The Vietnamese bamboo circus Làng Tôi (“My Village”) begins regular performances in Hanoi following a world tour. From November 3, the show will be staged regularly at 6:00 p.m. at the Hanoi Bamboo Circus Arts Center.
Làng Tôi combines circus art with expressive stage movement and live music performed on some thirty traditional instruments of Vietnam’s peoples. On stage, the bamboo serves not only as a prop but also as a storytelling device, bringing images of village life to the stage.
This is the first bamboo circus production to tour the world. Since 2009, the show has been performed in 50 cities across nine countries, reaching more than one hundred thousand spectators. It has been covered by publications including The Guardian and CNN. Now, the production, which has become a notable phenomenon in Vietnamese performing arts, will be accessible to Hanoi residents and visitors to the city.
The show’s director is Tuan Le. He began his career as a juggler, won several awards and gained recognition in Germany, where he had lived since the age of 14. Tuan Le became the first and only Vietnamese artist to perform as a soloist with Cirque du Soleil, and later returned to the famous circus as chief choreographer of Toruk, a production based on the film Avatar. After returning to Vietnam, he and his colleagues created a trilogy of bamboo circus productions devoted to Vietnamese culture: Làng Tôi, À Ố and Teh Dar.
The production’s co-authors are Nhat Ly and Nguyen Lan Maurice. Music director Nhat Ly was born in France but spent his childhood in Vietnam, where he became fascinated by traditional musical instruments. Creative director Nguyen Lan Maurice is a graduate of the Vietnamese circus school and has lived in France since 1985, teaching circus arts there.
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