Stills from "Six Tales of Floating Life"
Editor's note: Lin Kai is the head of the Taiwan delegation to the 11th National Congress of the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, and a well-known drama producer in Taiwan. In the days when the WenDai conference was about to be held, he wrote an article for Beijing Youth Daily, telling the history of cross-strait theater exchanges between the mainland and Taiwan that he experienced in the 30 years from 1992 to 2021, and at the same time expressed his chest and talked about his dream: eager to work with theater and opera people on both sides of the strait to once again promote cross-strait theater and opera and even cultural and artistic exchanges.
"With the appearance of the WenDaihui, I see that in recent years, culture and art have grown rapidly in all aspects. Over the years, I have cared about and invested in the performance environment on both sides of the strait, and I have deeply felt that the Taiwanese audience has always maintained a super enthusiastic viewing atmosphere, and the stage has also retained excellent theatrical traditions, especially traditional Chinese opera. Over the years, Taiwanese audiences have particularly wanted to see superb performances by mainland artists. Similarly, in recent years, mainland audiences have become increasingly enthusiastic about watching Taiwan's excellent stage works. Looking forward to the future, theater audiences on both sides of the strait can see all kinds of excellent performances, and the creators, performing artists, and producers on both sides of the strait can watch good plays and perform good plays together! --Lin Kai
Something that melts into everyone's DNA
At the end of 1992, the Beijing Opera House, the China Peking Opera House, and the Shanghai Kunqu Opera Troupe successively brought plays to Taiwan to perform, and the dramatists on both sides of the strait were "greatly shocked": the audience in Taiwan was shocked by the "original" Works of Peking Opera and Kunqu Opera, and the mainland artists were shocked by the professional audience who "knew the goods" and had a sense of pity for each other.
Of course, this is still an officially promoted cultural exchange more than forty years after the suspension of cross-strait music and books. I have often traveled to and from various cities in the north and south, and I have rushed into various performance venues, and I realize that the good horns and good dramas on the mainland are definitely not only these three theater troupes. Over the past few years, since 1997, for about seven consecutive years, I have brought nearly 100 good plays from Six well-known theaters and troupes to Taiwan, including Peking Opera, Beijing Opera, Huangmei Opera, And Commentary.
It is very worth mentioning here that my "introduction" work is a pure market behavior, and the officials on both sides of the strait have greatly given certain support in the cooperation of customs clearance and release of manpower. Revenue is entirely a market behavior, and it can also allow me to continue to introduce various high-level performances from Taiwan, which clearly shows that Taiwanese audiences really love Chinese opera, which is something that is integrated into everyone's DNA.
Although these performances are very successful, for me, I still feel that the degree of cross-strait cultural exchanges is not deep enough, and if I just bring mature plays to the other side to perform, then both as producers and creators on both sides of the strait, it is very addictive.
At that time, the dramatists on both sides of the strait were anxious
Since everyone feels "not addicted", there are naturally people who are "anxious" than me.
In the 1980s, many excellent new operas were born in the mainland opera circle. In the early 1990s, "Xu Jiujing's Elevation to The Ranks", "Cao Cao and Yang Xiu", "Golden Dragon and Floating Tour", "Song of the Summer King" and so on came to Taiwan, and the Taiwanese theater industry even reached the point of boiling. As a result, Chen Yaxian, Yu Xiaoyu, Xi Zhigan, Luo Huaizhen, Wei Minglun, Li Lianbi, Yang Liuqing and others have created many invited locally produced works for the Taiwanese theater industry. These new works were performed in Taiwan, because of the extremely high level of creation, the performances were bound to have a great response, and the cultural exchanges between the two sides of the strait reached an unprecedented peak.
Mainland audiences are more familiar with "Sex and the City", because I liked the traditional old drama "Vazidu", I thought that Shakespeare's "Macbeth" transplanted contemporary Peking Opera, it must be no obstacle. After visiting and pleading with a number of actors, in addition to the system in Taiwan at that time, in 1986, wu Xingguo, Wei Haimin and others initiated the establishment of the "Contemporary Legend Theater", and in 1987 I served as the premiere producer for the new play "Desire and the City Country". Then in the 1990s, contemporary legends invited Xi Zhigan to write "Yin Yang River", starring him and Taiwan's famous Dan Dai Qixia. "Yin Yang River" is not an original script, but a new editor of an old play, and the audience sees a different fresh feeling from the familiar old play, which is not only not annoying, but also causes discussion.
Not only Xi Zhigan, but also Chen Yaxian, the screenwriter of "Cao Cao and Yang Xiu", also has cooperation with the Taiwanese theater industry. In 1990, he wrote Infinite Rivers and Mountains for contemporary legends. In 2002, his play "Yan Luo Dream" was adapted and performed by Wang Anqi, the screenwriter of the Guoguang Theater Company, and others. Interestingly, this play is also an old story, telling the story of the scholar Sima Miao complaining about the unfairness of the world, saying that if he let himself be a half-day Yan Luo, he would definitely be able to cut off everything in the world clean and refreshing, and as a result, the Jade Emperor really heard it and let him do half a day's Yan Luo. This play is written very lively, because in the underworld, heroes of different generations have taken the stage, in today's words, "the brain hole is very big". At the end of this year, the Guoguang Theater Troupe will continue to perform this good drama produced by Taiwan and cross-strait cooperation.
Guo Xiaozhuang, a small collection of Taiwanese Yayin, was recommended by screenwriter Wang Anqi and watched the script of the Yue opera "Xi Shi Guiyue" and was greatly moved. Subsequently, Guo Xiaozhuang personally visited Luo Huaizhen on the mainland within a week, and successfully adapted "Xi Shi Guiyue" into the Peking Opera "Guiyue Love", which was performed on stage in 1993 and became a sensation.
Since 1997, I have introduced for the first time the award-winning Beijing opera new creations "Smoke Pot" and "Yang Naiwu and the Little Cabbage", which are new dramas born after 1949, taiwan is very strange, and it is very popular in Taiwan because of its good listening and good fun. Two years later, he discussed with the opera troupe to rehearse "The Tea House", and then assembled the previously unsloved "Longsugou" and the new "Four Generations Together", and performed the "Lao She Trilogy" at the Two Halls Theater in Taipei. Culturally, it is also an important event in cross-strait exchanges.
An in-depth exchange of two ideas
This is the exchange of opera creation between the two sides of the strait that I have observed, and if I want to talk about more in-depth exchanges, I think it should be an exchange in the production of plays that allow artists on both sides of the strait to "move.".
In 2011, I planned and produced "Suolin Capsule" for Shi Yihong in the mainland, in fact, from the perspective of Taiwan, from the beginning of Gu Zhengqiu in that year, Mei Pai actors acting in Cheng Pai drama is really not "deviant", but the performance is still a lot of topics. Including the later "2012 Peony Pavilion" is also this idea, allowing Peking Opera actors to learn Kunqu opera and perform Kunqu opera. In the following years, there are many such opera plays that I have participated in the production and co-created with outstanding mainland artists and art academies, some are old plays, some are new plays, and it is found that Taiwan's production ideas, drama propaganda ideas and mainland creative ideas are combined and collided, and many sparks will erupt.
Later, in 2016, I produced "Drunken Flower", adapted Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet", the screenwriter was the wizard Luo Zhou, was working with the artists of the Kun Theater in Jiangsu Province, and the director I invited was Li Xiaoping of the Taiwan Guoguang Theatre Company - and this is not the first time Li Xiaoping has come to the mainland to direct a play, he earlier directed the Sichuan opera "Xizhao Qishan", And Luo Zhou's "Spring River Flower Moon Night" was also directed by him.
During that period, there were many examples of such in-depth exchanges between the creation or production of cross-strait operas. For example, Wang Peiyu and Wei Haimin cooperated in the Shanghai Grand Theatre to perform "The Legend of the White Snake", and Wang Peiyu played Xu Xian as an old student, which was also stunning in Shanghai.
In the past two years, people are familiar with the Kunqu opera "Six Memories of Fusheng" produced by the Shanghai Grand Theatre, in which music composer Li Zheyi and costume designer Lai Xuanwu are award-winning creators in Taiwan, and the final results are obvious to everyone.
This is the bloodline, which cannot be blocked
To this day, I still miss the time when cross-strait dramas were in-depth exchanges.
I have an experience that cross-strait exchanges in drama and opera art need a sustained and relatively stable exchange environment. For example, the Guoguang Theater Troupe came to the mainland to perform, as early as 2010, there were "Golden Locks", "Centennial Theater" and "Meng Xiaodong" on the mainland stage, when the mainland audience felt very fresh, but it still needed a process to accept the creative style of a troupe. Then Guoguang also had a small theater Peking Opera to participate in the mainland's small theater opera festival, until 2019 when "Heaven on Earth Li Hou Lord" and "Eighteen LuohanTu" performed in Shanghai, the Shanghai Grand Theater and the Guoguang Theater Company invited me to participate in the publicity, I am more aware of the operation process, it should be the time for many years of hard work, the box office results have become very good, and even added seats. This shows that more and more people in the mainland audience are familiar with the style of Guoguang, "raw people" have become "familiar customers", and everyone has made friends, that is, we say that there is "stickiness", which is naturally good.
As for the reasons, as I said earlier, the love of Taiwanese audiences for opera is integrated into the DNA, which is the same as when we say the same words, use the same words, eat the same meals, drink the same tea, and hear the sound of orchestral bamboo, and a certain gene in the body is to move. This is the bloodline, which cannot be blocked.
What we must do in the future is still not to let the exchange of opera only stay at the level of repertoire performance, but also to let artists on both sides of the strait move, communicate with each other, and create together, not only to let Taiwanese artists come to the mainland, but also to let the mainland's good plays and good horns come to Taiwan, jointly create, and even jointly push the art of opera overseas.
Opera people on both sides of the strait have long been familiar with each other, so let's create more good plays to entertain the audience in the future.
(Note: The title in the article is added by the editor)
Text and photo/Lin Kai