed that Andrew was simply too nervous around her. Even though she mentioned that Andrew had “NGed (short for ‘no good take’) so many times”, she diplomatically added that he “is a dedicated actor and always did his homework”.

Look out for the chemistry between Andrew and Joanne, and watch the sparks fly when push comes to shove in the troubled Ma family.

Despite the somewhat downer of a premise, the script has its humorous moments. The gags are mostly visual and many laughs stem from the plot details itself. For example when the Ma family finds their new neighbour carrying a bag of female clothing, they start calling him a pervert. Yuwan met him before and started scolding him as well. The neighbour, Xu Chuanfeng (played by Terence Cao), kept staring at her because she forgot to take off her facial mask, prompting her to say, “Haven’t you ever seen a pretty girl before?” It doesn’t take long for her to realise she still had her mask on. Then she screamed and quickly ran away in embarassment.

Let’s just be thankful that the veteran cast has nothing to feel embarrassed about.

The Ties That Bind will begin tying up your weeknights starting August 25, 9pm on Channel 8.