Benny Lim

Last updated

Benny Lim
Born (1980-04-25) 25 April 1980 (age 42)
Singapore
OccupationTheatre practitioner and educator
NationalitySingaporean
EducationDoctor of Philosophy, University of Glamorgan

Benny Lim (born 1980, in Singapore) was the artistic director of the now defunct the Fun Stage, a non-profit theatre group in Singapore. [1] He obtained a Doctor of Philosophy from the Division of Drama, University of Glamorgan (now known as the University of South Wales) in 2012.

Contents

Biography

In 2001, at the age of 21, he founded the Fun Stage and has since held on to the record as the youngest artistic director of a theatre company in Singapore. [2] In 2006, one of Benny's plays, Existence, was published in Singapore. [3] Existence was written in 2003, inspired by the poetry of Cyril Wong, as a response to Leslie Cheung's suicide. The play was mentioned in Time magazine (10 August 2003) as a story that "portrays the love of two young Singaporean men for each other as doomed". [4] In 2015, Benny co-curated Umbrella Festival, an arts festival in Hong Kong, [5] in response to city's Umbrella Movement.

Censorship

Benny's works often deal with social-political issues within a postmodern society. In 2004, Benny organized the Lovers' Lecture Series, which was not given a go-ahead by the Public Entertainment Licensing Unit (PELU) under the Singapore Police Force. [6] In 2005, Benny collaborated with artist Brian Gothong Tan on a devised play, Human Lefts. The content of the play, which was on the issue of the death penalty, was given a total ban by the Media Development Authority of Singapore (MDA). [7] [8]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cantonese opera</span> Chinese opera tradition originating in Guangdong province

Cantonese opera is one of the major categories in Chinese opera, originating in southern China's Guangdong Province. It is popular in Guangdong, Guangxi, Hong Kong, Macau and among Chinese communities in Southeast Asia. Like all versions of Chinese opera, it is a traditional Chinese art form, involving music, singing, martial arts, acrobatics, and acting.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ivan Heng</span>

Ivan Heng is a Singaporean actor and theatre director of Peranakan descent. He is the founding artistic director of W!LD RICE, a theatre company in Singapore, and an outspoken advocate for respect for diversity and freedom of expression.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jim Chim</span>

Jim Chim Sui-man is a Hong Kong-based stage actor and comedian.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yu Long</span> Chinese conductor

Yu Long is a Chinese conductor. He is currently artistic director and chief conductor of the China Philharmonic and of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, music director of the Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra, and principal guest conductor of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra. Yu is also the Chairman of the Artistic Committee of the Beijing Music Festival and co-director of the Music in the Summer Air Festival (MISA).

Richard Lee Peng Boon, professionally known as Dick Lee, is a Singaporean singer-songwriter, playwright and film director. Lee was awarded the Cultural Medallion, Singapore's pinnacle arts award, for music in 2005.

DV8 Physical Theatre was a physical theatre company based at Artsadmin in London, United Kingdom. It was officially founded in 1986 by Lloyd Newson (1986–2015), Michelle Richecoeur (1986–1988) and Nigel Charnock. Lloyd Newson led the company as choreographer and artistic director from its inception, apart from the production My Sex, Our Dance (1986), which was co-created and performed with Nigel Charnock. DV8 officially ended in April 2022 when Lloyd Newson announced his retirement via the company web page.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">National Arts Council, Singapore</span>

The National Arts Council (NAC) is a statutory board established on 15 October 1991 to oversee the development of arts in Singapore. It is under the purview of the Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth. The NAC provides grants, scholarships, awards and platforms for arts practitioners, as well as arts education and programmes for the general public.

Tan Tarn How ) is a Singaporean playwright and senior research fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies (Singapore). His plays have been staged in Singapore and Hong Kong, and have won numerous awards. In 2011, Epigram Books published a collection of six of his plays.

The Necessary Stage is a Singaporean non-profit theatre company with charity status. Formed in 1987 by Alvin Tan, The Necessary Stage was established with its own mission to create challenging, indigenous and innovative theatre that touches the heart and mind. The Necessary Stage is a recipient of the National Arts Council's Major Grant FY2014-2016, and is also the organiser of the annual M1 Singapore Fringe Festival. It is currently located at the Marine Parade Community Building.

Alvin Tan is the founder and artistic director of The Necessary Stage (TNS), and the co-artistic director of the M1 Singapore Fringe Festival. Under Tan's leadership, TNS has grown from a small society in 1987 to one of Singapore’s most prominent and respected theatre companies. He also initiated the Company's Theatre For Youth Branch and the Marine Parade Theatre Festival.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hong Kong Arts Festival</span> Hong Kong festival (est. 1973)

The Hong Kong Arts Festival (HKAF), launched in 1973, is a major international arts festival committed to enriching the cultural life of the city by presenting leading local and international artists in all genres of the performing arts as well as a diverse range of “PLUS” and educational events in February and March each year.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kuo Pao Kun</span>

Kuo Pao Kun was a playwright, theatre director, and arts activist in Singapore who wrote and directed both Mandarin and English plays. He founded three arts and drama centres in Singapore, conducted and organised a number of drama seminars and workshops, and mentored Singaporean and foreign directors and artists.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mathias Woo</span> Chinese designer

Mathias Woo Yan Wai joined the arts collective Zuni Icosahedron in 1988 and is now the Executive Director cum Co-Artistic Director of the group. Woo is renowned for his creative career in multimedia theatre as a scriptwriter, director, designer, producer as well as curator with a portfolio of more than 70 original theatre works, which are best known for their unique rendering of space and technology.

The Isango Ensemble is a Cape Town-based theatre company led by director Mark Dornford-May and music directors Pauline Malefane and Mandisi Dyantyis. It was established in 2000, when Dornford-May and conductor Charles Hazlewood travelled to South Africa to form a lyric theatre company for the Spier Festival; most of the company members are drawn from the townships around Cape Town. The company's work focuses on re-imagining classics from the Western theatre canon, finding a new context for the stories within a South African or township setting and developing new productions based on South African issues, stories and novels.

Alan Lyddiard is a theatre and film director, best known as an advocate of community arts and the ensemble theatre model in the UK. Lyddiard was Artistic Director of Northern Stage, Newcastle upon Tyne (1992–2005), Artistic Director of TAG Theatre Company, Glasgow (1988–1992) and Associate Director at Dundee Rep (1984–1988).

Marc Goldberg is a French theatre director, playwright, actor, and translator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leon Rubin</span>

Professor Leon Rubin is a UK, Theatre Director, Theatre Management Consultant, Professor, Writer, and former Director of East 15 Acting School. He is a member of the Directors Guild of Great Britain and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society. He was the first foreigner to be awarded an Honorary Professorship of GITIS Russian Theatre Academy, Moscow, in 1997. He began his career as Assistant Director at the Royal Shakespeare Company, and has been Artistic Director of three major UK theatre companies: Lyric Theatre, Belfast, Watford Palace theatre the Bristol Old Vic and Associate at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin and a frequent guest at the Stratford Festival, Canada. He has directed theatre production in many countries across the world. In April 2019 it was announced that he had decided to step down from his position as Director of East 15 Acting School, and joined the school’s newly formed research department, undertaking an initial 2 year research programme and focusing on directing and writing. Routledge published his book, Rehearsing Shakespeare in 2021. He then became Dean of Performing Arts at LaSalle College of the Arts, Singapore.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">OzAsia Festival</span> Annual arts festival in Adelaide, South Australia

OzAsia Festival, or simply OzAsia, is an Asia-focused arts festival in South Australia, presented by the Adelaide Festival Centre for two weeks in late October to early November each year. It features theatre, dance, music, film and visual arts from across Asia as well as outdoor events and food stalls. In some years it has focused on specific regions or countries in Asia.

Bonni Chan Lai-chu (陳麗珠) is a Hong Kong stage director and actress. She is the co-Artistic Director of Theatre du Pif,

Tisa Ho is an arts administrator and writer from Hong Kong. She is currently the director of the Hong Kong Arts Festival and has previously been the director of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, the Singapore Arts Festival, and several public art projects in Singapore, including the Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay, a public arts venue. She is currently the chair of the International Society of Performing Arts, and received an award from the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong for her contributions, in 2020. She has written several books on arts administration in Asia.

References

  1. The Fun Stage's website archived by the National Library Board, Singapore
  2. Arts and Entertainment section, Singapore Book of Records - Updated March 2016
  3. The book's information on WorldCat
  4. Price, David Clive (August 10, 2003). "Singapore: It's In to Be Out". Time .
  5. "Umbrella Festival". Time Out Hong Kong . Archived from the original on 21 September 2016. Retrieved 7 September 2016.
  6. Article from The Guardian - dated 11 March 2004
  7. Arts Engage website
  8. Article from The Sydney Morning Herald - Dated 3 December 2005