It is vindication for the young man who was told there was barely a market for normal theatre, never mind a long-running musical.

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“Hong Kong needs two to three long-run shows if we want to expand the theatrical market,” says Chan. “We can’t rely on one-off productions.

“You have to make people think of going to the theatre as available entertainment in the evenings, like going to the movies, not something you have to plan and buy tickets months before because it’s only playing for a few nights. The show has to be waiting for you all year long.”

In the show’s theme song “I Have a Dream”, the students sing of their dreams of being a songwriter, a footballer and even a dating coach, before being told by their parents to be more pragmatic and study for their exams.

The show has resonated deeply with its young audiences, parents and teachers alike, earning high praise for Chan’s remarkable ability to portray the perspectives of all three demographics with equal thoughtfulness and maturity.

Our Journal of Springtime may just be the bridge that Hong Kong needs to connect the youth to the older generations.

“I love talking to people and discovering what they’re thinking, what their point of view is. We all have different experiences, so I step in and ask why,” says Chan. “Sometimes I see students who are not happy about being made to come to the show by their teachers but by the end, they are enjoying themselves.

“There are a lot of messages aimed at young people but you can’t beat them over the head; it has to be communicated in a subtle way.”

Veteran producer Lawrence Cheng Tan-shui, who first watched another of Chan’s musical productions, Fly Bao to the Moon, in 2017, remembers watching a preview of Our Journal of Springtime in 2019.

“It started with goosebumps and by the end I was crying,” recalls Cheng, who has entrusted his popular The Yuppie Fantasia (1989) to Chan for a musical adaptation. “I remember thinking, ‘Who is this young man who can write a script and lyrics with such insight?’

“As a former DJ, I’m quite sensitive to melodies and I could tell that six or seven songs really worked. He was only 19 years old then.”

In many ways, the story of Our Journal of Springtime mirrors the challenges that Chan himself faced in bringing the production to life, although unlike his characters, he has been fortunate to have had the full support of his family to pursue his dreams.

Theatre has been in Chan’s blood since his parents took him to his first musical when he was three. He wasn’t in love with it then, says Chan, but he found it fun enough to want to join a children’s troupe where he worked his way up from ensemble cast to leading role.

Funded by money his parents saved when Chan entered university a year early, he set up Boom Theatre in 2015.

Later, during his holidays from Royal Holloway at the University of London, where he was studying theatre, Chan returned to Hong Kong to stage Bloody Love the Musical – a vampire musical he now laughingly calls “a stain” on his career.

“My parents had always been very supportive and even they were like, ‘Why did you do something like that?” he says.

His follow-up, Fly Bao to the Moon, was a half success at best. “People either loved Fly Bao to the Moon or hated it. It really made me doubt myself. So many people were scathing. It lost money and I began asking myself if I was cut out for musical theatre.”

But London and the West End continued to fuel Chan’s passion for musicals. There was the music of Les Misérables and the storyline of Wicked, but it was The Book of Mormon that made him realise he wanted to do musical comedy.

“Real life is too boring, I want people to go away from my shows with a smile,” he says.

Like the story of Our Journal of Springtime, Chan found fiscal realities forming major obstacles in his ambitions. “Dreams are not always beautiful,” he says. “Chasing after your dreams can be very painful but when you achieve it, everything is worth it.

“This struck a chord with me when I was writing the script – there were so many ups and downs as I was pursuing my own dreams.”

Being producer, director, scriptwriter and songwriter all in one also came down to financial practicality.

“I couldn’t afford to pay four people to do these jobs. If I did it all myself, there was no extra cost, just my time,” he says.

“What I love about musicals is how the story flows into a song and then back to the story seamlessly. If I did all that myself, it would be easier for me to make adjustments and make sure what is in my mind can be done.”

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It didn’t help that he was uncompromising on what he wanted to achieve. For all his productions, Chan has stuck to the West End model of having workshop readings and previewing the show to gain feedback before staging the run proper, knowing that “these previews are so important because if you’re doing everything yourself, it’s easy to have blind spots”.

Aside from the production, Chan knew he needed investors, a venue and an audience – and not necessarily in that order. Investors told him there was no commercial value in musical productions and finding a venue proved to be almost impossible.

Many of his cast held down full-time jobs and would perform after work, which meant some could not make it through their one-year contract.

“We looked for a venue for a year,” he says, “it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. We would find a place, start designing and then realise we couldn’t meet the fire safety requirements, and we’d have to start looking again.”

The 100-seat Kwai Chung theatre was built during the pandemic and inevitable delays ballooned costs by the millions. “There was no chance to say stop,” he says, “we just had to keep going.”

Fortunately, by then, he was able to find investors to back him.

His age – and the fact that he looks even younger – was also a hurdle working mostly with people older than him. He’s been able to overcome that by doing research and being thoroughly prepared, whether he is making a presentation for potential investors or working with his cast and crew.

“I have to double the preparation for other people,” he says, “because I have to be very clear that I can answer any challenges.”

With the success of Our Journal of Springtime, it’s likely the future will hold fewer challenges. The wunderkind has proven that age is no barrier to talent and passion, and the popularity of the show has already resulted in Boom Theatre being sponsored to take an abridged version to local schools for 100 performances over the coming two years.

Next year, filming will begin on a movie based on the musical.

“I hope my productions will long outlive me,” says Chan. “England can have so many productions that can run for decades. It would be so good for Hong Kong to have that. And I hope that Hong Kong audiences don’t just go for my shows but other shows as well.”