The high-tech entrepreneur, who's quickly rising to fame and fortune, and a movie star (played by Yang Xue), whose career is in decline, court each other for different reasons.

The writer should be able to work alongside with the cast through the creative process, sometimes to argue with the director about his intentions and to achieve the best results, he believes.

"Fortunately for me, as both the playwright and director, the argument happens mostly in my head," Zhou says.

A first-time play director, Zhou is bold to experiment with new ideas, borrowing from opera quartet and sprinkling in references to Shakespeare. While he's confident about the story and narrative, he's not sure about the rhythm and tone onstage.

"Mr Lai agreed to be my artistic director, and helped me to work out some key parts," Zhou says.

Lai and his Performance Workshop have been an important force in contemporary Chinese theater in Taiwan since the 1980s. Magnificent is his mainland production partner that has produced all his plays since 2007.

The play's June premiere sold out in Beijing and has since started its China tour.

Four actors play eight roles onstage: man and wife, the actress and director, the housemaid and the bartender, and the student in the United States and his girlfriend in China. They chase, seduce, blackmail and love one another, forming a full circle of interpersonal relations.

Sex parties, blackmail with nude photographs and celebrities seeking spiritual guidance from the so-called guru - Zhou wrote the play about phenomena that he observed during decades of living in the US and later found the same things happening in China.