SIFA 2026: Hedda Gabler – An interview with director Park Jung Hee on Henrik Ibsen’s universal cultural resonance

Few characters in modern theatre are as enduringly enigmatic as Hedda Gabler, a figure suspended between control and chaos, desire and restraint. In this latest staging by Park Jung-hee, Artistic Director of the National Theater Company of Korea, the question is not how to modernise Hedda Gabler, but how to encounter it anew. Rather than imposing a contemporary veneer, Park approaches the work as a … Continue reading SIFA 2026: Hedda Gabler – An interview with director Park Jung Hee on Henrik Ibsen’s universal cultural resonance

★★★★★ Theatre Review: Last Rites by Liu Xiaoyi / Emergency Stairs (SIFA 2026)

Five masters of performance confront mortality and artistic legacy in Liu Xiaoyi’s ambitious, cathartic cross-border work. What has always made theatre so beautiful is its temporality. Every performance exists only once; even repeated over multiple nights, no show will ever look or feel exactly the same again. It is fragile, fleeting, and alive precisely because it disappears the moment it is completed. By extension, the … Continue reading ★★★★★ Theatre Review: Last Rites by Liu Xiaoyi / Emergency Stairs (SIFA 2026)

★★★★☆ Theatre Review: Hamlet by Teatro La Plaza (SIFA 2026)

Life-affirming deconstruction of Shakespeare’s tragedy that insists on the validity of every human experience, regardless of disability or neurotypicality. Theatre and disability have long shared an uneasy relationship. Theatre is, after all, an art form built on visibility: on bodies being watched, voices being heard, and stories being witnessed. To place atypical bodies centre stage is therefore an act of resistance against mainstream ideas of … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Theatre Review: Hamlet by Teatro La Plaza (SIFA 2026)

★★★★☆ Theatre Review: Makan Culture by Jo Tan and Krish Natarajan (SIFA 2026)

Earnest, wry and smile-inducing commentary on pride, joy, and criticism in the local arts and culture scene. Singapore has long measured success in terms of efficiency, practicality and polish, so it’s perhaps unsurprising that the local arts scene often finds itself trapped in an exhausting cycle of comparison. Why watch a homegrown production when there’s Broadway and West End to assure us of ‘quality’? Why … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Theatre Review: Makan Culture by Jo Tan and Krish Natarajan (SIFA 2026)

★★★☆☆ Dance Review: Tempo by Kalle Nio and Fernando Melo (SIFA 2026)

Moments stretch, reverse and repeat through magic, circus and dance in this frustratingly slow meditation on time.  Time is supposed to be objective, but more often than not, it is deeply relative; stretching, compressing and slowing according to emotion, attention and memory. Presented as part of the 2026 Singapore International Festival of Arts, Tempo takes that idea and turns it into a performance experiment, where … Continue reading ★★★☆☆ Dance Review: Tempo by Kalle Nio and Fernando Melo (SIFA 2026)

Theatre Review: The Lighthouse by Patch Theatre (SIFA 2026)

Surreal, interactive series of experiential light installations that turn physics into magic, ideal for younger audiences. For those who have never quite learnt about reflection and refraction in science class, interactions with light can feel like pure magic. That sense of innocent mystery is exactly what Patch Theatre harnesses in The Lighthouse, an experiential promenade work that guides audiences through a series of interconnected rooms … Continue reading Theatre Review: The Lighthouse by Patch Theatre (SIFA 2026)

Singapore Takes Centre Stage as Global Performing Arts Leaders Gather for ISPA 2026 Congress

Singapore’s arts scene stepped into the international spotlight this week as more than 400 performing arts leaders from over 40 countries arrived for the International Society for the Performing Arts (ISPA) 2026 Singapore Congress, the first time the global gathering has returned to Southeast Asia in more than two decades. Held from 19 to 22 May and hosted by the National Arts Council, the Congress … Continue reading Singapore Takes Centre Stage as Global Performing Arts Leaders Gather for ISPA 2026 Congress

SIFA 2026: Strangely Familiar《熟悉的陌生》 – An interview with choreographer Kuik Swee Boon on coexistence and projection

In Strangely Familiar, the stage becomes a meeting ground between worlds. A shifting digital presence, neither fully human nor entirely machine, moves alongside five dancers, blurring the boundaries between body and projection, instinct and invention. Created by Kuik Swee Boon, founding artistic director of T.H.E Dance Company, the work unfolds less as a linear narrative than as an evolving encounter: a space where the human … Continue reading SIFA 2026: Strangely Familiar《熟悉的陌生》 – An interview with choreographer Kuik Swee Boon on coexistence and projection

SIFA 2026: Last Rites – An interview with director Liu Xiaoyi on the temporality of live performance and preparing for the end

What would it mean to stage your final act, not as a last bow, but as a reflection of everything that came before? In Last Rites, Liu Xiaoyi brings together five veteran performers from across Asia to confront this question, weaving their personal histories into a meditation on life, art, and what remains after both have passed. Presented at the 2026 Singapore International Festival of … Continue reading SIFA 2026: Last Rites – An interview with director Liu Xiaoyi on the temporality of live performance and preparing for the end

SIFA 2026: Hamlet – An interview with director Chela De Ferrari on inclusivity and who deserves to be seen onstage

At the heart of Hamlet lies one of the most enduring questions in Western theatre: who has the right to exist, to speak, to be seen. In her radical reimagining of the play, Peruvian director Chela De Ferrari shifts that question off the page and into the bodies of her performers: actors with Down syndrome who take centre stage in a work that refuses both … Continue reading SIFA 2026: Hamlet – An interview with director Chela De Ferrari on inclusivity and who deserves to be seen onstage