WT Students Jess Hilton and Rose Collard will be appearing in ‘The Sun is Not for Us‘ at the thespaces on North Bride this month. You can catch the show from the 3rd to the 11th August each day at 16.10.
‘Press release for The Sun Is Not for Us:
The stepdaughter of legendary Chinese dramatist Cao Yu is taking a piece of devised theatre based on her father’s four most famous plays to this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
Often compared to Shakespeare, Ibsen, Chekhov and O’Neill, Cao Yu is the foremost pioneer of modern Chinese drama; his skilful fusion of dramatic artistry and socio-political themes has made his work masterpieces.
Cao Yu’s work has been revived and adapted into other genres, and performed in other countries since they were first premiered in the 1930s and 1940s.
In The Sun Is Not for Us Dr Li Ruru explores love, hatred, adultery, incest, hope, frustration and struggle from a Chinese women’s perspective. What happens when a Chinese woman, after imprisoned in an eighteen-year arranged marriage, falls in love with her stepson? Why does a girl leave university to become a courtesan? How can a woman reconcile primitive passions, sexual deprivation, and defiant courage for life? After losing love and dignity is death the only escape? The production’s poignant splendour, poetic style and its profound sentiments help audiences see Chinese women’s long and painful journey in the early 20th century – denied the sun and bereft of hope.
This one-hour production aims to be dynamic, sophisticated, passionate and dangerous. The language of the Chinese master is well blended with movements/dances created by a talented group of British young actors who bring the Chinese characters, their heart-rending lives and the complicated society into their own perspectives.
The Sun Is Not for Us premiered in March 2011 in Leeds and comes to Edinburgh with a new cast under the helm of the award-winner David Jiang.
After the Fringe the production will be performed at the Shanghai International Contemporary Theatre Festival in China in November 2012.
The Sun Is Not for Us is a profound and intercultural piece of theatre.
Dr Li is a researcher and practitioner of Chinese theatre and is working on the Royal Shakespeare Company’s first Chinese play The Orphan of the Zhao Family.’