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Lee Wing-Sze

Mathias Woo

ZUNI ICOSAHEDRON'S Mathias Woo Yan-wai is getting repetitive in the green room of the Hong Kong Art Centre's Shouson Theatre. 'Hong Kong is so strange, and it's getting more like a prison cell,' the writer-director says - again.

Woo presents  such bizarre, property market-related phenomena  in the theatre group's latest  comedy, Strange Strange Hong Kong Series 1: The Agent.

It's about a real-estate agent couple (Carson Chung Ka-shing and Tanya Chan) looking for a place in Hong Kong - and in the process it reflects Hongkongers' values and concepts about property.

The production is another comedy series from Zuni, after the political satire East Wing, West Wing, which was first staged in 2003,  with the collaboration of theatre artist Edward Lam Yick-wah.

This time, Woo has  taken on all the  directing and scriptwriting   himself. He says he  chose property because it's such a major topic in Hong Kong.

'If you open a coffee shop in Taipei  or other places, the business concept is totally different from how you do it in Hong Kong - because Hong Kong's landlords can  raise the rent at anytime,' he says. 'People don't have any sense of  security in a lot of things, except property trading.' The 35-year-old architect-cum-artist  says people are becoming short-sighted  with Hong Kong's heavy  reliance on the property and stock markets.

'The  government always says Hong Kong is a knowledge-intensive economy,' Woo says. 'It's not true at all. The  system isn't about long-term development. It's no different to gambling. When people  establish a business, they expect to make big money in the first year.'

He  says the  government   is to blame. 'There are people  property trading in  Japan and Europe to earn fast money,' Woo says. 'But their governments have regulations to control the  property market.'

Building design and city planning in Hong Kong lag  those of other cities, and resources have been misused.

'As an international city, we don't even have a decent park,' Woo says. 'All parks in Hong Kong are fenced. It's not natural  or nice. They're just like shopping malls without covers.  Security staff are everywhere. It's so strange. It's just like a prison cell.'

Woo says schools, public housing estates,  Housing Ownership Scheme flats and even some luxury properties are built like jail cells, too.  'Lots of properties in West Kowloon are just like blockhouses. There's no community or neighbourhood. The problem is getting worse.'

And Woo says that many so-called  luxury properties in Hong Kong 'are architecturally insignificant'.

Woo, who was raised in  public housing, says the design of some of the old public housing estates, such as Lai Tak and Choi Hung,  are  better than the new ones because they  foster community.

'From an architectural  point of view, the standard of this government is really low,' he says. 'The buildings are expensive and ugly and not functional at all.'  By contrast, in other high-density cities such as Tokyo, the houses and city planning are more humane.

'The streets of Hong Kong in the old days were really organic,' Woo says. 'The structure grew like a tree. There were  lots of exchanges and connections [in  the community].'

Woo says Hong Kong should be  a good place for architects to  innovative ideas. 'But Hong Kong has never given them a chance  and Hong Kong architects have never strived for the chance. We just end up being the tools of the developers and the government.'

Having watched Hong Kong's evolution over the past decade, the out-spoken director wants to show these changes in the drama.

'In the old days, there weren't so many restrictions in Hong Kong and people wouldn't talk about  economic efficiency all the time,' Woo says. 'We might  not have been so well-off, but we had more space and were happier.'

Strange Strange Hong Kong Series 1: The Agent, today, Oct 16, Oct 23, Oct 30, 5pm; Oct 11-15,  Oct 18-22, Oct 27-29, 8pm (no shows on Mondays), Shouson Theatre, Hong Kong Arts Centre,   $119, $199.  Inquiries: 2566 9696. Ends Oct 24



Hell of a plot