For Merdeka and Malaysia Day, The St. Regis Kuala Lumpur turns P. Ramlee films into exclusive evenings of food, music and theatre, with Aruel Ariel and The FaSoLa carrying the legend’s mischief and mayhem from screen to table.

When the lid came off the claypot, there was nothing inside. No beef, no lamb, just an empty bowl and a room of strangers leaning in at once, half laughing, half stumped. It takes a moment before I noticed a bergedil disc tucked on the lid’s underside the whole time like a magician’s last card. The server slides it into the bowl, pours a spiced broth around it table side, and the feast resumes.

A Two-Year Wait for One Icon

Malaysiaku returns to The St. Regis Kuala Lumpur every Merdeka and Malaysia Day. Following a hiatus in 2025, Malam Gala Malaysiaku: The P. Ramlee Premiere finally reached the table, and once when the journey reached its end, I saw why it took so long to perfect. P. Ramlee is not a subject a kitchen gets to attempt twice. You either do him justice or you don’t do him at all.

I only have a passing sense of who he was because his golden era predates my own pop culture. The P. Ramlee Premier was created for two different audiences at once: the ones who grew up quoting his films and the ones meeting him for the first time over dinner, and somehow it ended up being one of the two most impressive dinners I’ve had this month.

P. Ramlee’s films and songs never really left. Decades after his death, streets in Kuala Lumpur and Penang bear his name, his childhood home is now a museum, and Malaysia has titled him Seniman Agung Negara. The two films this dinner draws its most theatrical courses from, Pendekar Bujang Lapok and Nujum Pak Belalang, won Best Comedy Film at the Asian Film Festival in their day, and his name was known not just at home but across the region.

Through the Curtains

The night starts outside The Brasserie, at a ticketing booth lined with original artefacts from the P. Ramlee museum exhibit and framed posters from his films. You are handed an actual ticket, stamped with the St. Regis emblem, before crimson curtains part and the room reveals itself on the other side, less a restaurant entrance than a premiere you happen to be attending.

Aruel Ariel is waiting once the chatter settles, taking the stage as the evening’s Pencerita to welcome the room into a night to celebrate Malaysia and honour one of its own. He grew up on P. Ramlee’s films and music, and it is audible in how he talks, like more someone who has waited a long time to tell this story. Across the night he threads romantic ballads and swinging jazz from P. Ramlee’s own songbook between courses.

Each seat is set with a vinyl record placemat and a flip guide connecting film to food within reach, and every course is preceded by a screening of the black-and-white scene that inspired it. We watched the scenes in black and white, then are collectively instructed by the Pencerita on how to peruse the dish before us.

A Story Told

Crafted by Executive Sous Chef Mohd Sakhawi Azizi and The Brasserie team, The P. Ramlee Premiere draws inspiration from cinematic moments, characters, objects or scenes from the late icon’s filmography and turns them into new memories at the table. The food is not meant to reproduce that in the films, but to translate their moments—humour and drama—into every bite.

The claypot from Nujum Pak Belalang, based on Pak Belalang’s bowl-of-water trick for locating missing livestock, arrives sealed and empty until the bergedil is discovered stuck to the underside of the lid, and is one of my favourites of the night from presentation to palate. Similarly, Pendekar Bujang Lapok turns its course into a literal trial next, a deep red box with six sections landing on the table, only one hiding the wild betel leaf fish cake inside, an empty section demanding you shout “Cobaan!” the way the film’s characters do when a plea for help is dismissed as merely a test. I found mine on the second attempt, a small private victory I was probably too pleased with, while the laughter rolling through the rest of the room suggested other tables needed considerably more tries.

Some courses are less deceptive and more amusement. Laksamana Do Re Mi sets the scene as an amuse trio on a “woven” mat, the room reciting “zam zam… ala kazam” before picking them up: sour fermented fish with young mango kerabu, that reminds me of scallop; honey-roasted quail with pomelo chutney, sweet enough for the afternoon tea trolley one floor down; and a soft-boiled egg under crispy beef lung that turned out to be the trio’s sleeper hit. Masam Masam Manis follows with a curry puff served with its filling on the outside, the pastry meant to be broken open to scoop it out by hand, a warm towel appearing the instant it’s needed. Further along, Musang Berjanggut hands you a Kedah rice dish to mix yourself, paired with coral lobster tail and a keepsake pack to recreate at home.

The evening closes with Nasib Labu dan Labi‘s pumpkin-shaped entremet and pengat labu channeling Labu’s cheerful spirit, and Ali Baba Bujang Lapok‘s iconic dice scene, rebuilt as a wooden chest carved entirely from chocolate, the dice landing on the same lucky number no matter how it’s rolled to reveal the final bites before sending you home.

The Final Bow

By the end of it all, the trick of the whole evening is hard to miss. Every course does double duty here, standing on its own as accomplished Malay fine dining while still evoking the story it was meant to tell. I walked in barely able to name a P. Ramlee film and walked out with some of them lodged in memory through a bowl of broth, a chocolate chest, and an egg I still think about. Anyone with even a passing fondness for P. Ramlee, and even anyone without one, should not let this run pass them by.

The Brasserie’s Malam Gala Malaysiaku: The P. Ramlee Premiere has four seatings at 6.30PM on 30-31 August and 15-16 September 2026 in line with Merdeka and Malaysia Day. Tickets are priced at RM428 per person. Reserve your seats here.

Images courtesy of The St. Regis Kuala Lumpur.

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