Taiwan-based Contemporary Legend Theatre will present the world premiere of its latest production at this year's Edinburgh International Festival, the organizers said on Thursday.
The Peking opera troupe will present the production 'Metamorphosis' featuring Wu Hsing-kuo, the founder of the group. It is the second time that the troupe is participating in the festival, which is one of the world's largest cultural events.
Wu's production is a perfect synthesis of live performance, technological mediation and a really powerful story, which fits perfectly with the theme of this year's festival, said festival director Jonathan Mills at a news conference in Taipei.The theme of this year's festival is technology and arts.
Wu will be the sole actor in the production, adapted from Franz Kafka's novel 'The Metamorphosis,' which depicts a young man who awakes one morning from uneasy dreams and finds himself transformed into a monstrous vermin creature.
'This is a very ambitious project,' Mills said, praising Wu as a 'master of transformation.'
Also at the news conference was Culture Minister Lung Ying-tai, who expressed great interest in seeing how Wu portrays the monstrous vermin creature.'I am so looking forward to seeing the performance,' she said.
In the production, Wu will play all the roles in the story, including the young man, the father, the mother and the sister, the group said, adding that animation will be incorporated into the play.
Chris Wood, the U.K.'s representative to Taiwan, also welcomed Wu's performance at the Edinburgh festival.
Taiwan and the United Kingdom both 'blend the traditional and modern in new and creative ways,' he said, adding that Wu's performance is an example of this creativity.
Wood also encouraged Taiwanese people to take advantage of the visa-waiver treatment to the U.K. to participate in the event in Edinburgh.
Wu's 'Metamorphosis' will be staged three times during the Edinburgh festival, which will run from Aug. 9 to Sept. 1. About 3,000 artists from more than 30 countries will participate in this year's festival, and the Contemporary Legend Theatre is the only one from Taiwan.
Last year, the Contemporary Legend Theater performed a play adapted from Shakespeare's tragedy, 'King Lear,' at the 2011 Edinburgh International Festival.
