A play performed by an android and human actors will be presented for the first time in Viet Nam on August 31.— Photo kansaiscene.com

HA NOI (VNS)— A play performed by an android and human actors will be presented for the first time in Viet Nam on August 31.

The 30-minute play, Sayonara (Good-bye) will be performed by human actors and Geminoid F, a humanoid robot that looks exactly like the woman who it was modelled after. The robot was developed in 2010 by world-renowned robotics specialist Professor Hiroshi Ishiguro of Osaka University.

Internationally acclaimed playwright and director Oriza Hirata of the Seinendan Theatre Company, has been collaborating with Prof Ishiguro in their Android-Human Theatre projects since 2007. Their past plays, in which human actors share the stage with robots, have been groundbreaking in the arts and sciences.

The Sayonara play depicts a scene in which a humanoid-robot recites Japanese, French and German poems to her dying young master. In the latest version of the play, however, playwright Hirata adds a short episode after the young master's death.

After losing her master, the humanoid-robot is assigned a new task of mourning for the deceased at the place where humans cannot enter. Through the play, its authors want to send a message: "What do life and death mean to humans and robots?"

The play will be presented at 10am, 3pm and 8pm on August 31 at the Cong Nhan (Workers) Theatre, 42 Trang Tien Street, Ha Noi, followed by Hirata's talk on Android-Human Theatre projects.

Free tickets are available from the Japan Foundation Centre for Cultural Exchange in Viet Nam, 27 Quang Trung Street, Ha Noi. — VNS