Tuồng play «Hòn Vọng Phu» (The Rock of the Waiting Wife)

   In central Da Nang the city's tuồng theatre stages the classic tale of a wife who waited for her husband with a child in her arms until she turned to stone. The Hòn Vọng Phu legend — the Rock of the Waiting Wife — is known across Vietnam from the cliffs that carry its name.

   Tuồng is the oldest of the country's stage forms: painted mask-faces instead of realistic make-up, codified gesture instead of scenery, and the chầu drum driving the action. There is almost no set — everything rests on the performer's body and voice.

   The essentials:

• — Performed by the Da Nang Traditional Art Theatre, also known as the Nguyễn Hiển Dĩnh tuồng theatre
• — A full staging of the classic play, not a shortened highlights programme
• — An evening performance at the theatre building in Hải Châu

   This is for travellers who want traditional theatre the way it is played for a local audience rather than the thirty-minute hotel version, and for families with older relatives who grew up on these stories.

   The theatre's schedule lists the ticket price for this performance as zero, but the site carries no separate confirmation that entry is free — worth checking with the box office before you go.

   The performance is in Vietnamese in the old tuồng singing style; much of the story still reads through gesture, mask and music.

   Full-length classical tuồng comes around only a few times a season, which makes this evening worth planning around.