Preview-ELDORADO(HK)!-Not So Loud

  27-11-13

By: Karen Cheung

Last week I had the pleasure of talking to Tom Hope, co-founder of Not So Loud Theatre Company, about ELDORADO (HK)!, the upcoming play reading series that’s to take place at the Fringe Club in December.

ELDORADO(HK)! stands for English Language Drama Offering Radical And Distinctive Opportunities in Hong Kong.  It's the acronymic moniker for each of the play reading 'festivals' put on by the Not So Loud Theatre Company in Hong Kong since 2008.

To better appreciate this year's ELDORADO(HK!)  - which is larger scale than what's gone before and not only showcases new writing of the moment but also what Not So Loud have produced over the last 20 years - it’s perhaps worth getting to know how Not So Loud Theatre Company began - which was more by accident than design.

“We didn’t expect the first show we put on to be accepted for production by the Fringe [for its 1991 HK International Fringe Festival]. We had to submit the title of the play and a descriptor, and as lawyers we could write something impressive – even though the play didn’t even exist at that point. As for the name ‘Not So Loud’ – we had to come up with a name for our theatre company too, and we had waited till the very last minute – the deadline day. We were sitting in a bar, we were seriously hungover, and someone said ‘Not so loud, please,” co-founder Tom Hope recalls.

To their surprise, their first play at the Fringe (HOME RUN) sold out; then they did a second run in April, which again sold out. And they thought, well, this is fun. And from there, it went on, always as a platform for new work, usually about Hong Kong, and by the end of the decade they were averaging (as they still are) one show or more per year.

The way it worked was simple. Someone came to them with an idea. They would say great, go ahead and write it; if we like it we'll put it on. The Fringe festival and the Fringe Club itself was always an important part of the recipe.

After 20+ years, the co-founders have gone a long way - you have ex-lawyer Richard Smith (aka Elvis McGonagall, who is flying back to Hong Kong after a 20 year absence to perform as part of the festival) now working as a performing artist, and Tom has also left the law to work (inter alia) in theatre. Most of the other people involved with Not So Loud, though, are those who still have their day jobs but dedicated enough to take the time to help produce shows relevant to the lives they are living. And Not So Loud has always been about this spirit – finding people who want to be part of this ad hoc process and providing them with the platform to make dramatic things happen.

This ELDORADO(HK)!, therefore, serves as a nice little historical marker for Not So Loud to stop and look back at all that’s been done so far. The readings will take place at the Fringe Club's Vault bar and will happen either side of Elvis McGonagall's 70 minute set in the Fringe's Upstairs Theatre ("to avoid", says Tom "unnecessary dramatic conflict").  While the play readings at 6:15pm will be the unveiling of new works, those at 9:15pm will come from an inaugural anthology of 5 Not So Loud plays (appropriately titled 'VOLUME 1') of plays produced by the company over the last two decades.

The selections are, Tom says, centred around the theme of east meets west.  “And most of the plays are very much of their time – like snapshots of what Hong Kong was like when they were written. Hong Kong is a place with lots of great stories – you never run out of things to write about - and so often, where those worlds collide and drama takes place, English is the common medium for expression.”

The anthologized plays were chosen by Mike Ingham, a professor of  literature at Lingnan University, who has also written a critical introduction in which he points up how these plays operate as social commentaries. Tom emphasizes, though, that they are not documentaries: “They’re dramas, with strong characters and a compelling story to tell, so the politics give context but never overpower the plays.”  

Professor Ingham also makes the point that, despite the diversity of their talent pool, these Not So Loud plays have a unifying characteristic style of extracting what's comic from what's serious - and vice versa - or, as Tom puts it  “a sweet and sour type of humour”.

The anthology readings may seem like a nostalgic trip down memory lane - and it's also NSL's way of saying thank you to the Fringe Club (whose artistic director Benny Chia has written a foreword for the anthology) and everyone else who’s contributed throughout the years - but Tom especially hopes this week of readings will encourage new talent to come forward and write for Not So Loud in future. 

Each reading is FREE OF CHARGE,in the Vault bar at the Fringe Club - all are welcome to attend and no pre-booking is required - so you can simply turn up,  buy yourself a drink, sit back and indulge yourself in slices of local life, art and history.

And, on the Saturday night, instead of a reading there's a closing party at the Vault, to celebrate in style the start of Not So Loud's third decade addressing Hong Kong issues in a dramatic way.

Copies of NOT SO LOUD DRAMA - VOLUME 1 will also be available at each reading, at a special introductory price of just HK$100.

The order of the play readings at ELDORADO(HK)!

ELDORADO(HK)! will be playing at the Fringe Club at 6:15 and 9:15pm nightly the week of December 10th to 14th. To find out more about the play readings, click here.  And for our preview of NSL co-founder Richard Smith aka ELVIS McGONAGALL, click here.

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Comments

• Yuxin
  03 December 2013

  I wonder when exactly the second play-reading is: 9.15pm or 9.45pm? The event listing says the latter.

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