Beijing News (Reporter Liu Zhen) The 2024 Aranya Theater Festival press conference will be held simultaneously offline and online in Beijing on April 22, and all 29 domestic and foreign blockbuster plays in the theater art sector will be announced, and it was announced that all the performances will be officially opened on the Damai platform at 10:00 on May 9. The Aranya Theatre Festival will be held in Aranya from June 20 to 30, 2024, with Meng Jinghui, Chen Minghao and Zhang Ziyi as artistic directors. Under the theme of "Routine and Exception", this year's edition invites playwrights, directors and performers to break the rules of classical theatre and encourage audiences to engage in discussions about the human experience and the core of theatre art, as well as to invite those who love theatre and life to explore the complex relationships between conformity and deviation, tradition and innovation, stability and change, universal and particularity in the context of theatrical aesthetics and theatrical culture.
The main creators such as the planner appeared at the release site of the Aranya Theater Festival.
The Drama Festival sets up four major sections: Drama Art, Life Art, Public Art, and Cross-border Art, to create a breadth and depth of artistic life experience from multiple dimensions such as creative lineup, cultural vision, innovative forms, topic exploration, new incubation, and public participation. Theatre art is the main section of the festival, in which 17 international avant-garde plays from France, Japan, Poland, Belgium, Italy, Germany, Norway, Portugal, Egypt, Brazil and other overseas countries will meet Chinese audiences for the first time, 12 domestic masterpieces will also bring rich and broad sensory experience to the audience, and 34 well-known directors at home and abroad will jointly present the exploration of multiple issues and cutting-edge art forms of contemporary theatre. The Guest Repertoire will present a total of 121 performances over 11 days in 14 theatre spaces in Aranya. It is worth mentioning that the festival has invited Olivier Pi, former Artistic Director of the Avignon Theater Festival in France, and Thiago Rodriguez, Artistic Director of the Vienna Festival in Austria, Satoshi Miyagi, Artistic Director of the Shizuoka World Theater Festival in Japan, Michael Cantor, Artistic Director of the Melbourne International Youth Theater Festival in Australia, Katerina Evangelatos, Artistic Director of the Athens Theater Festival, and Mazen Ela, Artistic Director of the International Youth Theater Festival in Egypt. Galabavi, Artistic Director of the Polish Divine Comedy Festival, Bartos Sidlovski, and Fabio Rubiano Ojuela, Artistic Director of the Colombia American International Theater Festival, are nine of the world's top theatre festivals with their theatre directorial productions to Aranya.
Among the high-profile "Eight Blockbuster Repertoire", Constanza Maclas's "Theatrical Maniac", the most sought-after director and choreographer of today's European dance theatre, will be staged as the international opening play at the Lonely Theater, "Theatrical Maniac" will connect 11 classic fragments of the play, from ancient Greece to Shakespeare, from soap operas to Hollywood, from cabaret cabarets to Argentine carnivals...... Accompanied by the grand musical narrative, elements such as naturalism, symbolism, and Hollywood cultural symbols burst out, and the ultimate theatrical landscape is presented to the audience. The first season of Ma Junfeng's stage play "Flowers" has toured more than 100 performances across the country, and the play continues the aesthetic characteristics of Shanghainese and classical vernacular novels in the original text of Jin Yucheng's novel "Flowers".
Constanza Maclas's "Dramatic Maniac".
In addition to the opening acts, the "Eight Blockbusters" include Command Hamlet by director Olivier Pi, who for ten years was the artistic director of the Avignon Theatre Festival, which approaches the all-encompassing classic of "Hamlet" in a new light. Emma Dante, an important exponent of Italian avant-garde theatre, will also return to the Aranya Theatre Festival. This year, she will present a new production, "The King's Mystery," which premiered in March, and Aranya audiences will see it earlier than many European audiences, and this year's closing show, "The Tale of the Castle Guard," will feature a seaside ukiyo-e with a Japanese tale of pure love. In addition, Meng Jinghui's version of "Guns, Lies and Roses", adapted from playwright Edelman's legendary play "The Suicide", starred by Meng Jinghui's Empty Flower Group of the Theater Studio. Tides director Baltos Sidlowski, the founder and artistic director of the Polish Divine Comedy Festival and the founder of the New Bathhouse Theater in Krakow, will tell the fate of the post-war generation in Italy with his solid literary background, showing the deep reflection of human beings on history and war. Chen Minghao, Artistic Director of Aranya Theater Festival, will invite the audience to the theater to "drink porridge in the morning, soup at noon, and drink wine in the evening", following "Hai Luozhu" and "Red", Chen Minghao will perform "Galileo by the Sea I.+II.+III." in the Rehearsal Hall Theater, he will complete the cross-border cooperation with artists in the fields of sound, architecture, painting, form, literature, philosophy, fashion, contemporary art and other fields in the "Tower of Galileo", the performance is divided into three performances every day: morning, noon and evening, each of which is different, and the performance will be performed for 7 consecutive days.
The specially invited plays of this theater festival are also the epitome of the pioneer attitude of contemporary theater in China, these creators are senior theater artists who are full of practice and breakthrough spirit, including: "Magic Toy Shop" directed by Li Jianjun, adapted from the novel of the same name by Maugham Prize winner Angela Carter, "Princess Fishbone" directed by Yang Ting, adapted from the famous Polish playwright Gombrowicz's work "Princess Ivona of Burgundy"; This year marks the 125th anniversary of Lao She's birth, and director Lin Xiyue will use old actors to partner with young actors, and collaborate with contemporary visual artist Zhang Wu to bring a large theatrical version of "Five Rules of Lao She" starring actor Wang Jinsong; Liu Chang, artistic curator of Aranya Theater Festival, will bring artists from various fields to connect diversified art forms, bringing "4:48 Mental Breakdown", which integrates sound field, music, text, vision, environment and AI technology, and Meng Jinghui's new work "Gentle Night" starring "Queen of One-man Show" Huang Xiangli It will also be staged, based on Zweig's classic novella "Fear", and director and visual artist Nie Jingzhu will use cold experimental visual choreography to tell the story of artificial intelligence transforming into female characters in Shakespeare's works, bringing "Shakespeare's Women".
In addition to the theater art section, the content of the multi-section that will extend the stage infinitely will also be revealed, including the youth culture vane "Migratory Bird 300", the popular "37°2 Environmental Drama Reading", and the "Drama House", which plays with diversified cross-border creativity. It is reported that the most eye-catching aspect of this year's Aranya Theatre Festival is the new drama professional competition unit - "Future Drama SHOWCASE". The competition will be judged by an international jury composed of 7 international theatre directors, directors, producers, critics, actors and professors from 6 countries, and 9 groups of Chinese shortlisted plays will compete for generous creative support bonuses and the opportunity to be invited to the next Aranya Theatre Festival. Co-curated by theatre directors Li Jianjun and Meng Jinghui, it will also hold a series of activities such as master classes, international market recommendations, youth summits, and action workshops, and look forward to creating an international stage for outstanding Chinese and foreign theatre productions to connect audiences, theaters and markets. This section will soon be open to professional young theatre professionals.
Edited by Tian Cheni
Proofread by Diyan Chen