Bond: Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice in Taiwan
Iris Hsin-chun Tuan

Abstract
Bond, the theatre production performed in the style of Yu opera (yuju 豫劇), is an adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice in Taiwan. Advertised as Yu-Shakespeare opera, the adaptation of Bond, beyond time and space, sets the background in the Sung Dynasty in China. This production adds classical Chinese poetry and the cultural, social and political local context in Taiwan to represent the intercultural performance to explore the issues of politics, class, religion and race. This paper compares the script of Bond with Shakespeare’s original play, offers a performance review and interprets its significance from the perspective of Interculturalism. Following Bakhtin’s concept of “heteroglossia,” I argue that it is questionable to classify The Merchant of Venice as a comedy from the Jew Shylock’s situation. This intercultural adaptation production imbues with woman’s wit, gay homosexual implications, and deconstruction manifested in this performing art fusion of East and West.

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