ShanghaiPRIDE 2015 Theatre Festival
This June, the ShanghaiPRIDE Theatre Festival (ShPTF) is ready to roll out an outstanding collection of theatre pieces for ShanghaiPRIDE that aims to broaden the art’s representation of LGBT lives and challenge, explore, and embrace its LGBT characters. Established as an alternate artistic experience to Pride’s many parties, the Theatre Festival gives theatre-goers a glimpse into what queer art can look like in China, and engages both local Chinese and English-speaking theatre companies. Shows start from the beginning of June with pre-Pride acts and then run on after Pride week, sizzling with dance, music, song, and drama through a diverse range of acts with some of the best performers in Shanghai.
Getting the pre-Pride party cracking on June 1 and June 13 is Fudan University’s feminism club, Zhihe Society, which takes on a giant of a production every year with the world-famous Vagina Monologues. Each year the group renews and reworks its skits to reflect critical current social issues, and this year’s Chinese script is simply fantastic. Monologues this time around include heartrending stories of a newly-wed lesbian couple who have finally been recognized by their families; a couple whose relationship strains under the difficult realities of one partner’s transition from male-to-female, as her girlfriend struggles with a desire to keep up a “normal” straight life; and a married couple who meet a special lady and share their lives together.
Bite My Thumb looks to be a crowd pleaser as it reinvents Romeo and Juliet into a modern-day queer love tangle, setting two rival “gangs” of Off-Off-Broadway Romeo and Juliet productions against each other in a lovingly flamboyant subversion of traditional gender roles. Female-to-male transgender meets lesbian cross-dressing, and lesbian butch squares off against male machismo in this swashbuckling comedy on June 18!
Everyone’s favorite musical theatre legend, Rent, makes its debut as “BENT” in Shanghai on June 19 and 21 with its emotional ode to a circle of young bohemians living and dying in New York City’s gritty Lower East Side. In 1996, RENT The Musical stormed onto Broadway and changed it forever with soaring rock tunes and touching ballads that brought urban LGBTQ lives and the HIV/AIDS crisis into public consciousness for the first time. Produced by Urban Aphrodite and staffed with professional actors, the group launches its version of RENT into “BENT” to Shanghai audiences that will interweave the show’s famous songs between live performances of true stories from the local LGBTQ community.
Finally, Colours is scheduled for June 28, produced by Shanghai’s first full-time comedy group and most active improv troupe, FLYIMPROV. Produced and supported by LGBTQ members and allies, the team is stirring up a magical concoction of sexual orientations and gender identities to serve to its audiences.
The ShanghaiPRIDE Theatre Festival is proud to present this theatre series in conjunction with ShanghaiPRIDE 2015 and welcomes any and all to its performances! Keep an ear out for updates and additions, and look out for fundraising events leading up to Pride week.
ShanghaiPRIDE is a non-profit, volunteer-led festival. For updates on upcoming Pride7 events, visit shpride.com or follow ShanghaiPRIDE’s social media channels, including WeChat (Shanghai-PRIDE), Weibo (weibo.com/shanghaipride), Facebook (www.facebook.com/ShanghaiPride), and Instagram (@shanghaipride).
Contact:
Email: shanghaipride@gmail.com
Website: shpride.com
