A scene from Hon Truong Ba, da hang thit (Truong Ba’s soul in a~C butcher’s body) staged by IDECAF in Ho Chi Minh City. The costumes for the play, written by late playwright Luu Quang Vu, cost more than VND100 million ($5,800).

A project initiated by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism to revive the popularity of classical plays has been criticized by actors and directors who feel it has many “impractical” and “superficial” aspects.

At a meeting organized by the HCMC Theater Association in the city on Monday to discuss the project, participants said theaters should be given more money and freedom to choose the dramas.

Under the project, the plays that will be staged are those that have won national awards or gold medals at theater festivals.

But Anh Kiet, playwright and director of the HCMC Hat boi (Vietnamese opera) Theater, said such a selection process will not work.

“Some award-winning dramas in the list are totally strange to local audiences while many dramas that have never won anything are popular,” Kiet said.

Directors Khanh Hoang of HCMC Theater and Huynh Anh Tuan of the Institute of Cultural Exchange with France (Idecaf)’s Theater, backed Kiet, referring to several nominated dramas that only were forgotten just days after their release.

Moreover, the topics in such big dramas like Ha Mi cua toi (My Ha Mi) by Doan Hoang Giang or Toi va chung ta (I and we) by the late Luu Quang Vu are “out of date,” they said.

Huynh Minh Nhi, director of the small-stage 5B Theater, said the theaters should choose the dramas that they want to stage so that the project will be more likely to succeed.

Tuan said the Bureau of Performing Arts should only choose 50 dramas and let the theaters choose the other 50, which should be modern, humanitarian and popular.

Chairman of the Vietnam Theater Association, Le Duy Hanh, felt this was a good idea, adding that the ministry can make a call on whether the latter 50 plays suited the project goals.

Most participants at the meeting expressed doubt about the city’s capability to carry out the project, considering the cast at hand, current stage conditions and the paucity of funds.

The project will provide VND100 million (US$5,800) for each play, but requires theaters to stage it at least 80 times. Tuan estimated that around VND1.2 million ($70) for each performance would be barely enough to pay backstage workers.

“It’s not enough for a puppet play,” he said, suggesting each drama should be staged only up to 20 times. Otherwise, the audience will lose interest, he said.

Hoang, also a stage actor, said costumes for a classical drama already cost more than VND100 million.

Contemporary actors and actresses have gotten used to dramas dealing with daily life issues and can no longer perform classical plays, he said.

“To carry out the project in such conditions would be a mission impossible for us,” the newswire VnExpress reported Hoang as saying. “We are willing to do it; we will just make ourselves tired.”

Reported by Quang Thi