December 14 -15, 2018 | 7:30–8:45PM
Asia Society/ 725 Park Avenue | New York, NY

Directed by influential Chinese avant-garde theater director Meng Jinghui and starring Huang Xiangli, the compelling solo performance Nine and a Half Love opens at Asia Society in New York on December 14 and 15, 2018, as part of the Creative China Festival 2018.

As one of China’s most significant and celebrated theater directors, Meng is the touchstone for contemporary theater production with his incisive wit and radical style. His unique and dynamic artistic expression has become a notable phenomenon in China where, since the 1990s, he has presented over 40 productions on stage, garnering widespread public recognition.

Nine and a Half Love is the third one-woman performance collaboration between Meng and Huang, following Letter from an Unknown Woman and Bonjour Tristesse. Based on a true story of revenge in southern China, the play reconstructs the dramatic narrative by combining elements from Homer’s epics, Greek tragedy, Nietzche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra, and Krzysztof Kieslowski’s Blind Chance, among other works of inspiration.

Nine and a Half Love mixes disparate genres—magic realism, realism, and surrealism—and evokes an infinite imagination through the protagonist’s unflinching self-analysis and subconscious soliloquy. Using montage to combine poetry, myth, and allegory, the play traverses across genres and cultures to reveal a narrative in three layers: the regret for lost time, frustration about destiny, and the volatility of love.

Hailed as “Queen of Monodrama,” Huang’s expressive style brings the characters to life. Huang’s powerful and forthright performance takes the audience through a myriad of expressions—absurdity, reality, lust, redemption, death, humanity, and love. Renowned in Chinese contemporary theater, she has performed in France, Australia, New Zealand, Germany, and Egypt.

Director: MENG Jinghui
Starring: HUANG Xiangli
Stage Design Director: ZHANG Wu
Lighting Design Director: WANG Qi
Multimedia Design Director: WANG Zhigang
Musical Director: HUA Shan
Composers: HUA Shan, WANG Chuang, ZHANG Xun, HUANG Xiangli
Costume Design: YU Lei
Makeup Design: LUO Yuan
Dramaturg: WANG Hao

Tickets are $20 for Asia Society Members; $22 for Students/Seniors; and $25 for Nonmembers, and may be purchased online at AsiaSociety.org/NY or by calling the Box Office at 212-327-ASIA (2742).

Members of the media interested in tickets or additional information about the performances should contact pr@asiasociety.org.

About the Director
Meng Jinghui’s celebrated avante-garde theater work has been integral in the renewed popularity of Huaju (spoken drama) in China. He is a resident director of the National Theatre Company of China in Beijing.

While exploring larger social issues and politically sensitive subjects, Meng’s productions are comedies infused with playful, animated energy, cajoling and provoking the audience. His style is characterized by a mix of politics and popular culture, and of dark and humorous elements. He juxtaposes disparate styles, periods and cultures, including classical references, current events and pop culture—TV, film and the latest slang. Recurrent elements include mime, dance, music, poetry and prose, a vignette structure with a chorus of actors playing multiple roles, improvisation and spontaneity, sound and movement rhythm games, vocal ‘sound parts’ and gibberish.

His representative stage productions include: Rhinoceros in Love, Two Dogs, To Live, Linchuan Four Dreams, Amber, A Letter From A Woman Unknown, The Murder of Hanging Garden, Accidental Death of an Anarchist, I Love XXX, Guns Lies and Roses, Mermaid in the Backwater, He Had Two Pistols with Black and White Eyes, Bonjour Tristesse, The Bedbug, The Good Person of Sichuan, Soft, Head without Tail, and Nine and a Half Love.

Widely recognized in international theater circles, Meng’s works have been performed in numerous international arts festivals, including those in Australia, Germany, France, Italy, New Zealand, Japan, England, Brazil, and Egypt.

Meng is also the founder and the artistic director of the Beijing Fringe Festival, Hangzhou Contemporary Theatre Festival, Shenzhen Biennale Theatre Festival, and the Beijing Bee Hive Theatre, as well as cofounder of the Wuzhen Theatre Festival.