Reads- 2024 NTT Fall for Great Souls
Imagining Another Life
Siraya PAI | Theatre Critic
If life is a kind of inertia, bringing a constant sense of stability but occasionally making one feel bored, weary, or even suffocated by its heavy burdens, have you ever wondered what it would be like to live a different kind of life?
On that account, the protagonist in The Sheep Song bravely lets its imagination take flight, envisioning itself as a human. He slowly straightens his limbs, stands, walks, and strives to live a human life. Having left the flock, he becomes akin to the "lost sheep" of biblical parable, but with no one seeking him out, he finds himself out of place in the human world. What will the outcome be of this courageous journey of self-transformation? If the "lost sheep" is a metaphor for human faith, then what hidden message lies in the desire of a sheep to become human? The Belgian FC Bergman presents The Sheep Song with minimalist language and precise performance, telling a simple yet profound story. The pastoral scenes, the linear perspective of Renaissance art, and the religious imagery in the play carry their own contextual significance. However, the audience does not need to be familiar with Western art history to deeply feel the myriad frustrations and complexities of being human, and thereby find solace in shared understanding.
At times, imagining another life helps us to see our own with greater clarity. Daniel WANG, an Artist-in-Residence of NTT (2017-2018), follows up his 2020 play Wonderful, which explored father-son relationships, with a new script titled The Moment. This latest work is produced and performed by M.O.V.E. Theatre, his long-time collaborator.
In the play, three women who are strangers to each other find themselves stranded in the same bed and breakfast by a typhoon. As they share their life stories, unexpected connections emerge: a mother paralyzed in her lower extremities, a lady caring for her bedridden husband, and a daughter of a foreign caregiver who grew up without her mother. Reality can be cruel, yet these women, confined by the challenges of illness, long-term care, family, and life, come before one another in transformed roles. How can they support each other and carry this newfound strength back into their real lives?
Directed by the late British director Jonathan Miller and produced by New National Theatre, Tokyo, in collaboration with the National Symphony Orchestra, Verdi's comedy Falstaff draws inspiration from Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor and Henry IV. The story unfolds the absurd tale of a lustful and greedy knight who flirts with two married women, only to be hilariously tricked. The lively music combined with the clever plot may reveal the shameless desires people dare not voice, or perhaps the vengeful thoughts that reality forces them to swallow in silence. Miller has specifically altered the original setting, making the characters appear as if they are in the realistic scenes of 17th-century Dutch paintings, thus making them more relatable to the daily lives of the middle class portrayed in the play.
At times, the disappearance of life makes us more eager to seize another kind of existence. Tang Mei Yun Taiwanese Opera Company presents Tavern by the Lethe, a darkly humorous yet heartwarming production that is a novel fusion of Taiwanese opera and musical theater. First launched as a theatrical production in 2018, it was later adapted into a television series in 2021, gaining widespread acclaim. This year, TANG Mei Yun, the owner of the tavern, takes on a new mission in Tavern by the Lethe: A Lost Actress, tackling the "Disappearance in the Locked Room" as he ventures into the world of martial arts, helping the departed fulfill their last wishes before they drink the soup of forgetfulness and reincarnate.
At times, you can also imagine another life for a work or genre. Ming Hwa Yuan's adaptation of HUNG Hsing-fu's short story Final Bow portrays the bittersweet tale of Taiwanese opera, from its glory days to the struggles faced under the pressures of changing times. Taking a different path, Tavern by the Lethe reinvents Taiwanese opera with a fresh and innovative approach.
As for Israel Galván's reinterpretation of The Rite of Spring, close your eyes and listen, in Stravinsky's classic dance music, you'll hear some familiar yet elusive sounds of percussion. However, closing your eyes while experiencing this performance would be a mistake, as you would miss seeing the source of those sounds: the extraordinary footwork and gestures of the contemporary flamenco legend Israel Galván. The traditional grandeur of flamenco might seem absent, yet the ingenuity executed with masterful skill captivates the audience, leaving them unable to look away. Complemented by the dual piano performance of CHEN Chao-hui and TSAI Shih-hao, extracting the bizarre chords and rhythms of The Rite of Spring and lingering traces of ballet movements, it evokes a sense of rebirth after the sacrifice.
Belgium's Peeping Tom presents Triptych: The Missing Door, The Lost Room and The Hidden Floor. What you might mistake for contemporary dance is, in reality, seems a thriller film. Divided into three scenes—The Missing Door, The Lost Room, and The Hidden Floor—the dancers portray passengers and attendants on an ocean liner, encountering inexplicable events. Shadowy figures flit past portholes, a head is cradled in the arms while muttering, bodies contort into grotesque shapes, objects move of their own accord, and eerie sound effects and music fill the air. Each precisely timed cue grips the audience's emotions, immersing them in a way that surpasses any horror movie.
Imagining another life can be wonderful, but perhaps another life comes with its own challenges and troubles. That's the wonder of theater: whether it's the Schaubühne Berlin performing Ibsen's classic masterpiece An Enemy of the People, the genius director WANG Chia-ming's reinterpretation of Lehár's operetta Das Land des Lächelns, Sir Simon Rattle conducting the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, or the GuoGuang Opera Company's poignant Three People, Two Lamps, we can momentarily escape from all our current worries (yes, just for a while) and then return to our own lives with a refreshed perspective.