Cheng Cheng-kung Taipei National Theatre November 29 World premieres of new operas are rare events but this 'world' premiere had the feeling of a work created for domestic consumption.
Cheng Cheng-kung, with music by Taiwanese composer Hsu Chang-huei, celebrated the popular story of the 17th-century Ming Dynasty hero (also known as Koxinga) who, after unsuccessfully battling the invading Manchu, crossed to Taiwan and there expelled the Dutch.
This was an attempt to treat, in quasi-Western operatic fashion, a tale often told in Peking opera.
Earlier this year it was re-told that way in Taiwan - and with words by the same librettist as used by Hsu in this latest version.
The piece opened with a gathering of fashionable, modern people, possibly in the lobby of a five-star hotel, being berated for their ignorance of history, and subsequently being coaxed into roles as extras in a portion of that history's re-enactment.
Simply staged by the Taiwanese film director Yen Hung-ya (better known as 'Hung Hung'), the show presented a series of tableaux musical items that rarely went on long enough to gather any momentum.