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Theater, bookstore, cultural creation, exhibition, art, education...Recently, the Mumu Theater located in Sino-Ocean Leti Port in Tongzhou District, Beijing, officially opened, and simultaneously launched the highlight of the 2024 "Canal Drama" performance season - the first Starry Theater Village Parent-Child Drama Festival. This new performing arts space integrating multiple cultural projects is affiliated to the Starry Theater Village and is the first new performing arts space in a commercial complex in the sub-center of Beijing. This innovative cultural project will bring more cultural and artistic enjoyment space to citizens, and also provide a new art experience platform for parent-child families.

Opening show attracts new and old audiences

At 10am on weekends, as soon as the Ocean Entertainment Mall in Tongzhou District opened, many parents with their children went straight to the Mumu Theater on the third floor of the mall. The Mumu Bookstore outside the theater is a multifunctional cultural space that integrates reading, communication, and creation. Before the performance, the children read picture books, played games, changed costumes, painted their faces, did handicrafts, and learned magic tricks. They all had a lot of fun.

At 10:30, the magic book 3D theater "Little Magician", the opening show of the first Starry Drama Village Parent-Child Drama Festival, officially began. The audience walked into the theater that can accommodate 200 people, as if entering a magical world full of fantasy. On the stage that looks like a 3D picture book, there are magic schools, hat kingdoms, robot kingdoms, cloud kingdoms... Every scene and every character, in the constant changes of lights and images, leads the audience of all ages to travel through the fantasy world; flying tables, magical hats, magic books, plants that bloom in one second, birds and fish that appear from nothing... All kinds of interactive magic, mind reading, funny magic and other magics connected throughout the whole process surprised the children again and again, and the atmosphere on the scene was warm and enthusiastic.

In addition to the audience who bought tickets early to watch the performance, some customers discovered that there was a theater here when they were shopping in the mall. They looked at this newly opened, warm and comfortable environment curiously, flipped through the beautifully designed promotional leaflets, and became very interested in the performance. Several audience members immediately bought tickets for the 3 pm performance. Ms. Sun, who lives in Tongzhou, was shopping in the mall with her 7-year-old daughter. When she was flipping through the theater brochure, she said to the staff with surprise: "I have taken my daughter to watch these children's plays produced by Fanxing Theater Village before. I didn't expect that there is a theater at my doorstep now. I don't have to travel so far in the future, and I can bring my daughter to watch the plays often!"

Exploring the "Drama + Commercial Complex" Model

"The Canal Has Drama" is a performing arts brand created by Tongzhou District to implement Beijing's "Performing Arts Capital" construction. As an important part of the "The Canal Has Drama" performance season, the first Fanxing Drama Village Parent-Child Drama Festival will allow more young people and children to participate and experience the charm of canal culture through a variety of art activities such as drama performances, opera, intangible cultural heritage, picture book classes, and celebrity exchange classes. Hao Weili, executive general manager of Mumu Theater, said: "As the first commercial space theater under the Fanxing Drama Village, we hope to create a new performing arts space for young customers and parent-child families through the model of 'drama + commercial complex'. The holding of the first Fanxing Drama Village Parent-Child Drama Festival is a concrete practice of this concept."

Hao Weili introduced that this year's drama festival is themed "Chasing the Light". From August to October, there are 81 wonderful performances and activities, including 39 parent-child performances at Mumu Theater, 31 parent-child activities at Mumu Bookstore, and 11 grassroots performances and cultural activities in Tongzhou District. In addition to the parent-child play "Little Magician" at the Magic 3D Book Theater, there are also Peking Opera children's interactive plays, such as the Children's Play Club series "Children's Play Club: Three Wonders of Face Makeup Plays", "Children's Play Club 2: Super Little Heroes", and "Children's Play Club 3: Pigsy Transforms", the Chinese version of the children's play "Drag-E" with a sci-fi environmental theme introduced from Spain, the Beijing National Orchestra's interactive experience concert "Zootopia", as well as Peking Opera children's handicraft workshops, drama picture book classes, parent-child art appreciation workshops and other performances and activities, which are rich in content and have many highlights. The drama festival will also launch public welfare discount tickets and public welfare activities free for the public to participate in, etc., to attract more families to experience the charm of drama.

Hao Weili is full of confidence in the future of Mumu Theater: "We will continue to uphold the mission of Fanxing Theater Village to 'advocate literary and artistic life and convey humanistic care', constantly enrich and improve the theater's operating content and form, and bring citizens a rich and colorful drama experience, an art space that combines exhibitions and performances, art education classrooms with a sense of theater, creative life, off-stage cultural and creative exhibitions and sales, parent-child picture book museums, drama bookstores, Mumu art popularization charity activities and other diversified content. The cultural brand building of Mumu Theater will also inject new vitality into traditional commercial complexes, help Leti Port become a new landmark for cultural and entertainment consumption in Beijing's sub-center, and provide citizens with a more colorful spiritual and cultural life."

Source: Beijing Daily Client

Reporter: Wang Run