If the old lady were still alive, she would be 93 years old this year.
Unfortunately, she has been gone for a full 21 years, and on July 17, 2000, she died of lung cancer, leaving her life and contribution to the cause of Chinese comedy forever at the age of 72.
At the time of his death, Feng Gong, Six-year-old Tong, Chen Peisi, Gong Hanlin, Ge You and many other big names in the industry came to see him off.
Tens of thousands of fans gathered at the send-off site to express regret and reluctance. This scenario is rare in the entire industry. Maybe you're wondering what kind of an old lady can have such treatment.
She is Zhao Lirong.
It's been 21 years since the Slovaks have passed, and I don't know how many people still remember her and the laughter she brought us.
Chen Peisi once said that the core of comedy is tragedy. Perhaps Zhao Lirong is the truest portrayal, she has used her life to bring joy to us, but she has been tormented by life.
In 1928, Zhao Lirong was born. The addition of a daughter to the family did not bring any joy to the family, because in that environment, the arrival of new life often meant that the poor life was more urgent.
Father Zhao Bingzhong may think that the future living environment of this daughter can be better and more cared for, so he will take the name of the youngest daughter Zhao Lirong as "old love".
Because her father has been doing miscellaneous work in the theater for many years, Zhao Lirong has heard about this environment since she was a child and has developed a great interest in drama.
Zhao Lirong really came to power when she was one and a half years old. It is reasonable to say that such a small doll should be afraid of the stage when she sees so many strangers in the audience, but Zhao Lirong does not, and even laughs crisply.
Since then, Zhao Lirong has learned to comment on drama in the drama critics. Maybe it was because of interest, maybe it was just a mixture of food, Zhao Lirong worked extra hard in the drama team.
At the age of 17, she alone had provoked the beams of the entire drama team, and her reputation was outstanding.
When the war hit their own cities, everyone was unemployed, and now saving their lives is the most important thing. Unfortunately, in the process, the biggest noble person in her life, the master who took her into the industry, fell seriously ill and died.
Returning overnight to the pre-liberation period, the accumulated popularity is no longer there. Fortunately, there are losses and gains, and in 1954, she was introduced to Sheng Qiang, the literary and artistic director of the troupe, and formed a family.
The combination of the two can be said to be a combination of langcai and female appearance, she is young and promising, excellent ability, he writes the script and shoots the scene, and everything is handy.
The following year, the two had a son, and two years later, the two had a second son.
If time can stay here, it may be the best ending. But how could the gears of fate stop swinging, and behind the joy was a greater catastrophe brewing.
It was a late night in 1957, and Zhao Lirong was making a meal waiting for her husband to come home.
That night, Sheng Qiang came back extra late, and his face was also very solemn. Zhao Lirong knew that her husband had something on her mind, and she wanted to ask again the next day, but she didn't know that the next day when her husband went out to work with a weak step, it was the last time the two of them met.
After two years of waiting, she finally waited for the news of her husband's death.
The child in his arms is still young, and he has no idea what the parting means at this moment, only to cry and shout: "Daddy, where is Daddy!" ”
There was no one to answer them, only Xiao Su's cold wind blew through, telling them how cruel it was.
After that, Zhao Lirong could only carry all the burdens alone. She was also advised to remarry, but she was reluctant. She didn't want her child to be looked at differently by her stepfather, and she didn't want her child to change her surname.
Fortunately, her husband's sister could not bear to see all this, and with her mediation, she finally formed a family with her brother-in-law Sheng Hong.
However, the combination of the sister-in-law and the little uncle seems absurd no matter how you look at it. But Zhao Lirong can manage these things, she does not think for herself, she always has to think about the children. In this way, the two were married.
Later, she and Sheng Hong gave birth to a son and a daughter. In such a family, the arrival of the daughter is particularly festive, so they named the daughter Sheng Jiahuan.
The family rejoiced, but the truth was that the family did not rejoice because of this, but fell into endless grief.
It turned out that the daughter was diagnosed with a congenital disability just 3 days after she was born. In that era, when the monthly salary was only about a dozen yuan, the family had to spend hundreds of yuan almost every month to buy medicine for their daughter.
But careful care has not been able to exchange for the healthy growth of her daughter. At the age of 7, my daughter still walked away with all the joys of this already crippled family.
For another 7 years, Sheng Hong also walked away in pain.
Anyone who encounters such suffering will also be depressed. But Zhao Lirong did not, she regained her strength, because she was not strong, no one was strong for her.
Perhaps this optimism and persistence in life touched the heavens, and soon after she finally ushered in her own opportunity.
In 1989, Zhao Lirong was invited by the Spring Festival Gala program group to perform the skit "A Day of a Heroic Mother" with Hou Yaowen.
The familiar phrase "Tango is Tang Ah Tang walk, three steps and two jumps and two turns." "It's from this show.
After that night, Zhao Lirong was popular all over the country, but she was already 60 years old at that time.
Of course, the dedication and pursuit of art will never be limited by age.
In the spring evening of 1995, she frowned and sang rap, and in the song and dance, people even forgot how to recite it in normal language.
It is also because of this skit called "So Packaged" that Zhao Lirong won the first prize of the Spring Festival Gala sketch that year.
In the spring evening of 1996, her section of "palace jade liquor, one hundred and eight cups, how about this wine, listen to me blowing for you" is simply a self-contained sound effect, which is still reminiscent of countless people to this day.
Many people may think that she will only sketch, but she does not know that Zhao Lirong has also acted in movies and TV series.
For example, after the che chi king in the six-year-old children's version of "Journey to the West", it was Zhao Lirong who played it.
At that time, when playing this role, because of misunderstanding the meaning of the role, the director Yang Jie was explaining it to her word by word.
Why do you need to explain? Because she can't read!
Yes, Zhao Lirong is illiterate, but this does not affect her play. In the days that followed, she went on to contribute countless classic roles.
For example, Liu Xiaoqing's version of "Dream of the Red Chamber":
For example, in the movie "New Year", the kind mother:
In the movie, she uses her face full of vicissitudes to express the expectations and worries of a left-behind mother during the New Year.
It is worth mentioning that it is also because of this role that she won the best actress at the Tokyo International Film Festival.
This award is heavy enough! Why? Because it was 1991, she was the first Chinese artist to win the best actress in the international selection.
More importantly, as we said earlier, she is illiterate. You can imagine how much hardship she has experienced in figuring out the characters and performances of the script.
In 1999, she appeared on the Spring Festival Gala as usual and gave a wonderful performance for everyone.
Few people know that at that time, she had begun to cough up blood and was diagnosed with lung cancer, and her life had entered the final countdown at this moment.
But Zhao Lirong did not shrink back, but dedicated her last love and persistence to the stage she loved most in her life.
At the end of the performance, Gong Hanlin pulled Zhao Lirong to take a photo. Unexpectedly, that photo became the final group photo of the golden couple.
To this day, many people still miss Zhao Lirong's performances and sketches. Why do we miss her so much?
Because the most intuitive feeling she gives us is that she is kind, real, and unpretentious. As soon as she took the stage, we felt like an old lady we knew next to us, or even like our grandmother.
She is humorous, affinity, never hoarse, not without any exaggerated actions and language, but with the most simple movements, into the hearts of each of us.
Someone once asked Zhao Lirong why she was so humorous, and the old lady smiled and said, "I don't know why, I think it's so good." ”
Possibly, as Chen Peisi said at the beginning of the article: the core of comedy is tragedy.
But brave people who are full of love for life can finally present the core of tragedy as comedy.