Wing Chun review – kung fu master gets the cinematic treatment in a spectacular show

Sadler’s Wells, London
Yip Man, who taught Bruce Lee, is the inspiration for this series of awesomely executed showdowns and acrobatics

History may be about the past but it speaks to the present. Real figures become mythologised, and legends are made and remade to find their audience – perhaps nowhere more than in the realm of cinema. So it is a deft manoeuvre on the part of this stage production based on the real-life figure of Yip Man – grandmaster of the wing chun style of kung fu, teacher of Bruce Lee, and already the nominal subject of a four-part film franchise and several spin-offs – to tell his story as if it were already a movie. In short, the Man is now even more the Myth.

Shenzhen Opera and Dance Theatre’s spectacular Wing Chun follows a dual narrative, pitching between a 1990s film crew who are making a movie about Yip Man, and the man himself following his arrival in Hong Kong from south China in the 1950s. That sounds head-scratching – real-life performers playing movie-makers making movies about real-life people played by performers. But fear not: all questions are swept away by smart staging, sleek designs, awesome revolving sets, tricks of the light, a pulse-quickening soundtrack, uplifting storytainment, and above all exceptional dance, acrobatics and martial arts.

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