What's New-And Renewed-Onstage in China

Author(s): Claire Conceison

Source: TDR (1988-), Vol. 47, No. 1 (Spring, 2003), pp. 74-80
Published by: The MIT Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1147030
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Critical Acts
The theatre season in Beijing and Shanghai, an over-the-top takeoff on heavy
metal "cock-rock" bands in New York, a San Franciscoperformance artist,and a
new theatre company in New York'sLower East Side: the new critical acts section is up and running.
TDR's inaugural sampling spans not only geography but a diverse range of
genre from duration art to spoken drama to collaborative theatre to glam-rock.
The issues raised are equally diverse: When Satanicide's feminist groupies run
their hands up Aleister's thighs, is it an ironic gesture or a fantasyfulfilled?What
happens when you aestheticize a tragedy,and, how does 9/I I read onstage?How
will economic and social reforms in China change its theatre?Does drag subvert
the culturalexpectations for a Chicano performance artist?
What's new? What are we missing?What are you experiencing? We're asking
you to write for TDR about what's exciting, provocative,and challenging in your
neighborhood, your city, your country, your culture. Or in places you're visiting.
TDR's Critical Acts is a new featurethat will be as fine as you make it. We're waiting to hear from you.

What'sNew-and RenewedOnstagein China

ClaireConceison

In the Chinese theatre hubs of Shanghai and Beijing, spring is typically the
most active period for spoken drama,but in 2002, a full slate of exciting productions continued into June andJuly, usually months with scarcetheatre activity.In
Beijing, this was due to the inauguralseason of the National Theatre Company of
China (NTCC)-the merger of the Central Experimental Theatre and China
Youth Art Theatre that was implemented in the fall of 200I-as well as the revival
of severallocal classicsat the Beijing People's Art Theatre (BPAT)to celebrate its
o5th anniversary.
The most notable of the BPAT restagingswere Jin Yun's 1986 National Play
Awardwinner Gou'erye niepan(Uncle Doggie's Nirvana), directed by Lin Zhaohua, and directorRen Ming's version of AustralianDavid Williamson's1977 drama
The Club, which had premiered severalmonths earlier.Retitled The SoccerClub
(Zuqiujiilebu)in Chinese, its revivalcoincided with China'sfirst-everappearancein
the World Cup soccer tournament, which was the constant topic of conversation
and media attention during my stay.On the political front, 2002 markedthe 6oth
anniversaryof Mao Zedong's "Talksat Yan'an"(at the 1942 Forum on Literature
and Arts), to which China'sstateculturalpolicy owes its greatestdebt.
The Drama Review 47, 1 (T177), Spring 2003. Copyright ? 2003
New York University and the MassachusettsInstitute of Technology

74

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criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts criticalacts 75
In the midst of the ongoing and somewhat radical changes in cultural structures-both at the institutional and audience levels-it was uncanny to hear the
Yan'an tenets of socialist realism and the artist'sobligation to serve the Chinese
Communist Party reinforced. But in light of this political reminder, the choices
for both BPAT's and NTCC's summer seasonswere understandablyconservative.
In addition to The Club,BPAT also revived last summer'shits Diyicideqinmijiechu
(The FirstIntimateEncounter, originally a popularTaiwaneseinternet novel) and
WuchangNudiao (an experimental take on charactersfrom severalLu Xun short
stories), directed by Ren Ming and Wang Yansong respectively.BPAT also restaged its popular classics Tianxia diyi lou (World'sBest Restaurant), Cai Wenji,
Lao She's Chaguan(Teahouse),and Cao Yu's Leiyu(Thunderstorm).
As for the new National Theatre, after almost a year of planning, its inaugural
productions opened while I was in China. The first, Zheli de limingqing (The
Dawns Are Quiet Here), directed by Zha Mingzhe, was adapted from a Soviet
play about the sacrificesof women soldiers during the second world war and featured Beijing's most popular and talented actressesin the leading roles, along with
Zhang Fengyi in the role of the army officer whom they all serve. It was Zhang's
first-everprofessionalstage appearance(he has starredin films such as FarewellMy
Concubineand TheAssassin)-and his appearancewas highly anticipatedand critically well-received. Unfortunately, I was in Shanghai when Dawns opened and
arrived in Beijing just after the last performance. But I did make it to the capital
in time to see Wang Xiaoying's production of ArthurMiller's The Crucible(retitled
Salemude nuwu[Witches of Salem]), and I was invited to attend the in-house discussion symposium held afterit closed.
The symposium was a four-hour meeting during which top theatrepractitioners, critics, administrators,and educators came together to offer their reflections
regardingthe quality of the production and its sociopolitical context in contemporary China. The cast and crew also attended, and Zhang Qiuge, the wellknown film and television star who playedJohn Proctor, spoke on their behalf.
The most interesting part of the discussionwas the repeatedreference to "5- -6"
(16 May is the official date of the startof the Cultural Revolution in 1966). The
National Theatre's chief administratoracknowledged the risk taken in staging
such a thinly veiled allegory of the Cultural Revolution when a performance
would actuallyfall on 16 May, and admitted that the theatre company had asked
the pressnot to print any overt referencesto the coincidence.
It was refreshingto hear a group of experienced and respected theatre practitioners in Beijing speak openly about the CulturalRevolution and its impact (or
lack thereof) on China's newest theatre audience members, who were not even
born at the time of Mao's death. These 20-something educated urbanprofessionals, along with universitystudents, are the citizens purchasingmost of the theatre
tickets in China since spoken drama's"comeback"in the late I99os-and it is this
audience that NTCC is most concerned about attractingand nurturing.
The production itself was an odd mixture of socialistrealismin acting and "expressionism"in set design. The set spilled off of the proscenium into the sides of
the house and to the ceiling above the audience, where a huge mask similar to
EdvardMunch's The Screamwas suspended and from which IS nooses were released above the heads of the spectatorsat a dramaticpoint in the play.This blend
of realismand expressionismis a trademarkof Wang Xiaoying's directingstyle and
is very popular with audiences. The Cruciblewas enthusiasticallyreceived, but the
powerful emotion of the dialogue Miller wrote was somewhat overwhelmed by
the actors' histrionic displays.At the symposium, veteran female director Chen
Rong commented that although the new theatre company might draw criticism
from some because its first three productions were all foreign adaptations (the
third was Friedrich Diirrenmatt's The Visit,directed by Wu Xiaojiang), the thea-

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76

criticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscritical
tre should be applaudedfor choosing plays that did not
sing the praises of the government, but rather con--'nected to issues of humanity and society, staging a "di:"fi_
alogue with the people." The fourth production of the
l
=Hl.. BIm
! National Theatre-and its first production of a Chinese play-was playwright/director Meng Jinghui's
:?
r;i
i 'g |W|
Guanyuaiqingguisu de zuixin guannian(Head Without
Tail) in July, markingMeng's much-anticipatedreturn
to the stage afterspending the pastyear making his first
@, .- ~
film.
i'
Also in Beijing was Taiwanesedirector Stan Lai (Lai
Shengchuan) who recently took over the small theatre
--"-:'--l-.
near the CentralAcademy of Drama that was forKill l
space
~^
^ l merly leased by the China Youth Art Theatre. So far,
~ iLai's only originalproductionhasbeen Qianxiye,women
;
^il.i
'i
shuo xiangsheng(Millennium Teahouse), a transplantof
_
,
r-::!
one of Lai'spreviousTaiwanproductionswith a mixed
-.1:!
S.local and Taiwanese cast. His PerformanceWorkshop
productionsinclude furtherTaiwantransplantsand some
Beijing-based work by local playwrights.Lai's
111?i
_fill
loriginal
efforts on the mainland could herald interesting crossstraitcollaborationsif handled properly.The staging of
his latest creation, Rumengzhimeng (A Dream Like a
||:._._ t~
Dream), in Hong Kong suggests possibilities for Chif
J
-0 0_^
nese transnationaltheatre on an unprecedented scale.
Laiis not the firstto facilitatetheatricalcontact and collaboration between mainland and Taiwan and Hong
Kong, but he standsuniquely poised to deepen such artistic bonds due to his own experiences, including his
doctoral work at Berkeley,which addsan American dimension to the mix and further enhances the interculturalpotential.
Before leaving Beijing, I led a roundtablediscussion
.::: i:
with leading Chinese theatre artists on the topic of
"Trendsin American Theatre and Images across Cultures" sponsored by the American Embassy.This was the first time many of the
importanttheatrepractitionerswith whom I have held privateconversationsover
the past decade were gatheredin one room to discusstheatrein a Sino-American
comparativeframework.Some of the more practicalmodels I introduced to them
were community-based theatre and "24-hour theatre" festivals,which seemed
particularlyappealingand locally feasible.
While in Shanghai,I was invited by the U.S. Consul to speak on a similartopic
at ShanghaiNormal University.My lecture was followed by a lively discussionregardingtheatre audiences in China: what brings them to the theatre,what keeps
them away,and what future productionsshould offer them. Earlierthat morning,
I had met with the Dean of the Xie Jin Theatre Training Institute at East China
Normal University and exchanged ideas about actor training and nurturing audiences in contemporary China, as well as potential models to improve SinoAmerican theatre exchanges. Lunch between these two events was held with a
group of young local reporters,who were the only Chinese I have met who confirmed the existence of "performanceart" (biaoyanyishu), telling me about an
"underground"group of students from Fudan University who occasionallystage
Happening-type events at various locations (most recently,the ruins of a demolished building). I have yet to see anything I would classifyas "performanceart"in
the Westernsense in Shanghaior Beijing, so this information was of greatinterest
to me, but I was not able to witness any such performancesduring my stay.

a*

:-h

1. Theprogramcoverforthe
May 2002 opening of Gou-

mei Sylvia (Glamour-dog

Sylvia), the ShangaiDramaticArts Centreproduction of A.R. Gurney's
Sylvia, directedby Hu
Xuehua(SherwoodHu).
(Courtesyof Wujia and
the ShangaiDramaticArts
Centre)

i'

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actscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalacts 77

precede d

for2.

Jin Xing as Sylviaand

Liangas Gregin A.R.

Lu

Gurney's Sylvia

(2oo2).

(Courtesyof of Zu Zhongren and the ShangaiDramaticArts Centre)

The ShanghaiDramatic Arts Centre continues to feature the popular plays of
Yu Rongjun and will produce four of his new works in its 2003 season. It is unprecedentedfor one theatrein China to produce so many playsby one living playwright, but Yu is certainlyproving that his success in recent yearsis no fluke. His
plays seem to appeal to audiences of diverse ages and backgroundsbecause he
makes elderly men and middle-aged women his protagonists as often as young urbanites. The play that was in rehearsal while I was in Shanghai was Feichang zeren
(A Very Serious Matter). About an otherwise good woman who is imprisoned for
her culpability in an accidental explosion at her business, it marks Yu's first attempt at a dingxiangxi or "local play" (a play about actual local issues and events).
Along with several other Yu originals, SDAC also featured foreign adaptations this
year, including Harold Pinter's Betrayal and Yazmin Reza's Art, both directed by
Gu Yi'an.
Most of the recent theatrical energy in Shanghai, however, has been focused on
a new kind of play, called "white collar theatre" (bailing xju), referring to both the
subject matter of the plays and their producers, participants, and audiences. (Significantly, there exists no "blue collar" term or genre.) Characters in plays such as
Guo Chenzi's Aiqing shoushen (D-I-Y [Do-It-Yourself] Women), Xue Lei's
Shoushengorigyu (Singles Apartment), and Zhou Ke's Bailing xinshi (White Collar
Stories) feature young independent executives of consulting firms and Internet
companies, and often have themes of alienation, longing, and unsuccessful marriages. They are primarily written, directed, and independently produced by
women and feature strong female characters. By Beijing's standards, some of these
projects appear amateurish and unprofessional because young people with little or
no previous stage experience become actors via their financial and/or social connections to other participants, and often the results of such collaborations in production resemble low-budget television soap operas. However, the emergence of
this type of theatre as a colloquial "genre" reflects a phase in the ongoing negotiation of factors such as popular culture, low and high art, economic reform, social
progress, roles of gender and class, and shifting political influences that characterizes contemporary theatre in China. These themes surface more recognizably in
Shanghai than in Beijing.

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78

criticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscritical
:: .~::.
.;.s: I -,
11
~
: _ji.
;^
......

The regional difference can also be illustrated in

Shanghai's most recent choice of foreign adaptations.
While Beijing staged local and foreign classics, SDAC
produced A.R. Gurney's Sylvia (retitled Goumei Sylvia
[Glamour-dog Sylvia]), a hilariously theatricalized exof a marriage jeopardized by the husband's
l --- Xposition
v.^.
j'adoption of a stray dog. Hu Xuehua (Sherwood Hu),
:: who had concentrated on
/
filmmaking since receiving
^l
*
PhD
of
Hawai'i in I993, was inhis
at
the
K'ii.
University
L.'?
' -l
He had not directed a
vited
from
Los
to
direct.
S
Angeles
. .': :i
Chinese play since codirecting [TDR contributing editor] Sun Huizhu and Fei Chunfang's hit Zhongguo meng
(China Dream) in I987, and many of his choices for
B
-' iE w
Sylvia were reminiscent of that project years earlier.
' 8 I.
Hu's interpretation of Sylvia differed tremendously
___.
-5_
from productions I have seen in the U.S. He staged it in
a large proscenium and adopted a more melodramatic
(and less comic) approach to accommodate the increased scale. He opted to make Sylvia's character more
human than canine and to add nonverbal movement sequences before each act of the play to accent the emotional topography of the main characters. And he cast
three separate actors in the gender-varied roles of Tom,
Phyllis, and Leslie, usually played by one performer.
Along with these changes, Hu played with gender and
3. Theprogramcoverfor
species mutation in ways Gurney's script never anticipated by castingJin Xing as
Sylvia. As the only publicly acknowledged transgendered individual in China,Jin
WangXiaoying'sproduction of ArthurMiller'sThe is a national celebrity. A well-known and exceptionally talented modern dancer,
Jin emerged after her sex-change operations abroad to become director of BeiCruciblefor the National
TheatreCompanyof China jing's premiere modern dance troupe and an award-winning choreographer. Jin
was a wonderful choice for Sylvia, delighting the audience with her performance
in Beijing, May 2002.
and enhancing their spectatorship because her recent gender transformation comCao
(Photoby
Zhigang)
plemented the play's central themes of animal vs. human and male vs. female.
Signs of things to come in Shanghai were reflected in SDAC executive director
Yang Shaolin's request for me to bring him a copy ofSuzan-Lori Parks's Topdog/
Underdog (which presents tremendous hurdles for the Chinese in terms of translation, casting, and transmission to local audiences) as well as inquiring whether I
would assist in the translation of Eve Ensler's The VaginaMonologues. Setting aside
the difficulty of translating English vagina slang into Mandarin, there remains the
but Yang's suggestion ofconproblem of how to get the script past the censors
textualizing the production as a public health education initiative assisted by the
women's federation and local hospitals has potential. He was inspired by a March
2002 English-language production of the play at the Shanghai American Club organized by American expatriate lawyer Mattie Johnstone in collaboration with
Chinese associates (and with generous assistance from SDAC). It remains to be
seen if SDAC will indeed be able to follow the bold new path Yang proposes, but
they continually seek the most cutting-edge contemporary American scripts suitable for Chinese artists and audiences, so your suggestions are welcome.
Although encouraged by evidence of the hopeful turn that Chinese spoken
drama has taken in recent years, my heart was made heavy at times as I listened to
the responses of theatre people in both cities to the question: "What was your reaction to September I ?" There was not a single friend who did not express deep
disgust with the American government, president, and foreign policy, and some
kind of sympathy for Osama bin Laden. The stark contrast of this line of thinking
l

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actscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalacts 79
with the rhetoric I had been surrounded by in the U.S. jarred me beyond my expectations. I didn't know how to react or engage in debate with these colleagues,
because I wasn't confident that my information was any more sound than theirs.
At the same time, I sensed that their vision of America was as greatly skewed as
most Americans' vision of China.
Because Sino-American relations and cultural contact is at the core of my research, this discomfort was all the more disquieting. I could not work through this
confusion as I gazed into faces of old friends who not only knew me well, but
some of whom had recently lived in New York City funded by American government and private foundations. It was particularly difficult to hear one playwright
announce, "There are four things the Chinese people are elated about: getting the

4. WangXiaoying'sproductionof ArthurMIiller's
The Crucible (May
2002). (Photo by Cao Zhi-

gang)

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80

criticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscriticalactscritical
Olympics, getting into the WTO, getting into the World Cup, and 9/I I." Many
friends relatedto me the atmosphere on the night of I I September (Shanghaiand
Beijing are I2 hours ahead of New York City). People called each other about the
attacksas if giving good news. Even if their first thoughts upon hearing the news
or seeing the coverage was for the human suffering of the victims, this was soon
followed by thoughts of how America was finally getting what it deserved after
interfering in the affairsof so many other countries for so long. The American
retaliatorybombing of Afghanistanin particularheightened the feelings of hostility towardsthe U.S., and from my vantagepoint in China, such animosity continues to rise ratherthan abate.
This report would not be complete without mention of Liu Si (4June, the day
troops entered Tiananmen Square in 1989). This year 4 June marked a different
kind of milestone, with China playing its first-ever match in the World Cup.
Though China lost to Costa Rica 2-0 that day, the participationof the Chinese
team gave Beijingers feelings of elation and pride. Throughout the city, citizens
gatheredaroundtelevision sets to cheer for their team. As the day wore on and we
watched host countries South Korea and Japan play their matches (with greater
success than China), the weather grew very strange.I was with Chinese friends at
an outdoor pub, and the same hot, strong, dusty wind from late the night before
blew again. Seated with me the previous night in the foyer of the foreign students'
dormitory at the Central Academy of Drama, Meng Jinghui had glanced at the
clock when the unsettling weather began just after midnight and said, "Oh, June
Fourth is alreadyhere..." At the pub during the soccer matches, the wind was accompanied by dark clouds, thunder, lightning, and eventually rain. One of my
friendsraisedhis glassto toast those who died in 1989, saying to me, "The weather
is always strange like this on June Fourth." Whether or not that is true, it was
comforting to know that people remembered, even in the midst of the jubilation
of the World Cup. I did hear earlier that week that there was some concern that
if China won its match, people might flood Tiananmen Square(asthey did when
Beijing won the Olympic bid the previous summer) and that, the date being what
it was, could mean trouble-but, as luck or misfortunewould have it, the Chinese
soccer team lost on 4 June, and people were unusuallysad...
For Chinese theatre artists,the personal and public are unavoidablypolitical in
ways Americans can only begin to imagine. At the same time, China is going
through a period of tremendous economic and social change that is similarlybeyond our comprehension. These shiftsundoubtedly bring unprecedented opportunities for artists in terms of resources, approaches, and range of expression.
Recent trends in Chinese theatre practice are evidence of the complex interplay
of central,local, and privateprotocols and concerns, as well as the challengesfaced
by Chinese theatre companies as they compete with other forms of popular culture for the patronageof urban audiences. By mirroring their new "white collar"
audience onstage, the next generation of theatrepractitionersin China has seized
upon a profitableapproach-but one that is not without its own set of questions
that will soon demand answers.

Claire Conceison is AssistantProfessor

in theDepartmentof DramaticArt at University
of California,Santa Barbara.Her bookSignificant Other: Staging the American in
China isforthcomingfrom
on contempoUniversityof Hawai'i Press,and herscholarship
raryChinesespokendramaincludesarticlesin American Theatre (19:5),TheatreJournal (53:2), Theatre InSight (10:1), Asian Theatre Journal (15:1, 11:2) and TDR

(39:3).She wouldliketo thankLloydNeighborsandLiz Kaufmannof the U.S. Embassy

in Beijing,SalomeHernandezandJoe Wierichsof the U.S. Consulatein Shanghai,and
Dean David Marshallof UCSBfor supportingthisresearch.

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