Huang Lei [Photo provided to China Daily]

Audiences are likely to bump into them while wandering around the town.

The festival's slogan－"Beyond the real, all of Wuzhen is a stage"－means that the organizers want to create "dreamy and surreal experiences" with the festival.

"In the small town, you just dream," says Huang, 45, who graduated from the Beijing Film Academy and has been teaching there since 1997.

A detailed program of the international performing-arts groups has not been unveiled. But Huang says audiences can see more avant-garde productions than in the past three years.

At the annual competition of young talent, the festival will give more opportunities to participants by increasing the candidates from 12 to 18 this year.

The festival's Small Town Award, which includes prizes of up to 200,000 yuan, will be open to first-time participants younger than 35.

Entries are 40-minute plays on themes such as "a drop of blood", "a suitcase" and "a shooting star".

According to Huang, the works will be judged by a group of veteran directors, actors and critics, including scriptwriter Liu Heng and actress Xi Meijuan.

"We are proud of turning our crazy thoughts into reality. You won't be bored during the festival," says Meng, 52, a heavyweight figure on China's theater scene with such trademark works as Amber and Rhinoceros in Love.

Lai, whose eight-hour epic, A Dream Like a Dream, opened the festival in its first year, says that, as an art form in China, theater mostly appeals to young and well-educated urbanites.

"Usually you watch a play at night, after that you go back home and go to work the next morning. Your thoughts about the play have been interrupted. But in Wuzhen, you have the luxury to focus on your thoughts and emotions. It's an amazing thing, isn't it?" says Lai.