A successful play must be continuously lit, that is the most noble award that the audience gives to the artist.
The 1st Ho Chi Minh City Theater Festival 2024 (from November 12 to 29) attracted a large number of domestic and foreign artists from 20 units with 24 plays.
"Southern Aspiration"
According to the Organizing Committee, naming the festival "Southern Aspiration" is aimed at the goal of creativity, meeting the needs of today's viewers, creating conditions for young artists to express themselves, and providing an opportunity for Ho Chi Minh City's drama units to affirm their brands.
A scene from the play “The Night of the Howling Gibbons” directed by Chanh Truc, Ho Chi Minh City Small Stage Drama Theater
The new feature of the festival is that the organizers bring the judges to each stage, so that they can sit and watch with the audience. Only then can the judges feel the breath of life, and realize the value of the play that the audience has spent money to buy tickets to see. This is completely different from watching plays with invitations.
A little regret is that the plan to invite Northern art units to participate was postponed due to many objective reasons, so the Northern heroes had to postpone it to a later time. People's Artist Nguyen Xuan Bac, Director of the Department of Performing Arts, shared: "Right on the opening night, we saw the exciting atmosphere of public and non-public units. This affirms the strong vitality of the theater stage in Ho Chi Minh City, and we hope that the festival will bring many interesting surprises to the public."
According to People's Artist Kim Cuong, "the Ho Chi Minh City drama space is still the most vibrant place in the country". The Southern drama style in general, and Ho Chi Minh City in particular, always has many colors and the overall picture changes according to the needs of the public.
People's Artist Tran Ngoc Giau, Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City Theater Association, said that he had received many positive signals from the festival. For example, some units that have long exploited the entertainment trend, when participating in the festival, have adjusted themselves, improved their ideology, humanistic themes, delved into the depths of the spiritual life of the people, the Southern land, taking humanity and affection as the main theme. And these plays have won over the audience.
Filter the muddy to bring out the clear.
Of the 24 plays by 20 participating units, more than 2/3 are products of socialized theater, so most of them choose to compete in the direction of serving the audience's needs by buying tickets. People's Artist Tran Minh Ngoc, Chairman of the Art Council, said that this is a characteristic of Ho Chi Minh City's drama theater, even though tickets are sold, it still adheres to the festival's criteria.
The audience enthusiastically cheered for the plays: "Duc Thuong Cong Ta Quan Le Van Duyet - Nguoi Mang 9 Sentences of Death", "Ma oi, Ut dia" (IDECAF Theater), "Dau ngot", "Me Coc phieu luu ky" (Truong Hung Minh Art Theater), "Con me cuoi cuoi cuoi" (Hoang Thai Thanh Theater), "Bong canh co", "Dut thong to sag" (Hong Van Drama Theater), "Dem vuon ho" (Ho Chi Minh City Small Stage Theater), "Lo nho phan thuong" (Sai Gon Phang Theater)... Plays with revolutionary themes such as: "Dong chi" (Ho Chi Minh City Theater Association), "Ngay ay cong troi" (Trinh Kim Chi Theater), "Canh dong ruc luong" (Quoc Thao Theater) were also in short supply of tickets because the audience came to see them in large numbers.
Regarding the 3 plays that had to be re-examined for the second time, namely: "Iron Flower" (Ho Chi Minh City College of Culture and Arts), "Coconut Forest General" (Southeast Asia Cultural and Arts Research Center), "Showbiz" (Sao Minh Beo Entertainment Arts Company Limited), Meritorious Artist Ca Le Hong commented that all 3 plays were weak in terms of staging, the content was somewhat spread out, and the character images were not clearly portrayed. Despite the re-examination, there were still many places that were not really satisfactory.
Insiders believe that poor quality plays should be eliminated. Artistic evaluation needs to be more rigorous in order to separate the bad from the good, and find the right high quality plays to compete at the festival.
Public opinion believes that the Ho Chi Minh City theater festival really needs to have its own way to avoid falling into the situation of many other festivals with a rain of medals, and then the plays are put in storage, and the public cannot enjoy them.
Experts say a successful show must be consistently bright, and this festival is doing just that.
"Meritorious Artist Minh Nhi said he had won a gold medal at the National Theater Festival, but if he did not win a medal this time, he would still be happy because the theater festival must be a place of fairness and the desire to create art for the public.
Source: https://nld.com.vn/lien-hoan-san-khau-tp-hcm-lan-1-2024-vo-dien-hay-la-phai-sang-den-19624112020144543.htm
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