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Creative & Production Teams
DR. VICKI OOI Director & Adaptor Dr. Ooi began teaching Theatre and English in the English Department of The University of Hong Kong in 1971 and retired after almost 30 years there. She was instrumental in founding the Drama Lab at HKU where many generations of Hong Kong directors and actors were nurtured. A well-known theatre director in Hong Kong for over 20 years, Dr. Ooi was one of the earliest directors to introduce western plays in translation on the Hong Kong stage. She has directed many plays for her own company, Seals Players Foundation, as well as guest directed for theatre companies in and outside of Hong Kong. She has won theatre awards, has served on the Hong Kong Arts Development Council and has published widely on theatre and cultural policy research. In 1992, she founded the Hong Kong chapter of the International Association of Theatre Critics, whose mother body is UNESCO. This society is still on going. After retirement, she was invited to be part time consultant for the Primary Schools English Development Pilot project on Net Teachers Scheme for Primary School in 2000 to 2002. Whilst working there, Dr. Ooi was invited to apply her experience in writing a resource package called Let’s Experience and Appreciate Drama (LEAD). It was produced by the English Section, Curriculum Development Institute of the Education Department to provide teachers with some effective strategies, activities and exemplars on how to use drama effectively in the learning and teaching of English at primary level. In 2008-2010, she was also instrumental in developing the curriculum for English language teaching and learning through drama for SCOLAR’s Drama Alliance programme. Partnering the British Council, a Teacher’s Manual was created to teach over 200 teachers in 51 primary schools. In 2010-11, SCOLAR once again appointed Dr. Ooi as the curriculum planner for its English Alliance- Stories Alive (Readers’ Theatre) Programme, which aims to enhance teachers’ skills and techniques in using Readers’ Theatre to teach English at primary level. For 2012, alongside the S4A team, she has created a host of projects across different art forms for SCOLAR’s English is Everywhere programme. In 2003, Dr. Ooi established Shakespeare4All® Ltd. (S4A), a charity that works with local students on their English fluency and in the building of self confidence through adapted Shakespearean plays. She created a ground breaking event in association with The Globe Theatre in London to run a Learning and Participation Festival for S4A in May 2012, the first ever Shakespearean drama showcase & learning competition for local schools. Under her leadership, S4A has also been awarded The Springboard Grant awarded by the Home Affairs Bureau in 2012. Since December 2008, under the LCSD’s Venue Partnership Scheme at the Sai Wan Ho Civic Centre, Dr. Ooi, as Artistic Director under the name of The Absolutely Fabulous Theatre Connection (AFTEC), directed professional actors in the AFTEC English Learning & Participation The Jockey Club “From Page to StageTM” Programme. This programme has won a major 3-year support from The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust, and Dr. Ooi will be directing an adaptation of John Buchan’s The 39 Steps in March 2014. In addition she is nurturing a youth theatre in Chinese as part of AFTEC’s bilingual philosophy. Since April 2009, she is the Course Leader for the very new and unique Postgraduate Diploma in Integrated Arts programme at HKU SPACE. This programme will be extended to a Masters degree in the near future. In 2008, she was appointed as the University Artist in Drama by The University of Hong Kong. In July of 2009, Dr. Ooi was invited to collaborate with the internationally acclaimed dramatist, David Henry Hwang, in rehearsed play readings as the Opening Celebrations of its 2009 Summer Institute in the Arts and Humanities in Loke Yew Hall. Dr. Ooi was recently invited to give a presentation in the Shakespeare strand of the Worlds Together arts education conference organized by the Tate, British Museum and the Royal Shakespeare Company in London in September 2012 where she will speak on “Glo-calisation: A Decade of Drama in Shakespeare4All”.