Creating a performance for a small space can be challenging and exciting. The play 10x4≠40, with its inventive staging, attempts to create new connections to urban Taiwan life by bringing the audience literally into the action, intermittently inviting them onstage into the show’s Plain Soup Noodles (Yang Chun Mian) shop as customers.
The device works, but as not as well as it could. Some cast members were part of the audience, and so they created conversation with Mr. Chen, the shop’s owner, as well as with other “customers”. Because of this, there were too many conversations happening at the same time, so I felt like I was missing important plot information. Being so close to Mr. Chen, however, created a stronger bond between the audience and his character, particularly because the actor playing Mr. Chen seemed so comfortable chatting up all of his customers, cast and audience alike (well, he didn’t chat me up – but facing the challenge of improvising a conversation with an unknown linguistic entity like me would be daunting for many actors.)
Indeed, Mr. Chen’s performance with the audience was the strong point of the show.
My biggest problem with this play, however, is consistency. The world that T-star theater created in this noodle shop is interesting, but it doesn't follow its own rules. We were given real tea and real snacks to eat, but our noodle bowls were empty and the disposable chopsticks we were given were left unopened. The shop (and show) had a very local Taiwan flavor, but the theme music was western chamber music. Mr. Chen was very relatable to us all, but he also spent much of his time on stage speaking monologues to an unknown subject. Overall, the show seemed unable to keep the focus on expressing its theme of the stories behind urban masks.
This theater company has interesting ideas, now it needs to start doing the work to make those ideas into high-quality and focused performances.
其它意見：T-star theater seems to be made up mostly of college-aged men. They've got spirit and energy, but I suggest that they talk to more mentors that can offer suggestions from life experience for both the story and performance of this piece.
I would have loved to see a woman or two in the cast, particularly since they played an important part in Mr. Chen's story.
Also, some small theatre behaviors, such as not allowing backstage crew to appear to the audience while the show is going on, help to raise the show's quality level quickly and fairly easily. If curtains had been hung above both of the doors, the crew would have been much better hidden, and it would have looked like much more like a small noodle shop.
演出場地：小小幸福