Remarkable forces will be at work during this year's Arts Festival, writes Clare Morin

In 2008, conditions combined to make the theatre scene the darling of Hong Kong’s cultural landscape: with the decline of the local film industry, creative talents increasingly turned to live theatre, performing in a record-breaking number of new shows. Equally, with film companies increasingly turning towards mainland partnerships, topical Hong Kong stories have been disappearing from cinemas (almost half the local flicks were screened in Putonghua in 2008): As a result, audiences desperate for topical social commentary have lookd to the stage instead – flocking to performances in their thousands. And in September, something utterly bizarre occurred: The Emperor Entertainment Group (better known as Hong Kong’s Cantopop Factory) staged Art, Yasmina Reza’s Moliere-award winning play about the virtues of friendship and the definition of high art.

It was all proof that theatre had officially become mainstream; and when we heard the line-up for the 37th Hong Kong Arts Festival, we were pleased to see that the programmers had reacted to this trend. This year’s festival has an intense theatrical quality to it – some of the world’s most pioneering directors are staging shows in a two-month onslaught that will offer the best theatre you’ll see in Hong Kong for the entire year. Even the ballets and operas have remarkably strong dramatic elements, such as the Latvian National Opera’s staging of the sex and violence charged Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. While this year’s festival promises to redefine the parameters of the stage with some of the planet’s greatest talent, there are a set of standout local productions that will equally be breaking new ground.

In a bid to help develop the quality of home-grown companies, veteran thespian and director Fredric Mao has undertaken a mentorship scheme with the talented playwright Yat Yau – offering that one elusive thing so often overlooked in the Hong Kong theatre and film industry: a tight, rocking script. Meanwhile, theatre pioneer Danny Yung is bringing in a scholarly rigour with his marvellous regional showcase Book of Ghosts, featuring performances by master thespians, and an accompanying symposium that will see the region’s critics debating the development of regional networks.

In sum, if 2008 was the year that theatre overtook film, 2009 has all the makings of another landmark year for the stage – but we’ll need to see quality overtake mere quantity.

The Emperor Jones
Feb 18-22
“I remember when I was in school reading The Emperor Jones wondering what the hell was [Eugene] O’Neil thinking. I just couldn’t imagine it being performed,” explains Elizabeth LeCompte of The Wooster Group, New York’s masterminds of avant-garde theatre. “But when I saw Kate [Valk] performing in some of our early pieces like Route 119, I thought about… this huge moving character that O’Neill had written, which had seemed to me impossible to perform and seemed out of the naturalist tradition. I just thought it would be a challenge for her, in a beautiful way that I would like to see.” As David Cote of Time Out New York wrote in a review of Valk’s performance as Jones: “She paints her face deepest black, dons Japanese robes, and wields a microphone-cum-sceptre like a multicultural mutant. Shucking and jiving through the Eugene O’Neill role, the performer exploits the tropes of minstrelsy – puckering lips, rolling eyes, braying wide-mouthed laugh – while navigating an audio-visual field that includes ear-pounding drum mixes and hypnotic video.”

Kafka’s Metamorphosis
Feb 19-21
“What’s wonderful about the story is it is so simple. Every society can read itself in it. It’s like a very beautiful mirror,” says David Farr, artistic director of the Lyric Hammersmith theatre company. “But it’s also a theatrically explosive evening, and there is a pleasure in just watching that. It almost beguiles you, the piece, because it seems to be very exciting. It’s very physical, and yet there is something very ordinary about it, because essentially the two rooms are normal, yet the room above is turned at 90 degrees, so his floor is a wall and he has to obey a non-existent gravity.” This Lyric Hammersmith and Vesturport Theatre co-production has earned tremendous reviews for its staging of Kafka’s tale of alienation, and the young man Gregor Samsa who wakes up one morning to find he has been transformed into a giant insect. This version is unlike any you may have seen before: there are no insect costumes; instead the suit-clad Gregor awakes in a surreal world where everything is turned on its head through the use of remarkable aerial theatrics. Set to a score by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis of the Bad Seeds, the split-level set promises to astound audiences.

Pygmalion
Feb 5-8
“I think it’s one of the great comedies. And because it’s a great comedy it has a satiric edge and it’s very contemporary – and it was contemporary in 1914 when it was first performed,” says the director Sir Peter Hall of Pygmalion. “Women did not have the vote then. I don’t want to emphasise it too much, it’s not in a sense a political play, but it is a political play because it shows how difficult it was for women to make their way in the world then, and it’s not entirely happy now.” One of the theatre world’s most infamous names, Sir Peter brings his acclaimed staging of George Bernard Shaw’s play to the city. The director has revived the original 1914 version of Shaw’s script, revealing the playwright’s genius, in a comedy laced with social commentary and some of the finest acting we’re likely to see this year.

Tim Crouch
Feb 6-14
“I meet them an hour before the show, and we have a cup of tea or a bottle of water. I don’t tell them about the play, I just talk a little bit about the idea behind the play. We talk about being open on stage, allowing the play to pass through them, of trusting their instinct. I emphasise they can do nothing wrong, and then the audience come in and we start.” Avant-garde British talent Tim Crouch manipulates the minds of the audience in three mind-warping performances. The first piece England is a play about identity and culture, performed in the eclectic setting of the Tang Contemporary Art gallery in Sheung Wan. In a unique twist, the second show, An Oak Tree, will feature an actor who knows absolutely nothing about the play – it played to immense acclaim in New York with the likes of Mike Myers appearing on stage.

In-I
Mar 4-6
“It was very intense,” admits dancer and choreographer Akram Khan of his collaboration with actress Juliette Binoche. “There was a lot of joy, a lot of love, but it was very intense. First of all, we’re under pressure in the sense that the expectations and the hype around it were very high. What we realised was, this is an experiment. It’s never been done before. It’s not like my other work which is more catered for an audience. Some people will love it, some people will hate it.” Khan has been to the Arts Festival before, but this time the astoundingly talented dancer and choreographer steps into new terrain as he dances with Oscar-winning actress Binoche, in a performance that explores the boundaries of love.

The Black Swan
Feb 20-22
“The pop music industry [is] only about money,” says director Victor Pang. “We have plenty of love songs, but it’s a tool for earning money. This kind of industry manipulates people’s tastes and thinking. The story begins from this philosophy.” Signalling a new direction for the Arts Festival, Black Swan is a collaboration between director Fredric Mao and playwright Yat Yau. The mentor-protégé relationship has spawned a brilliant, devious story set amidst the brainwashing cogs of the local music industry. Based on the classic Swan Lake, the tale is set in a world without gender, where grown men in tutus abound. Says Mao: “I very much believe that we can do better with our local productions. Since we do have a lot of chances to work, you can see many things, but the quality is the most important. I wanted to help.”

Book of Ghosts
Feb 13-15
“It should be a festival, not only for the audience but also for the artists themselves, and provide a platform for scholars and critics,” argues theatre pioneer and founder of Zuni Icosahedron, Danny Yung, who proves to be a man of his word with this highly intellectual performance inspired by Zhong Sicheng's Yuen dynasty work Lu Gui Bu (Book of Ghosts), featuring four masters of traditional, regional art forms.

Read our other features:
Your year in art
Your year in stage
Your year in music
Your year in film
Your year in food