Samantha Leese speaks to Theatre du Pif’s Bonni Chan about her company’s new play, a tragic tale of lust, greed, and mortality.

As the planet continues its plunge into economic despair, it seems a timely moment to re-stage Cao Yu’s 1936 tragedy, Sunrise, in which the master playwright comments in part on the corruption and wanton opulence of the rich. The piece, widely regarded as the cornerstone of spoken Chinese drama, is reinterpreted this fortnight by Hong Kong company Theatre du Pif, with artistic director Bonni Chan at the helm.

Sunrise follows the story of student turned party girl Chen Bailu. Star-struck by the promise of wealth, Chen moves from the countryside to live in a Shanghai hotel as a banker’s escort. When her childhood love rides in to rescue her from decadence, Chen refuses him. It’s not until she befriends a lowly prostitute, cruelly nicknamed Xiao Dongxi (“Little thing”), that Chen opens her eyes to the horrors of a brutally unjust society.

The piece was chosen for two major reasons: one is that it’s a very solid text for a young actor to exercise. It has a strong narrative, and a wide variety of characters to explore. The other reason is that I wanted to do [Sunrise] in Macau. Given that the whole piece is set in a luxury hotel, there is no city more appropriate. Macau is a city of hotels.

In the original script, Cao Yu didn’t specify the city. It was a decadent, modernised, rich city – probably Shanghai or Tianjin. But because we’re working with Macau actors, who have done their research in their own city, it will definitely have the feel that it’s taking place now and here. The perspective of young people in Macau has very much been injected into this story.

Very much so. Sometimes in ways not directly related to the play, but I do ask them questions, like how they feel about the changes in Macau over the last four or five years, or what the setting of a hotel says to them. Their views are very diverse, so there’s a lot to work with.

It’s about existence, and choice. The play is based on [protagonist Chen Bailu]’s internal argument. Why consciously choose a life like this? And then consciously choose to end it? It’s about hopelessness, and exhaustion. I think it’s a universal, timeless argument we’re tackling: do you seek the fulfilment of a spiritual life, or the fleeting content of a physical one?

Oh, yes, that argument is really happening here. Now, students in Macau are dropping out of college to become dealers in casinos, because if you’re willing to do it, you earn $14,000 a month. But if you graduate and you get a job as a designer, or a manager at a small firm, you’re earning $8,000. So what do you to do? Why should you stay and get a degree?

All the characters in this piece are absurd. They’re exaggerations of vanity, they’re rich and they’re very unpleasant. So the comment made [on this class of people] is clear. What we’ve tried to show is that there’s also a humanity, a ‘flesh-and-blood’ to them: There are reasons they are who they are. If you don’t have this other dimension, the social commentary becomes too one-sided.

Yes, I think so. At the time Cao Yu was pioneering this Western [spoken] form of theatre in China, Ibsen and Beckett were writing in Europe. You can see the traces very clearly – with Ibsen especially – in the social commentary, the interpretation of how people are living, and the value and meaning of that life. Cao Yu’s script is more moralistic; there’s an element of [accountability], of “I believe I can do something for this world.”