On the outskirts of Chengdu, a traditional Sichuan opera troupe faces extinction. With their theatre scheduled for demolition, a wave of progress seems poised to wash them away. Fearful of losing her niece (Gan Guidan) to the opportunities presented by the city, their manager (Zhao Xiaoli) searches for a new theatre. But as she finds herself embroiled in the bureaucracy that comes part and parcel with doing business – or performing art – in China, she notices that the more fantastical elements of their opera have started to manifest in mundane reality…