The Clock God from the West

The Clock God From the West is a modern theatrical piece that blends one of the most glorious Chinese artistic forms, Peking Opera, with more up-to-date narrative design. It is a melodramatic fantasy about a three-generation family in Beijing, which is involved in a mysterious incident about time and truth during the last few years of the Qing Dynasty. The discussion of “What is truth” is the primary intention of the story.

The theatrical stage is always a magic place where time, space and culture intersects. On stage, magic can send you back to the past, but how can it remove your pride, greed, envy and lust? In a dark age, no one is optimistic about the future, the only way that they can find relief is by looking back. Can the family in the East finally find any resolution with the magic of the clock from the West?

The play was produced by Quirky Moth Theatre, one of China’s leading theatre companies established by a group of younger-generation practitioners and here they explore the influence of the West on China’s sense of self with a heightened sense of the intersections between past, present and future.

23 April 13.00 UK (BST) – Xunnan Li hosts a discussion with the creative team from The Clock from the West, examining the relationship between tradition and globalization in the contemporary Chinese theatre. Participants include the producer and playwright Tianjiao Li, director Xuexi Li, script translator Joe Chen and production advisor Hsiao Hui-wen. Zoom Room

LISTEN to Xunnan Li hosts a discussion with the creative team from The Clock from the West, examining the relationship between tradition and globalization in the contemporary Chinese theatre. Participants include the producer and playwright Tianjiao Li, director Xuexi Li, script translator Joe Chen and production advisor Hsiao Hui-wen.