W!LD Rice

W!LD RICE was founded in 2000 by Ivan Heng, an internationally acclaimed and award-winning theatre practitioner, and is recognised today as one of Singapore’s leading professional theatre companies.

Our mission is to provide an open forum for the shared experience of theatre; celebrating our diversity, reflecting on the problems and possibilities of our times, and presenting productions that inspire, challenge and entertain.

A commitment to the highest standards informs every aspect of W!LD RICE’s creative work, which is first and foremost a celebration of Singapore theatrical talent. By producing and touring productions that are distinctively local in flavour and yet universal in vision and concerns, the company creates memorable experiences for audiences in Singapore and the world.

The company’s exciting and varied programming for the main stage includes:
•• New and original works.
•• New productions of the Singapore repertoire.
•• New interpretations of the World’s Classics.

The company’s mission to build a theatre culture also extends to the wider community through the following divisions:

•• FIRST STAGE!, a project which nurtures young talents from 5 - 12.
•• young & W!LD, which identifies and develops Singapore’s young theatre professionals.

W!LD RICE is committed to touring its shows internationally to raise the profile of Singapore theatre, to create an international awareness of its unique productions, and to engage its artists and collaborators in creative dialogues with the international arts community. Its distinctively Singaporean productions have won great acclaim at major international arts festivals in Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Malaysia, New Zealand and Russia.

In August 2006, W!LD RICE presented the inaugural SINGAPORE THEATRE FESTIVAL, a biennial new writing festival committed to developing, presenting and promoting Singapore theatre. Renamed the OCBC SINGAPORE THEATRE FESTIVAL in 2008 and MAN SINGAPORE THEATRE FESTIVAL in 2011, this festival has, to date, produced 22 World Premieres of new Singapore writing, and has been hailed as “the main event in the world of the arts” (SPH The Straits Times, 2006), and the “Blockbuster Event of the Year” (TODAY, 2008).
W!LD RICE is a not-for-profit Singapore Registered Charity, (Institution of a Public Character No. 000122). It is a recipient of the National Arts Council's Major Grant for the period from 1 April 2013 to 31 March 2016.