Best bets

National Opera Production Rusalka

Date: May 21-22 - 7:30 pm

Venue: National Center for the Performing Arts

Price: 100-880 yuan

Acclaimed for his spectacular scenery sets as well as for his special way to use the lights, Hugo de Ana is a regular guest at world's most prestigious opera houses. His career started as Technical Director and Executive Producer at the Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, staging operas such as Turandot, Werther, Don Carlo, Cavalleria Rusticana, Pagliacci, Medea and The Rake's Progress.

Philippe Bizot - 40 Years of Silence in Beijing

Date: May 21-29 - 7:30 pm

Venue: Penghao Theater

Price: 80-600 yuan

According to French mime artist Philippe Bizot, "The play is life, so you don't act." Chen Yingqun finds out more about the universal language of saying nothing. Philippe Bizot doesn't say a word on stage and yet, using exaggerated facial expressions and body movements, he expresses himself perfectly. "Silence is my language, my music, and my song," the 58-year-old French mime artist says. "The art of pantomime is a universal language, the language of emotion." The renewed version of 40 Years of Silence consists of 13 short stories as a retrospective of Bizot's 40 year career as a mine.