The classic "The Tale of Kieu" by poet Nguyen Du will be adapted to the puppet theater as a creative experiment of the Vietnam National Puppetry Theater. Through pieces, acts, and puppet plays The fate of Kieu wants to bring a different character image, close, under the contemporary perspective.
People's Artist Le Tien Tho, President of Vietnam Vietnam Stage Artists Association, present flowers to congratulate the creative team of “The fate of Kieu”
Creation and testing from the perspective of the 7X generation
With a specific art form which main means of expression are puppets, usually many directors will choose simple scenarios with less conflict and fewer characters to choreograph. The number of plays is not nonexistent but quite small and often the ones that tell the story are not too complicated about the psychological character. Meanwhile, the literary script The fate of Kiều is written by writer Nguyễn Hiếu and Meritorious Artist Lê Chính and transformed by People’s Artist Nguyễn Tiến Dũng is a poetic script based on Kieu’s story of great poet Nguyen Du. Therefore, the use of puppet art with the "actors" is that puppets are sometimes just a bamboo stick or a piece of cloth that does not know how to cry, not angry, not jealous ... to tell about her. Kieu brought a life of three lives in the middle of the world who always contains so many colors: happiness, indignation, craving, sting ... are quite risky for the creative crew, with artists and actors.
Director, People's Artist Nguyen Tien Dung, Director of Vietnam National Puppetry Theater speaks at the groundbreaking ceremony of "The fate of Kieu"
“I will not set up and build a Kieu like any other stage has ever shown. If the puppet art imitates other types of theater building Kieu, it will surely fail. Every circumstance and scene in "The fate of Kieu" will be handled by pieces, puppet show, space, novelty abstract light, traditional music combined with contemporary ", People's Artist Nguyen Tien Dung, Director of the Vietnam National Puppetry Theater, who is also the director of the play, assures.
The director said this was a work that he personally cherished for many years but was not confident enough to do. The shadow of a classic is both a strength for artistic value but a great challenge to exploit. Although the script has many changes to suit the puppet stage, the psychological developments of the characters still have to develop according to the main conflicts of the original. This time, the creative team bravely took the play to the stage with a determined, innovative and experimental determination. People's Artist Nguyen Tien Dung will build The fate of Kieu with the look and understanding of the 7X generation and he also invites creative crews of his generation as musician Nguyen Vinh Tien, choreographer, Meritorious Artist Hong Phong ...
Through the eye of contemporary
"The fate of Kieu" is a play specially invested to attend the 4th International Theater Experiments Festival 2019 in Hanoi. Therefore, the time for composing plays is very urgent for creative crews who only packed in this July. However, the creative team as well as the artists of Vietnam National Puppetry Theater are very excited to share their feelings of joy at the groundbreaking ceremony.
Visual artist Le Dinh Nguyen has completed 6 maket drawings of characters: Thuy Kieu, a silk seller, Tu Hai, Tu Ba, a crematoria, he had to stay up all night to perform. Currently, he also has to draw 20 characters' maket. But he was excited to work with the director to find a different visual style - the conventional way for the characters in this special puppet play. “According to the plot, except for two characters from Tu Hai, Ho Ton Hien has real life prototypes, characters Thuy Kieu as well as other characters without prototypes, are adapted. Therefore, we agreed to create characters in a surrealistic, conventional, and adventurous way, but still convey the message of the times, ”artist Le Dinh Nguyen revealed. Also bringing so much excitement when he first started to write musicals for puppet theater but it was an experiment, musician Nguyen Vinh Tien said he intends to boldly try to come up with new innovations such as restructuring one. Special musicals specifically for plays. Each character will have a quite special line and be expressed as a poem. To accomplish these intentions, he invited musician Tran Duc Minh to collaborate. Even more touching when a young artist of the Theater spoke before the plan to practice 3 shifts daily throughout this July, he informed his parents of a month of absence, bringing the rice cooker to the theater, cooking and sleeping with colleagues with the desire to contribute to the audience an excellent play about Kieu at the 4th International Experimental Stage Festival 2019.
The play " Hydrangea flower dance " by the People's Artist Nguyen Tien Dung was awarded a gold medal at the 4th International Marionnette Festival for the best performance and director award at the Festival, the material to create puppets are all made of bamboo.
In the form of puppet show, the The fate of Kieu will be retold in the original way, but with the connection between the scenes by the expression of contemporary art, creating the feeling that a play is like a puppet. Director, People's Artist Nguyen Tien Dung said that he could not "reveal" how he would do it in detail in this play because according to his experience, there are plays when starting to build, maybe the way reconstructing the turn completely in a different direction than the original plan. Just know that because this is a play with an experimental element, Kieu will test all elements from music, shaping, choreography, etc.
Calling the implementation of the play "The fate of Kieu" a risky adventure, knowing she can "bump into the rocks" but before the appeal of the script and not afraid to challenge, the creative team also as the traditional art troupe performers of the Vietnam Puppet Theater are still available. The puppet art community can also fully trust the People's Artist Nguyen Tien Dung, the name of the director associated with the success of the Vietnam National Puppetry Theater in festivals, career contests at home and abroad, recorded in a series of works such as: "Rhythm of the homeland", "Aladanh and the magic lamp", "Sun Wukong beat White Essence" ... With the uniqueness of puppet art language as well as an talented and enthusiastic creative ekip, "The fate of Kieu" has great expectations of a work worth seeing and contemplating at the International Experimental Theater Festival 2019 for domestic colleagues and international.
THUY HIEN - Culture Newspaper
