The first Beijing International Drama Season will be held from Sept. 27 to Oct. 14, according to a press conference held  Friday.

Foreign dramas, including Aida, Romeo and Juliet, MacBeth and River Dance, as well as some traditional Chinese dramas will be on show, said the organizers at the conference.

The drama season is co-sponsored by the Ministry of Culture, the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, and the municipal government of Beijing.

More than 50 performances of pantomimes, melodramas, puppet shows and traditional Beijing Operas, Kunqu Operas and Shaoxing Operas will be staged during the 18-day drama season.

Audiences will have the chance to enjoy the charms of modern and ancient and foreign and traditional Chinese dramas, organizers claimed.

Chinese artistic troupes, along with artists from Ireland, Australia, the Republic of Korea and Vietnam, will showcase their skills during the drama season.

(Xinhua News Agency August 16, 2003)