Bumper crop of Singapore acts travelling to festivals and fringes abroad despite rising costs

SINGAPORE – From a dance piece inspired by a 1911 Malay manuscript on sexuality to an examination of South-east Asia’s relationship with South Korea, a bumper crop of Singapore acts are travelling the world in the coming months.

Singapore performers have been resourceful in leveraging their networks to gain international exposure, despite rising costs of touring and the drying up of funding sources amid economic uncertainties.

During theatremaker and producer Shaifulbahri Mohamad’s six-week self-designed and self-financed residency in South Korea in 2025, he wrote the script for Noraebang Diplomacy and presented a showcase for South Korean theatre practitioners. The one-man show, which asks difficult questions about South Korea’s appetite for diversity, impressed a producer from the Seoul Marginal Theatre Festival who programmed its world premiere at the experimental festival in September 2026.

“It’s about trying to find my connection to the world, especially in these times when there are very divisive views that aren’t going away,” says Shaifulbahri, who is applying for grants from the National Arts Council (NAC) and hopes to tour the work to other South Korean cities in 2027. Although there is no artist’s fee, the economics still work out, as the festival covers venue, production and marketing costs, while box office revenue will be shared.

Berahi: Holy Unions, choreographed by Norhaizad Adam, will premiere at the newly opened East Kowloon Cultural Centre in Hong Kong as part of the #Danceless Complex Festival on June 13 and 14.

Commissioned by Hong Kong contemporary dance company Unlock Dancing Plaza, the work was developed in residency at Singapore choreography centre Dance Nucleus, independent dance centre Dancehouse Melbourne and the Esplanade. It is also supported by an NAC grant.

Norhaizad says the work, drawn from research on a progressive guide to intimacy and relationships by Khadijah Terung, “is an incredible opportunity to share early Malay-Muslim social history and movement practices with an international audience, and foster deeper intercultural awareness through a progressive aspect of our heritage”.

The show will be presented by Dance Nucleus at Goodman Arts Centre on June 27 and 28 as part of the cont.act dance festival in Singapore.

In Hong Kong from June 5 to 7, How Drama’s one-woman musical Big Brown Girl – an interactive show in which Ross Nasir tackles race and body image – will be presented at the Xiqu Centre as part of the inaugural WestK Cabaret Festival. The invitation came out of a conversation between West Kowloon Cultural District and show commissioner Esplanade.

Says Ross, who is hoping the taboo-breaking work will travel farther: “For me, touring the work is not just about presenting a finished product; it’s about listening, learning and seeing how the conversation changes in a different cultural context.”

Nine Years Theatre’s Mandarin meta-play Waiting For Audience, which won an award at The Straits Times Life Theatre Awards, is heading to the Festival Off Avignon from July 4 to 25.

Shaifulbahri, who has been producing shows internationally since 2016, says Singapore artists should look beyond the fringe set-up, where creatives bear 100 per cent of the cost, and find more opportunities to be invited. “A very important point I’ve been trying to make to a lot of independent artists is to see touring or international opportunities as a means of sustainability. We don’t often do that in Singapore, mainly because we don’t have a touring culture to begin with.”

Part of the gap, he says, is that the NAC’s internationalisation plans are geared towards institutions and major companies and less towards independent artists. He thinks artists should be exposed to a larger range of smaller-scale festivals and be supported in making those connections.

Participation at the world’s biggest arts festival, the Edinburgh Fringe, has been crucial for raising the profile of Singapore performers to international presenters.

Independent producer Lim Shien Hian, who led the first Singapore Spotlight at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2025, is leading a leaner effort to highlight Singapore artists in Edinburgh in August through talks, mixers and a one-day symposium.

“Going international is expensive and so we are focusing on a leaner programme, focusing on what is really of value to the artists at the festivals – opportunities, connections and, above all, community,” says Lim, who adds that costs have gone up by 20 per cent since the last edition.

The pool of funders has dwindled too, he says, and instead of the $70,000 the team raised in 2025, he is going in with a $15,000 budget in 2026 and still negotiating sponsorships. The team’s application for NAC grants was unsuccessful for the second time.

Singapore acts at Edinburgh include Apsaras Arts Dance Company’s Agathi – The Plight Of The Refugee, and Legendary, a solo musical about Chinese mythology and queer legacy by Cheeyang Ng, winner of the inaugural Campus Superstar. There are also three comedy shows – Sam See’s The Asian Comedy Showcase; Australia-based Ting Lim’s Asian, But Wrong; and UK-based Li Jin Hao’s Falling From A Moon.

Even if costs cannot be recouped, some artists who participated in the Fringe are already seeing payoffs in terms of commissions. A programmer who caught Singapore actress Jo Tan’s NAC-funded monologue Forked at Edinburgh in 2024 asked her to pitch for the Sydney Fringe Festival in 2025, where Tan staged King. In 2026, she was commissioned by the Sydney Fringe Festival for Happier Place, a rework of her dark comedy Happy Place. It is running from Sept 1 to 5, concurrent with another Singapore show, Pretty Ugly, by Theo Chen.

Lim, who is also producing both Sydney shows, says it is about creating a larger impact on the international circuit: “Because we did the Singapore Spotlight at Edinburgh in 2025, they are keen to explore a similar thing at Sydney Fringe – which is why there are two Singapore shows opening the season. It’s an informal season now, but there’s a chance to do it more formally in the future if things go well.”