Works (selected) by Pat To YAN
THEATRES, FILMS, SCRIPTS & WORKSHOPS

Yan Pat-to 【Playwright & Director】
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Amos Wong Ho-Yin 【Video Director】
A night we are still parting
22 . 3 . 2024 - 6 . 4 . 2024
East Kowloon Cultural Centre, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
Ka-yan and Yin-Hei, a physical therapist and an insurance professional respectively, face the city's various pains due to their jobs. After three years of dating and cohabiting in Kowloon Bay, the pandemic forces them into close proximity, prompting them to reflect on an unclear future. One day, Ka-yan dreams of an elderly man who says, 'What you fear is not me, but aging.' Without discussing a breakup, she leaves Kowloon Bay to follow Hayden, whom she just met, to attend the Summer Sonic music festival in Osaka, Japan. Yet, leaving Hong Kong makes her yearn even more for the city and for Yin-Hei.

VR Programme –
THE Wall
16 - 19 . 1 . 2025
Incubator 1,
East Kowloon Cultural Centre, Hong Kong
In Cantonese with some English dialogue
A metaphor for Europe's predicament in relation to the world, an invisible force will erode time and space.
Adapted from the novel of the same name, 'The Wall,' by Austrian author Marlen Haushofer.
Hugo, Luise and her with a loyal dog Luchs head to a hunting lodge in the Alps. However, after Hugo and Luise go out to a tavern, they never return. She and the dog attempt to walk to the village for help, but they are stopped by a mysterious invisible wall. Even trying to return to the lodge proves futile. Time is frozen, and space becomes increasingly oppressive. Faced with such a survival dilemma, how will she respond?"

Playreading:
Neometropolis
20 - 22 . 12 . 2024
The Corner, East Kowloon Cultural Centre,
Hong Kong
In Cantonese
A world once existed that was organised precisely as plants wanted it.
Years later, the city isolates the forest, leaving the forest with no choice but to retaliate against.
The roots creep into the gaps of the steel and concrete.
The Forest declared,
"There are so many times of extinction of species on this Planet, and this time is entirely on Humans!"

___
Post Office in Hell
The origin
5 - 8 . 9 . 2024
The Box, Freespace,
West Kowloon Cultural District, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
The second in a series of theatre experiences adapted from Hong Kong author Westwingmoon’s online novel Hell Post Office.
The new, stand-alone theatre production tells the story of postman Nam Mun-leung – an individual gifted with the ability to travel between worlds and deliver letters to loved ones in the afterlife. As he journeys back and forth between the living and the dead, Nam witnesses the remorse of his clients. Forced to confront his own personal issues, he navigates how to save himself, his family and his significant other.

Cultural Masseur 2023: Art x Internet Literature
Goddess
29 - 31 . 3 . 2024
Hong Kong Arts Centre, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
There is someone in everyone’s mind who leaves marks and residues that shape their love in the future even when the person is no longer there.
Keisson, a man who enjoys the superficial dividends in the cruel world of relationships where everyone is judged by their appearance. At the same time he experiences betrayal, separation and remarkable love and more. Wounds after wounds, his search for warmth eventually results in solitude and regret.

———
Post Office
in Hell Part 1
1 - 3 . 3 . 2024
The Room, Freespace and Art Park,
West Kowloon Cultural District, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
An immersive theatre production adapted from the novel "Hell Post Office,"
This is the first part of the story, where postman Nan Men-lang will lead the audience between the realms of yin and yang through three intertwined stories. With headphones on, you will walk along the path and listen to three instances of entanglement and regret, or perhaps hope and love—a journey shared by the living and the deceased.

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A Haunted VR Conference
15 - 17. 9 . 2023
Sha Tin Town Hall (Cultural Activities Hall),
Hong Kong
In Cantonese
What begins as a routine online business meeting among four men gradually unearths long-buried bloody secrets. Suddenly, blood-stained packages, ropes, and strange occurrences emerge. Do vengeful spirits really exist? How will the four men unravel the deep-seated hatred of a woman? Ultimately, will they be left with the dilemma of murder or suicide?

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Goldfish of Berlin
(Complete Version)
6 - 8 . 10 . 2023
Yuen Long Theatre, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
In an age of liquidity, how can a person manage his love/life?
Sze Yin, a middle aged Hong Konger, specialises in creative technology. Once he met Lin lin in Berlin. Lin lin, aged 20 something, was born in Xi’an. They quickly fell in love with each other, but Sze Yin could only keep a long distance relationship with her as he had to be back to Hong Kong……
It’s a love story and not yet only a love story, as always. It’s still a story about city, life and time.

Experience Theatre
The Sparkling and Swaying Snow
24 . 3 . 2023 - 27 . 5 . 2023
The Mills, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
That year, Sheung suddenly felt overwhelming fear of the city and locked herself at home for two weeks. She was introduced to move to an organic farming farm, but the wound still could not heal. Meanwhile, Mike, whom she was in love with, suddenly left for Berlin but continued to maintain an ambiguous relationship with her. She tried to find the cold air to heal the inner trauma in the unfamiliar fields and land.

Tai Kwun Performing Arts Season: SPOTLIGHT 2023
I will die
in my home
21 - 23 . 4 . 2023
F Hall, Tai Kwun, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
Is there anyone who, in his youth, already reminisce about the days not yet lived? Among the antiquated buildings in Wan Chai, one home built in the last century escaped the inevitable destiny of being demolished while a hotel becomes the subject of ghost-lore. The home bought by the grandmother used to be glitzy with visitors coming and going. The daughter-in-law promised to continue the home’s vitality. But the grandmother prophesised “my” eventual passing in this home. People, just like homes, will be forgotten eventually just like the unrecorded last words of the abandoned souls. These lonely presences, one after another, continue to be overlooked by history.

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Sound Everywhere
In The Universe
25 . 3 . 2022 - 2 . 4 . 2022
National Theatre Mannheim,
Mannheim, Germany
In German
A cat with a hole says that when things fall into a black hole, they only transform, not disappear. T craves for reuniting with Aries and the OO inhabitants, embarking on a two-hundred-year journey across the cosmos to the other side of the black hole. Scorpio—an astronaut's sister— becomes his companion for the journey. To extend their lifespans, T and Scorpio must use hibernation and cloning technology. Two hundred years pass, and Planet OO becomes Planet QQ. T excitedly sets off for QQ, while Scorpio chooses to avoid her transformed brother.
When T arrives on QQ, everything is not as expected. QQ appears quite similar to OO, yet T feels completely out of place.
T reunites with Aries, but she has forgotten everything that happened on OO and does not recognize T, having married an astronaut instead…

New Vision Arts Festival 2022
POSTHUMAN CONDITION
28 - 30.10 . 2022
Theatre, City Hall, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
Frank is an ordinary man living in a developed country. By pure coincidence, he became a remote pilot, sitting in the comfort of his home and using his gaming skills to launch airstrikes in other countries. When his son Another is born, the baby doesn’t have a buttock! His wife Jane recounts a legend from the East about redemption… Frank resolves to visit the places he has destroyed and the people he’s wounded.
A cyber-buttock has been appended to Another to save his life, yet there are side effects: the baby grows ten times faster than any normal boy, he is also bestowed with paranormal powers. Is Another a harbinger for future generations or an exemplar of the epic failure of technology?
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A MINUTE SOMETHING ELSE ENTERS
7 - 9 . 1 . 2022
The Public areas nearby HKU in Central District,
Hong Kong
In Cantonese
A Myriad of farewells, which are in the three occasions of the pandemic in two defined time frames in space.
Carson encountered a dilemma in relationship and incapacity with the diagnosis of his sister’s cancer when the lethal virus hit the city in 2003; Ah Shue was forcibly dissociated from her partner in 2021, encroached into the matter of the unfamiliar. Pandemic endured its never-ending mark in human history, would that ever be the ordinary form of life? The journey begins in 2022 January with the stories of departure and aggregation. Time wheels, Solitude reigns.
———
A Poem in Jail
7 - 16 . 5 . 2021
TAI KWUN, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
In prison, time is at once transitory and eternal….resurfacing as memories for the future. In the 1980s, two women were imprisoned in Victoria Prison, where they experienced an unexpected romance in confinement. Their growing affections for each other were interrupted as one was released while the other wrote a love poem of longing on her bed board. When released from prison, she discovered that her lover had already married. She suppressed her mishmash of feelings and started a family as well. Approaching 1997, she did not want to live in a bigger prison. The decision to immigrate prompted a final rendezvous and conversation in which deep feelings were cast aside but never forgotten.
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Happily Ever After Nuclear Explosion
(Hong Kong & Korea)
12 - 14 . 7 . 2019
JC CUBE, TAI KWUN, Hong Kong
In Cantonese, with English Surtitle
3 - 4 . 11 . 2019
International Playwrights Festival, Korea
In Cantonese, with English Surtitle
Two people from the nuclear explosion affected area. She speaks, he can’t. He once witnessed a person being choked to death by the broken pieces of his organs; then he often has the feeling to be choked. They come here to introduce another face of post nuclear explosion. In there, the nature grows freely, flowers blossom. Green is the warmest colour. Animals lead their lives happily. But they can’t use conditioners and lotions in order not to be contaminated by radioactivity elements. Apart from these, nothing is not fine for living there.
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GOLDFISH of BERLIN
10 - 12 . 5 . 2019
Auditorium, Kwai Tsing Theatre, Hong Kong
In Cantonese & Mandarine, no subtitle
In an age of liquidity, how can a person manage his love/life?
Sze Yin, a middle aged Hong Konger, specialises in creative technology. Once he met Lin lin in Berlin. Lin lin, aged 20 something, was born in Xi’an. They quickly fell in love with each other, but Sze Yin could only keep a long distance relationship with her as he had to be back to Hong Kong……
It’s a love story and not yet only a love story, as always. It’s still a story about city, life and time.
———
Happily ever after nuclear explosion
24 . 6 . 2018
Residenztheater München, Munich, Germany
In German
Two people from the nuclear explosion affected area. She speaks, he can’t. He once witnessed a person being choked to death by the broken pieces of his organs; then he often has the feeling to be choked. They come here to introduce another face of post nuclear explosion. In there, the nature grows freely, flowers blossom. Green is the warmest colour. Animals lead their lives happily. But they can’t use conditioners and lotions in order not to be contaminated by radioactivity elements. Apart from these, nothing is not fine for living there.
———
stream of consciousness
27 - 30 . 4 . 2018
Fringe Club, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
It’s an immersive theatre inside a Hong Kong heritage which is also a mini cultural cluster. Two characters: Conscious 1 & Conscious 2 speak about our conscious state. And then audience are free to wander and discover inside the building. Audience may then find the story behind: Ben and Christina met at Fringe Club in 1984. But Christina wanted to continue her career as a performer in London so they broke up.
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How to present the love life of Hong Kong people to Aliens?
8 - 11 . 2 . 2018
N2, Cattle depot, Hong Kong
16 . 5 . 2018
Tai Kwun, Hong Kong
28 . 11 . 2019
Quanta Hall, Taipei
12 . 4 . 2020 & 1 . 5 . 2020
Online Livestreaming performnce
''Those people, that crowd of people, moving to different directions, are like cells. They, like us, if only living in a giant body, then the pain I am used to is only temporary, not worth mentioning. I feel this after having been to a bookstore in Tsim Sha Tsui. At that moment, I just stared at the crowd who was looking at the Christmas decorations." One day, she suddenly said to me. Before that, she stared at me for ten seconds. I am just wondering what kind of spirit is living in this girl's body?
New Vision Festival 2016
a Concise History of futurE
4 - 6 . 11 . 2016
City Hall, Hong Kong
In Cantonese
The first ethnic Chinese play selected by Berliner Festspiele Theatertreffen Stückemarkt 2016.
It's now. A man who witnesses pain loves watching musicals, but he doesn't know how to dance, sing and act. One night, he saw a chorus girl -- the sinister girl. They had to flee from north to the south ......
It's future. The outsider held a box and destined to travel to the north from the south though he didn't know the content of the box, though everyone was fleeing from the north to the south.
The two time lines are seemingly parallel, but is the 'reality' real?