Watch water puppet show in Phu Quoc.

Việt Nam•18/02/2024

The "Vietnamese Puppet Show - Spring Festival" in Phu Quoc is the first water puppet show performed on a beach in Vietnam.

"Spring Festival" is designed to recreate the essence of Vietnamese life, work, beliefs, and culture, especially during the Lunar New Year.

Eight performances immerse viewers in the endless flow of Vietnamese culture, with folk artists recounting village festivals, legends of the Dragon and the Immortal, the conical hat, wet rice farming , and the worship of the Three Mother Goddesses… through the language of puppets and traditional music.

The colorful puppets, manipulated by the artists, create spectacular and vibrant artistic performances.

The performance "Telling Stories of the Harvest Season," featuring a buffalo and a farmer, delighted the audience.

"Spring Festival" is not just about water puppetry, but also combines diverse performance forms such as dry puppetry, dance, and singing. The musical performances also introduce visitors to other theatrical arts such as Cheo singing and Chau Van singing.

The combination of music and traditional performing arts evoked many emotions and experiences for the viewers. In particular, the "Storytelling of the Harvest Season" performance, featuring a buffalo and a farmer, brought many tourists to tears with continuous applause.

Meanwhile, the "Elegant Conical Hat" performance was breathtaking due to its stunning visual effects, with the dancers appearing on a giant conical hat and performing graceful, cloud-like movements that captivated the audience.

The dancers perform while wearing traditional Vietnamese conical hats.

"Hello Vietnam" is the closing act of the show, featuring a new arrangement using four traditional Vietnamese musical instruments: flute, two-stringed fiddle, gourd lute, and zither, combined with a dance in ao dai and conical hats, conveying a greeting from the Vietnamese people to friends and tourists around the world .

Cate, a tourist from the United States, shared: “The show was very interesting. I had heard a lot about Vietnamese puppetry, especially water puppetry, but had never had the chance to see it. Luckily, my family came to Phu Quoc today and were able to watch and learn more about puppetry and Vietnamese culture through it.”

Jing Xiang, a tourist from Taiwan (China), expressed her excitement after the show: “The performance was so beautiful and elaborate, from the water stage to the costumes and the puppets. I truly admire the artists who manipulated them so skillfully and expressively.”

To create an engaging and innovative program that preserves traditional cultural elements, Sun Group collaborated with the Vietnam Puppet Theatre to stage and design the show for both domestic and international tourists.

Vietnamese puppetry is one of the performances invested in by Sun Group at its 4,000 billion VND entertainment complex in Hoang Hon town, with the aspiration to preserve and promote Vietnamese cultural identity to both Vietnamese people and international tourists.

After each performance, visitors can also interact with the artists, experience water puppetry, watch puppet parades around the beach, and visit the Fun Night Market...

Water puppetry is a traditional folk theatrical art form that originated from the unique creativity of the Vietnamese people. It emerged about ten centuries ago in the Red River Delta region (some also suggest that water puppetry originated during the construction of Co Loa Citadel, in 255 BC).

Foreign tourists enjoy watching water puppet shows in Phu Quoc.

This art form is usually performed during festivals, village celebrations, joyous occasions, and Tet (Vietnamese New Year), using puppets to perform plays and dramas on the water. Water puppetry is also considered a unique intangible cultural heritage of Vietnam.

Water puppetry is gradually fading away, so the "Vietnamese Puppetry - Spring Festival" show has brought a refreshing breeze of traditional culture to the European-inspired setting of Sunset Town.

With its unique range of tourism products and continuously invested iconic landmarks, Sunset Town is becoming one of the top tourist attractions on Phu Quoc Island.

The stage of the "Vietnamese Puppet Show - Spring Festival" recreates the water pavilion of Thầy Pagoda - a unique architectural and artistic relic from the Lý Dynasty, creating a highlight amidst the modern and poetic landscape of Hoàng Hôn town.

Water puppetry differs from traditional puppetry in that it uses the water surface as a stage (called a puppet house or water pavilion), with a backdrop (called a screen) behind it. The stage is decorated with flags, fans, canopies, and ceremonial arches. On the stage are puppets (made of wood) that perform, controlled by people behind the backdrop using a system of poles and strings. Water puppetry performances are also incomplete without the sounds of drums and firecrackers as supporting elements.