APA, Lyric Theatre Wednesday 12 & Thursday 13

Tradition and innovation are delicately merged in Lang Toi, a new circus performance with a distinctly Vietnamese ethos. “With this show I wanted to share with the people a different side of the world,” says stage director Le Tuan Anh, one of the project’s three creators alongside French-Vietnamese brothers Nhat Ly and Lan Nguyen. “I didn’t want to use ‘tradition tradition’ to create the show, but, yes, the interesting elements and feel of the traditional culture [are] there. My imagination about the simplicity and personality of the real village people and [their] lives [can be found] in the show.”

To evoke the dreamlike ambience of the countryside, Lang Toi has incorporated the cultural histories of many Vietnamese tribes and regions into its props, costumes and stage design, while ancient folk instruments are played not to a written score, but by musicians organically interacting with the acrobatic movement of the performers and the changing images onstage. Instead of following a straightforward storyline, the show seeks to recreate the feelings and imageries of the country, by combining the rhythmic movements of circus, dance, traditional games, and farming activities.

“There wasn’t anything like Lang Toi before in the history of Vietnamese circus,” says Anh, who has also adopted bamboos as one of his show’s key elements and opened up the floor for new experiments on circus techniques. “Most [previous productions] were more or less adaptations from the East [or] West European circus world. My challenge was to bring the identity of Vietnamese culture through this new circus performance; for that goal, I think [we’re] successful.”

Edmund Lee

Tickets: 3128 8288; www.hkticketing.com.