Tony award-winning Broadway play “Lend me a tenor” will be staged for the first time by Saigon’s English-language Dragonfly Theater at the Soul Live Project in District 3, HCMC at 7:30 p.m. on November 24, 25 and 26, and December 1, 2 and 3.

Artists join a rehearsal of the play “Lend me a tenor” directed by Aaron Toronto

Created by American playwright and theatre director Ken Ludwig, the Broadway-style comedy show is directed by Aaron Toronto, co-founder of the Dragonfly Theater.

The play tells a story about the escapade of world-famous tenor singer Tito Merelli, who is unintentionally drugged and takes a long nap before an important performance.

Merelli is thought to be dead, so the opera manager persuades his assistant to impersonate as Merelli so that the show can go on.  Everything goes smoothly but the singer suddenly wakes up and the play unfolds a series of unexpected situations and brings hearty laughter to spectators.   

The 40-year-old American director Aaron Toronto, who visited Vietnam in 2002 and has stayed on here to build his career since 2004, told the Daily in an email interview that he is overwhelmed with joy to bring the award-winning play to the city stage for the first time as it has been performed around the world for three decades and bagged three Tony awards, the highest U.S. theatre honor equivalent to the Academy Awards (Oscars) for film, the Emmy Awards for television, and the Grammy Awards for music, and four Drama Desk awards on Broadway theatre. 

“At first my goal to come to Vietnam was making films. But now I have found a deep passion for drama. Building a professional stage for English-language dramas in Saigon is my priority,” Toronto added. 

With a good command of spoken Vietnamese, he was cast in popular TV films in the country like Cam bay (trap) in 2005 for Binh Duong Television, Gio Thien Duong (heaven’s wind) in 2005 and Chuyen tinh dao ngoc (a pearl island’s love story) in 2009.

He also served as vice director in some movies like Saigon Yo, De mai tinh and Chuyen tinh xa xu (Passport to Love).

Toronto was also cast in some independent foreign movies like The Crossword Monologues (2007) by Hideaki Kataoka, The Prince (2013) by Son Pham, and Speak Low (2013) by Travis Dunaway.

“Currently, there’s not an industry for English-language theater in Vietnam and I’m striving to change this to answer the demands of a wider foreign audiences as well as locals who wish to improve their English,” the director noted.

Toronto, together with Nicaraguan director Jaime Zuniga, established Dragonfly Theatre Co., a professional English language theatre in HCMC, in 2011. This is one of the rare stages performing dramas in English, especially with local artists performing.

After six years of operation, Dragonfly Theatre has gained popularity from local audiences and the expat community through the critically-acclaimed performances including The Importance of Being Earnest (2011), The Last 5 Years (2012), The Little Prince (2012), and Dangerous Liaison (2013).

The upcoming play will be performed in English with Vietnamese subtitles. Tickets for the forthcoming show are on sale at https://ticketbox.vn/event/lmat-67124/43412, with prices starting from VND150,000 (US$6.6)  

The Soul Live Project is located at 214-216 Pasteur Street in District 3.

SGT