The popular opera, Turandot, directed by globally renowned Yimou Zhang which was once performed in Bird's Nest in Beijing will premiere in Taichung Intercontinental Baseball Stadium. Jason Hu, the Mayor of Taichung City, attended the press conference on March 10. He dressed up as the character of Turandot’s sister (Tur-hwa-dot) and surprised the press. He requested Mr. Chang Yun-chih, the Chairman of the show organizer BROS, to offer a 10% discount for the citizens of Taichung City. Chang promised to grant the mayor’s request.

Turandot will be performed on March 27 and 28 in Taichung Intercontinental Baseball Stadium. The ticket agency held a press conference and invited Hau Lung-pin (Mayor of Taipei City), Jason Hu (Mayor of Taichung City), Sisy Chen (popular writer) and Sun Tsui-feng (popular actress) act out a drama during the conference. Hou played “the father of Princess Turandot”, Sisy Chen was “Princess Turandot”, Sun was “Prince Calaf” and Hu was a fake figure��"“Tur-hwa-dot”.

Hu dressed up in the glamour costume custom made by the Zhang team and wore make- up with cherry red lips. He used his sleeve to partially hide his face when stepping on the stage and aroused the curiosity of the audience. After he revealed his face, all of the photographers started to shoot. Douglas Hsu (Chairman of Far Eastern Group) gave Hu two thumbs up for his beautiful make up.

In the drama, the Emperor (played by Hou) asked Prince Calaf to ask 3 riddles. He told the Prince that even if he solved the riddles, nevertheless, the Prince would not be allowed to marry Princess Turandot because he had to marry “Tur-hwa-dot” first. And “Tur-hwa-dot” told the Emperor that she had met the Prince last night and built a very close relationship. The drama was very fun and kept all of the audience laughing.

The Emperor asked the Prince 3 questions. The first question was “Who is the director of Turandot?” Sun (as Prince Calaf) answered “Zhang Yi-mou”. The second question was “The opera will be performed in which venue?”. Sun replied “Taichung City”, which was also Tur-hwa-dot’s residence. The 3rd question was “Who is the most beautiful woman in the world?” Prince Calaf said that the answer was very difficult. He wanted to answer “Turandot” but he was afraid of this would make Tur-hwa-dot upset. If he answered “Tur-hwa-dot”, this would make himself a liar. This made the audience laugh again.

Following the drama, the guests hit the gong to launch the ticket sales of this opera. Jason Hu requested offering a 10% discount as goodwill for Taichung City citizens. Chang Yun-zhih, Chairman of BROS, echoed Hu’s request and promised that Taichung City citizens would get a 10% discount for tickets to “Turandot” in the ERA ticket box situated on 17 F of No.337, Daya Road in Taichung City.

According to the show organizer, “Turandot” premiered in National Stadium, the main stadium of the 2004 Summer Olympics (aka Bird’s Nest) in Beijing. The opera was very spectacular and popular. Now, in Taiwan, it will create another new record. It will be the most spectacular opera show across the straits. In addition to the same main cast and production team, the orchestras will increase from 2 to 3 and there will be 240 choir singers (in Beijing, there were only 160). The total number of members of the team will increase from 600 to almost 1000. The director Yi-mou Zhang said the opera will be even better than the “Bird’s Nest version”. He invited the local audience to visit Taichung and watch the show produced by his international team members.