Le Fou, a production by Théâtre de la feuille in Hong Kong

Overview In an unknown space, an indeterminate era, animals brimming with life stir about. The light gradually reveals them to us, the spectators. The members of this group of zany animals take on varied forms. Sometimes calm, sometimes agitated, they seem driven by a desire that comes from outside themselves. But like the other men observed by the madman, it is impossible to name them, to tell whether what they do is good or bad. From their mouths come sounds we do not understand. Is this strange world a mirage, or the refraction of a signal from outer space? In the year of the centenary of Lu Xun’s birth, the company Théâtre de la Feuille and Hybridités France-Chine—bringing together artists from Hong Kong, mainland China, and Europe—take up his work, the first novel written in vernacular Chinese, to create The Madman. As in the novel that inspires them, by shedding the novel’s spatial and temporal constraints, they explore through alienation the relationships between people and society; they confront and bring together their respective cultures to rediscover the richness of Lu Xun’s world and to question the world of today. Time and space seem frozen, suspended, in this play. The bodies form a system that unfolds, distorts, rumbles, rejoices, is seized by madness, awakens… It changes to the rhythm of the words, stabilizes, disappears, lingers on. Cast Text: Lu Xun Adaptation: Wong Chun-Tat, Wang Jing Direction: Wong Chun-Tat Dramaturgy: Wang Jing Production: Lei Yuen Hung, Wang Jing Costumes and set design: Stephen Fan Chun Pang, Wong Kay Sound design: GayBird Leung Kei Cheuk Production: Théâtre de la Feuille in Hong Kong Co-production: Hybridités France-Chine https://vimeo.com/301842495