ECA2 provides multimedia spectacle to Sun Group’s Sunset Town on the shores of Phu Quoc island
by Joe Kleiman
On the southern edge of Vietnam’s Phu Quoc island sits the Sunset Town inspired by Italian culture and landscape, an amalgamation of highlights from throughout the European nation – a clocktower reminiscent of the one in St. Mark’s Square of Venice, the ruins of Pompeii, and an erupting fountain resembling Mt. Vesuvius. In the center sits a replica of the famous Roman Colosseum, which doubles as the station for the world’s longest triple cable gondola, conveying guests to an adjacent island with a waterpark and wooden roller coaster.
“We built Sunset Town here,” says Sean LE, Head of Business Development of Sun Group, which developed the residential, resort, retail and dining destination, “because the climate is very similar here to the Mediterranean. Our chairman fell in love with the coastal Italian towns on his visit. When he saw that, he came back to Vietnam and visited the island and thought, ‘This is it. This would be a good place to do something like this, to bring the outside world to Vietnam.’”
The Kiss Bridge
The romance of Italy is prevalent throughout Sunset Town, most noticeably with the Kiss Bridge, which encircles Sunset Town’s bay. Designed by Italian architect Marco Casamonti, the central portion of the bridge abruptly ends in two termini intended to resemble the finger of God bringing life by touching Adam’s finger in Michelangelo’s famous Sistine Chapel fresco. Across a 30-centimeter gap at the bridge’s center, lovers can reach out to each other and kiss. Once a year, on January 1, the sun sets perfectly within the two separated central portions of the bridge.
To tell the story of the Kiss Bridge, Sun World, Sun Group’s entertainment division, employed the services of ECA2, a Paris-based designer of nighttime spectacles and events. The company is famous for its global events, such as the Millennium Celebration at the Eiffel Tower, the annual New Year’s Eve celebrations at Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, Nigeria’s Centenary Celebration, and National Day Celebration in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. ECA2 has also developed a number of prominent nighttime spectacles, primarily throughout Asia, including Wings of Time (Sentosa Island, Singapore), The Big-O Show (originally created for Expo 2012 Yeosu in South Korea), and recently, The Legend of Pangu (Lanzhou, China). The company’s experience in a variety of international tourist markets made it an ideal partner for Sun Group in developing a centerpiece show for Sunset Town.
The massive set consists of four pools of seawater with three monumental arches, containing lighting, sound, and water elements, towering overhead. Each of these arches represents a portal connecting Earth to other worlds. The main arch is 30 meters high and 65 meters wide, with the two rear arches being slightly smaller to fit within sightlines. The architecture of the set is so massive that it can be seen for miles around and fits perfectly within the Italian theme of Sunset Town. Guests watch the 30-minute show, which runs nightly, within a 5,000- seat amphitheater, the largest ever for a permanent spectacle from ECA2. “Every seat is going to give a different experience,” shares Jean-Christophe Canizares, the company’s Chairman and CEO. “In the middle, you’ll see the center of the set perfectly, with much action happening through your peripheral view. At the front, you’re close to the actors and the show becomes more personal. At the back you can also see action taking place farther back and on the top of the portals. And it also matters if you sit in the middle, left or right, because those result in different experiences too.”
A Universal Story
Over the eight-year course of development of the show, called Kiss of the Sea, the storyline changed multiple times, ultimately settling on a tale of love traversing time and space. The Kiss Bridge’s architecture is reminiscent of a flock of birds, an element of the traditional Vietnamese tale, two celestial lovers banished by an angry god to opposite sides of the universe, only to reunite once a year when the birds flocked together to create a bridge in the heavens. Kiss of the Sea is based on this tale, but gives it a modern science fiction twist and a much more universal feel. It centers around five main characters – an Earth boy and his Phu Quoc dog, a girl from the center of the galaxy, accompanied by her sidekick space dugong, and an evil villain intent on destroying all he encounters.
Charline Munnier, artistic director on the show, shares that “many different components of the production helped to inform story development. ECA2 designed a huge arch to represent a black hole, so I built a story around this architectural element, which I thought of more as a vortex. Each part of the story had to reflect the links between here and the other side of the galaxy. And each of the characters had to link symbolically to a natural element – for example, our villain is connected to fire – which ties into various special effects in the show.”
In addition to catering to Vietnamese travelers, Phu Quoc has become an international destination for visitors from Korea, Japan, China, and Europe, primarily Russia. Gabrielle Chuyu Tan, Head of Creative Direction for Sun Group points out, “There are Vietnamese stylings in the show, but we also want the show to have an international flavor. For instance, the figures in the show are designed in the style of shadow puppets, paying tribute to Vietnamese shadow puppetry, but it has also taken inspiration from great modern French animation films. The young man, who is the main character in the show, is introduced wearing a Vietnamese conical hat, but that is soon lost to reveal his modern hair style. He’s on a beach, but it could be a beach anywhere. He has a dog, because dogs are common in Phu Quoc, but dogs are also everywhere else in the world. And the girl’s sidekick is a dugong, which can be seen around Phu Quoc and Vietnam, but dugongs are also found in many of the world’s oceans.”
Kiss of the Sea is the second permanent ECA2 production to employ an extensive live cast, following The Fountain of Dreams in Wuyishan, China. In Phu Quoc, over fifty dancers and acrobats from around the world help bring the show to life. While the show had its grand opening on January 20, 2024, its soft opening took place almost a year earlier, with a purely technical version of the show. According to Emmanuelle Charotte, VP business development for ECA2, “We made some minor changes to the animation for the permanent version of the show, to slow down the pace at points and take into account that we now had live performances as part of the canvas.”
A Hidden Fortress
The show extends to the edge of the architecture, as water falls off the edges of the raised set, giving the impression of waterfalls cascading off an island. Beneath the entrance hall, grandstand, and set are a series of corridors and support facilities, including pump rooms, control racks, dressing rooms, and an extensive studio for the dancers and acrobats to rehearse and work out. Above them, the main set consists of a stage with trampolines. Dancers enter and exit through panels that open at the base of the first arch, or portal. Above those panels are the loudspeakers for the show, built on scaffolding within each side of the portal structure itself.
Julie Cugurno, ECA2’s director of operations, shares, “Working on international projects, we have to take a lot into consideration. We have to look at it from a cultural and artistic point of view, we have to work closely with the client to ensure we’re true to the culture and their vision. Then of course, there’s the technical part, where we try to source as many elements as possible locally, which meant that we sourced as much as we could from Vietnam, but even those materials and items needed to be shipped because Phu Quoc is an island. We wanted to be energy efficient and as sustainable as possible, so we use seawater instead of using the potable water from the island’s municipal supply.”
The venue features two projection rooms. The first is located above the grandstand, where eleven Barco UDM 4K projectors are mounted at various angles to map onto the portal structures and water jets spraying above the portals. The second is in the rear of the set, behind the third portal and is used to project onto water curtains.
“The main screen is the largest cascade screen® ever constructed, measuring over 1,000 square meters,” says Aurélien Bouvier, ECA2’s technical director. In one pivotal scene, the show’s villain reaches out from the main portal, with part of his image projected from the rear of the set on the cascade screen and his hands grasping the portal, projected from above the grandstand, with the two images perfectly blended.
Adjacent to the grandstand projection room is the control room with the primary racks and control system, developed in-house by ECA2 and built upon Medialon show control technology. According to the integrators, who trained the local permanent crew on operation, this system allows for quick alterations should something need to be changed last minute. The variability allows for changes in lighting cues should a performance not involve the full cast. It also allows for individual effects, such as fire or lasers to be removed from a showing, with the remaining effects continuing as programmed.
Beneath the portals lie a stage and a catwalk linking the two sides of the main arch. Water levels can be adjusted to submerge the catwalk when desired. The set is versatile and was designed to also function as a multipurpose venue. Fountains, cascade screens, projections, and lighting are all available to enhance other types of presentations. The facility has already hosted a fashion show and a Bollywood-themed wedding.
Elements
During Kiss of the Sea, a myriad of effects take place supplementing the projected images and live performers, including fire bursts, lasers, and giant dancing water jets above the portals, which become an extension of the screen during parts of the show.
“We like to approach our shows from a different perspective,” says Canizares. “When we add a special element to a show, it is in support of the story. Fire is not here just to be fire, or an explosion. Instead, it shows that something menacing is coming or it represents the anger of the bad guy. We also like to use effects in unusual ways. Sometimes we will activate a fountain without lighting in order to have the spray linger in the air as an additional element that helps build the story and complements other effects in the show.”
Naturally, water plays a central role in the show. The decision was made to use natural seawater, which is piped in from the adjacent Gulf of Thailand, as a sustainable alternative to fresh water, which requires consistent filtration and treatment.
The intake pipe is laid in a fixed position above the seabed to ensure sand and other ocean floor elements are prevented from entering the show’s water system, where they could cause damage to the equipment and even the performers. The set, costumes, and fixtures were all designed with saltwater in mind and the performers wear special makeup imported from France that is resistant to seawater. Each of the show’s four pools can easily be emptied or refilled within 20 minutes.
The grand finale of the show brings all the performers on stage with all effects at full impact. The villain is banished, the dog and the dugong who valiantly fought him together become friends for life, and the boy meets the girl from the other side of the galaxy on the Kiss Bridge, where they kiss for the first time across the bridge’s central gap.
The development of the show employed over 300 members of the ECA2 and Sun Group teams. “There were different artistic and technical teams working together between the two companies,” shares Cugurno. “Sun Group also has a dedicated creative team that we worked closely with during the development stage, long before on-site production began.”
“This production is all about love,” says Sun Group’s Gabrielle Chuyu Tan. “The boy and the girl are in love, the animals are in love, couples are in love on the Kiss Bridge. Sunset Town is about love. And this show has been a tremendous and fulfilling labor of love.” •
