Having staged several absurd plays and classics, Beijing People's Art Theatre is now returning to real social life. Officer Catching the Thief, (Guanbing Na Zei), is an original play written by three dramatists--Yu Yue, Zhang XiaoGuo, Li ChunXi-- all of them staff of the Chinese Theatre Association.

Officer Catching the Thief is the name of a game that children used to play in the hutongs (alleys) of Beijing in the past. It suits the play, which tells a serious story in a light way. The story starts when the safe of a state-owned company was broken into and a large amount of banknotes were stolen. In the course of looking for the thief, an unexpected corruption case was disclosed -- the manager of the state-owned company abuse his power and earned himself millions of illegal moneys by selling sophisticated machines to private companies at extremely low prices.

Officer Catching the Thief is directed by Ren Ming, who has just directed the acclaimed play Waiting for Godot. The play stars Tan ZongYao, one of the leading actors in China.

Time: 7:15pm everyday until the end of May

Place: Capital Theatre, No22, Wang Fu Jing Da Jie. For tickets call: 86 010 65249847, 65250996

--By Wang Ling
China Correspondent