CUHK and CUHK-Shenzhen Co-Present My Love in Poly Theatre
My Love, a theatrical production scripted and projected by Dr. Leung Fung-yee, Anita，CUHK Council Member and alumna, , who also starred in the play, staged its concluding performances in Shenzhen Poly Theatre from April 18th to 20th to celebrate the 55th anniversary of The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) and the 5th anniversary of The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen (CUHK-Shenzhen). As the terminal stop of its global tour, the show in Shenzhen was jointly planned by the alumni associations of the two Universities to deepen the cooperation and integration in higher education across the cities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.
In this play of romance featuring Hong Kong’s financial industry in the previous century, CUHK and CUHK-Shenzhen's alumni, special guests such as Beifang Dai, Shenzhen Municipal CPPCC Chairman, and Jiahua Qiao, Deputy Director of the Standing Committee of Shenzhen Municipal People's Congress, as well as CUHK-Shenzhen faculty, students and parents relived the vicissitudes of Hong Kong's history and felt the early pioneers’ patriotism.
Previously, My Love World Tour made its debut in Hong Kong with three performances in August 2018, followed by one performance in Vancouver, Canada in October 2018, and another four in Beijing in March 2019. Shenzhen marks the last stop of the global tour with three consecutive performances presented from April 18 to 20, 2019. As a charity show, My Love has raised a total of over HK$150 million, all of which will be devoted to the teaching and research development, college activities and educational programmess on Chinese culture of the University.
Professor Yangsheng Xu, President of The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen expressed in an interview: “CUHK is of great humanistic spirit. The many difficulties encountered during the University’s founding phase established a strong link between the University and its faculty and students. My Love has drawn together more than 100 alumni from all over the world. CUHK-Shenzhen inherits the mission of CUHK to combine tradition with modernity, and to bring together the East and the West. This year, CUHK-Shenzhen has launched the University Art Centre to enhance the artistic atmosphere on campus. Our students have also founded several theatrical troupes which the University strongly supports in hope to carry on the artistic traditions of CUHK. CUHK-Shenzhen emphasizes the integration of arts and sciences as we believe that the extent and scope of one’s success is largely determined by one’s literary nourishment, worldview, and humanistic spirit. Without humanistic spirit, intellectual attainment alone does not suffice to take one from merit higher up to excellence. An individual shall enjoy an inexhaustible driving force only when education equips one with passion, aspiration, and dreams.
The story of My Love spans across the development of CUHK from the 1950s to 2003 and the transformation of Hong Kong during different historical periods, such as the Asian Financial Crisis in 1997, illustrating the University motto – “Through Learning and Temperance to Virtue”.
It is reported that Dr. Leung Fung-yee, the playwright of My Love and a world's leading financial fiction writer, stars as a heroine of her own dramas for the first time in this remarkable performance. The whole show is cast by the administrators, faculty, and alumni of CUHK and CUHK-Shenzhen. Dr. Leung Nai-pang, Norman, Chairman of CUHK Council, CUHK President Prof. Rocky S. Tuan, Former CUHK President Prof. Joseph J. Y. Sung and CUHK-Shenzhen President Prof. Yangsheng Xu, all participate in the event by singing the theme song Through Learning and Temperance to Virtue. The starry casting of My Love does surprise the audience with a vivid rendition of the humanistic spirit and the history of Hong Kong.
Apart from the renowned financial fiction writer Dr. Leung, who played the heroine, senior administrators, faculty members and alumni from both CUHK and CUHK-Shenzhen participated in this performance, including Dr. Nai-pang Leung, Chairman of CUHK Council, Prof. Rocky S. Tuan, President of CUHK, and Prof. Yangsheng Xu, President of CUHK-Shenzhen. They joined their voices in the theme song Through Learning and Temperance to Virtue at the end of the play to a heart-thrilling effect, capturing a historical moment of humanistic spirit.
