(Author: Weng Sizai) Source: Air Peking Opera Box Office
Most readers will be unfamiliar with the name Bi Guyun, but he has a good reputation in the pear garden. Before being accepted as apprentices by Mei Lanfang and Xun Huisheng, Bi Guyun had already been accepted as a disciple by Xu Biyun, one of the "Five Famous Masters" who had both culture and martial arts. Mei Lanfang discovered the potential of Bi Guyun and focused on the cultivation of singing skills, personally teaching "Noble Concubine Drunk", "Taizhen Waichuan" and "Xi Shi". However, after his middle age, the area of artistic activity was mainly in a medium-sized city in Liaoning Province, which led to a limitation of influence. Until his later years, CCTV invited him to appear on camera at the Chongyang Festival gala several times in a row, and the knowledgeable audience was like smelling the empty valley foot sound, seeing each other and hating the night.
Mr. Bi Guyun retired and returned to his hometown of Shanghai, and in the middle of summer this year, I rang his doorbell in a lane near Huaihai Road.
Mei Lanfang Bi Guyun master and apprentice
=== Seesaw Hook Sinks into Obsession ===
When Teacher Bi led me to sit down at the Eight Immortals table, his steps were slightly turbulent, and he sighed: "I am ninety-one years old, and I can't expect my legs and feet to be as flexible as when I was young." "Your spirit is still so strong. However, depending on your stage career, the load on your legs and feet may be larger. Along with this topic, we talked about Bi Guyun's stunt - stilts.
The stilts under the feet of actors on the traditional Peking Opera stage can be compared with the shoe boxes under the feet of Western ballet dancers. The ballet shoe box, hidden in the tip of the actor's shoe, is actually a hard sleeve that covers the toes and part of the foot surface, supporting the actor to stand and dance on the tip of his toe. The main part of the stilt is a piece of hardwood foot support plate modeled on the shape of the small foot of the foot-wrapped woman, connected to the long handle, and the handle is firmly tied to the actor's legs and feet with a white cloth belt of five or six feet long, and then the shoes and socks are put on the outside of the foot support board to form a stilt shoe, which creates a "three-inch golden lotus". The difference between stilts and ballet shoes is that ballet dancers can heel the ground at any time after putting on the shoes, while stilts are a prop shaped like a spoon and fixed to the legs and feet, and the legs and feet are moved as a whole, and the heels cannot land on the ground. Among the characters portrayed by Bi Guyun with stilts are Zou Shi of "Zhan Wancheng", Pan Qiaoyun of "Cuiping Mountain", Jia Shi of "Daming Mansion", Yan Xijiao of "Capture Sanlang Alive" and "Sitting on the Building to Kill Pity", and so on. There is a kind of "flower" footsteps in the seesaw, when the performance of BiGuyun staggered the use of "cloud steps", "broken steps", "pad steps" and "step", sometimes in and out and shaking shoulders, during which the body does not shake, the feet are not chaotic, and the faster and faster, so that running "whirlwind step", showing the happy mood and lively posture of the people in the play. Every time the performance is up to this point, the audience must be applauded.
"In the past few years, the outside world has begun to pay attention to me again, which is related to the endangerment of stilt walking or stilt art." It turned out that after the Xinhai Revolution, foot binding gradually became less fashionable, and "small-footed women" were considered to be a symbol of feudal backwardness, so there was no such course in science classes and drama schools. Since the reform and opening up, with the promotion of traditional culture and the deepening of understanding, people of insight have pointed out that contemporary Chinese men will no longer worship the "three-inch golden lotus" because they look at the small feet on the stage, and stilt work should be preserved as a skill with traditional Chinese characteristics, so the stilt performance has been tolerated.
Seesaw shoes with foot support
=== There are people on campus ====
Bi Guyun began to learn drama at the age of 12, the basic skills teacher is Zhao Yunqing, the stilt teacher is Qi Caifen, the drama teacher and Lin Haoqing. "It is said that you studied drama while studying in ordinary primary and secondary schools?" Bi Guyun pointed to Xiangming Middle School, which was a few feet away, and responded: "I went to school on this campus in the 1940s, and there was a French Concession church school called Sacred Heart Elementary School in it. Mei Baojiu also went to school there, and we each asked Mr. Xi to practice after class. In the basic skills I practiced, there was this kind of seesaw work. Bi Guyun said that to practice this exercise, you need to first tie a sandbag on the surface of your feet to bear weights, and then stand on a stake with the soles of your feet against the wooden stilts. At this time, the master burned incense next to him to calculate the time, and he had to burn an incense to loosen the binding. After the apprentice's kung fu is strong, the master will also "pressurize" - put two square bricks vertically, so that the apprentice can step on both feet and continue to stand on the pile. In this way, we must insist on "an incense stick". The teenager Bi Guyun often practiced bleeding from his toes, and had to clench his teeth to endure pain. However, after hard work, stepping on the platform is not only windy under the feet, but also turns quickly, so as to depict the girl's delicate or ghost ethereal posture is particularly beautiful and evocative. In the early 1950s, he registered a business license with the Shanghai Cultural Department and organized the "BiguYun Peking Opera Troupe" to run the docks.
"Do you count as a ticketer going to the sea?" "Otherwise—" Bi Guyun explained. "The people are mainly from three roads: the disciples of the class, the private apprentices and the ticket friends go to the sea. After learning drama from a master of drama, I directly took singing as a profession, so I belonged to the second type of private apprentice. At that time, in Shanghai, like me, who graduated from ordinary school or went to work as an actor, there were also Mei Baojiu, Zhou Shaolin, Li Shiji and so on. We genuinely likeD Sipi Er Huang, so we gave up the opportunity to go to school or go to university. Although we are not from the class, we are not among the ticket holders who have switched from other professions to Pear Garden. ”
In the middle of the last century, Bi Guyun hosted an advertisement for the performance of a folk theater troupe in Beijing
=== Go South and Run North docks ===
The first stop of the Biguyun Peking Opera Troupe was in northern Jiangsu, and after eight months of touring, there was a shandong venue to invite, so it went on tour for another eight months. Bi Guyun's principle is "walking is better than staying", that is, a little income is better than staying at home without income, so try to perform as much as possible, even if the distribution plan changes from "three seven open" to "three seven".
There are many new stories in the process of walking the rivers and lakes to run the docks. In 1953, When Bi Guyun arrived in Kaifeng, he suddenly received an urgent telegram from Xu Biyun from Xi'an, saying that another leading actor of his troupe had temporarily returned to Beijing, and there was a repertoire vacuum in the Great Northwest Tour, hoping that Bi Guyun would quickly come to "save the scene". The master's order was difficult to violate, so Bi Guyun quickly made arrangements, so that the troupe's brigade would return home and take his xiaosheng partner Zhou Chengzhi to Xi'an to meet the master. At that time, Bigu Yunren was relatively thin and small, not outstanding, on the train to Lanzhou, the troupe talked about it, saying that the new Shanghainese looked like a monkey, not like there was any real ability, this Lanzhou performance was smashed, regretting signing a 2-month contract with Xu Biyun. Hearing these words, Bi Guyun, who was not more troublesome, cried bitterly. Then he wiped away his tears and made up his mind that he must fight for breath this time. When I arrived in Lanzhou, at first the water brand (repertoire advertisement) was written like this: "Xu Biyun Peking Opera Troupe Bi Guyun starred in double out -" In this way, Bi Guyun acted for a month, doubling down on his hard work, and sure enough, the kung fu did not live up to the painstaking people, and the "seat (attendance rate)" was getting better and better. In the second month, the water card was changed to "Xu Biyun Peking Opera Troupe Xu Biyun Biguyun Master-Apprentice Co-performance-" Of course, the seat was more popular.
In 1954, Bi Guyun toured to Tianjin, where he performed 120 consecutive performances day and night in 2 months. After obtaining a considerable income, he went to Beijing to organize a private Minsheng Peking Opera Troupe and camped in Beijing for nearly four years. In 1958, he responded to the government's call to support the outside world and moved the troupe to Benxi, Liaoning.
Bi Guyun played the role of Green Pearl in "Green Pearl Falling Down"
=== "Green Pearls Fall" Life and Death Pass ===
Bi Guyun's artistic value has a lot to do with a play - "Green Pearl Falling from the Building". At that time, Xu Biyun used this play to obtain the reputation of "Five Famous Men" together with his brother-in-law Mei Lanfang. The story of the play is taken from the Jin book "Shi Chongchuan" and the Tang poem "Green Pearl": during the Western Jin Dynasty, the military attache Shi Chong saved the singer Lu Zhu from the robbers and took her as a concubine; his subordinate Sun Xiu coveted the beauty of The Green Pearl, was jealous of Shi Chong, and falsely accused him of rebellion. After Shi Chongmeng's unjust death, Sun Xiu came to the Jingu Garden where Lu Zhu was hiding to seek her as a concubine, but Lu Zhu resolutely refused to comply and jumped off the building to be martyred. Later generations praised the women's chastity festival with the allusion of "green beads falling from the building". The green pearl played by Xu Biyun climbed up three tables to flip down with "hanging hair" in the climax of the whole drama, "Falling From the Building". This is a difficult thrilling action, once accidentally touched the ground with the risk of life. Xu Biyun has been injured many times for this.
In the 1980s, traditional plays resumed performances, and In the strong voice of the audience, Bi Guyun's "Green Pearls Falling from the Building" reappeared on the stage. However, due to a serious injury when he was delegating labor in the 1970s, he unfortunately fell and injured his lumbar spine in 1984 when he performed this drama in Tianjin, and after recovering from his injury, he suggested to the relevant departments that "Green Pearls Fall from the Building" be made into a TV film to avoid being lost. It turned out that Xu Biyun's play was only passed on to Mao Shilai and Bi Guyun, and because Mao Shilai did not perform this play very early, he became the only one in the pear garden line who could play "Green Pearl Falling Down". Bi Guyun told the TV director that the "Falling Off the Building" performance was exactly as it was, although the difficulty was not reduced, but it was necessary to shoot the other scenes before shooting this one. It turned out that he was prepared for the worst, even if the "hanging hair" accident occurred when performing "Falling Down", then the thrilling process of "Green Pearl" falling head down into the lotus pond has been filmed into the camera, and it can still leave a complete "Green Pearl Falling Down". The filming location is Benxi City Art Palace, the whole crew is busy from three o'clock in the afternoon to three o'clock in the morning the next day, and when the final solo filming of "Falling Building" is filmed, everyone is wide-eyed, tenses their nerves, and pinch a handful of sweat for him. At this moment, the person in the play, Lu Zhu, is ready to die of martyrdom, and the actor Bi Guyun is determined to sacrifice for art. Only to see him look firm, stride to the edge of the "guardrail" equivalent to the height of three and a half tables, without hesitation, jump out - only to see this "hanging hair" out of the railing, the head rushed to the ground, folded in the air, landed on the back of the neck, and then rolled over, bounced up again, stretched out his legs straight, "snapped", a "zombie" stood straight to the ground. As the director shouted "Stop—" everyone rushed to Bi Guyun and wiped the tears from the corners of his eyes for him. Suddenly, many people in the audience were crying.
The opera TV film "Green Pearls Falling from the Building" premiered in 1984 and was repeatedly broadcast by CCTV and local television stations, with rave reviews. Now, after being taught by Bi Guyun, Mou Yuandi, a teacher at Shanghai Opera School, has learned "Green Pearls Falling from the Building", and recently contributed to the audience on the Tiantou Stage, with rave reviews. This unique drama created by Xu Biyun has finally been followed by someone. Liyuan jargon says that "drama does not leave art, art does not leave technology", of course, its inheritance must also rely on the persistence of benevolent people.
The moment of "falling off the building" on the stage
=== Leave it to death and come back to life ===
Bi Guyun and Li Wanchun collaborated on "Throwing in the Army's Kiln". In the early 1950s, Shanghai held a charity performance in support of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, and he co-starred with Liu Tianhong (Shu Yi) and Miao Shengchun in "Fishing and Killing The Family", which was played by Yu Shuyan and Mei Lanfang's drummers Hangzi and Sigu, and Tan Fuying's organist Zhao Jitang played the piano. He often performs dozens of plays such as "Red Lady", "Qiu Jiang", "Fan Li Hua", "Fan Jiang Guan", "She Sai Hua", "Hong Mei Ge", "Lu Hua River" and so on. There are also some plays created by him or secretly passed down, which I have not only had no luck in but also never heard of, such as "Continuing Red Lady", "Hou yutang chun", "Yu Xiaocui", "Relic Cuihua", "Fan Wang palace", "Big Joe Little Joe" and so on. Its old and new repertoire is so large that it is difficult for today's actors to reach.
It is true that the Biguyun Peking Opera Troupe is not a theater troupe fully funded by the state in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and other places, but a small and medium-sized theater troupe that is self-financing, and the performance income is closely related to the survival of the troupe. Bi Guyun said: "At that time, we implemented a scoring system for internal distribution, for example, if I scored 20 points, the main supporting roles and the piano and drummers were 10 points; according to the contribution and seniority of each person, the grade was about 2 to 3 points for the running dragon set. The income from the performance is distributed according to the score of each grade. Bi Guyun also told me that under the mechanism of leading the team under the leadership of Jiao'er, although he made more money, he also took a lot of risk. The income of each game must first guarantee the basic living expenses of all the owners of the group. For example, if there are 60 cast members, you must first divide 60 points to the head equally. If this income does not reach the amount required for 60 points, then Bi Guyun will have to pay for it himself. The stage is like a battlefield, put to death and then born.
=== Postscript ===
Bi Guyun is now a non-hereditary heir, and his legendary experience reflects the ecology of the former performing arts market and also teaches us a vivid lesson. Not long ago, the relevant documents of the central government re-mentioned "performance-centered", reminding us to fully understand and implement the current literary and artistic policies, to innovate the repertoire and the coordinated development of cultural protection, and to take the right path out of the drama. In view of this, Mr. Bi Guyun deserves our re-understanding and serious appreciation. (Originally published in the Sunday Luminous Cup edition of Xinmin Evening News on August 15, 2021)
Weng Sizai, the author of this article, has a cordial conversation with Bi Guyun, an old artist of Peking Opera (photo by Li Xiaonian)