A scarlet cloak of Baoyu stood on the white stage, the "book pages" that were opened on three sides slowly rose, the red Ying fell in the sky, and the prelude of "Joy" opened the heavenly wealth of the Rongning Erfu's fiery cooking oil and flowers... "Full of absurd words, a handful of bitter tears", in September this year, the Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center put the treasure of Chinese classical literature "Dream of the Red Chamber" on the drama stage, and the six-hour full interpretation aroused widespread concern among opera fans and "red fans".
The creators in front of and behind the scenes who pursue the ultimate aesthetic continue to draw feedback from all sides, and after three months of polishing and improving, this round of return performances has been upgraded and adjusted in terms of script, choreography, or costume styling details. The drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" will take over the Chinese version of the musical "Romeo and Juliet", which will be unveiled as the second blockbuster work of saic's "year-end performance season" of SAIC Shanghai Culture Square tomorrow and the day after tomorrow. Although it is 40 minutes less than the premiere version, the new version still has nearly six hours of time. In the face of "Dream of the Red Chamber", which "talks about love in a big way and records its facts", it is an adventure and challenge for both the creator and the audience.
Leave a classical look and add a modern touch
The combination of classical character charm and modern stage aesthetics is obviously the creative feature of the shangjiao version of "Dream of the Red Chamber".
The drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" is composed of the upper part of "The Prosperity of the Wind and Moon" and the lower part of "Eating all the birds", and the full performance is presented in a six-hour picture scroll, which slowly unfolds the dream of the Red Chamber in the midst of prosperity, wealth and prosperity, and sadness and trepidation, leading the audience to "stand in mid-air and re-examine the classics" and appreciate the neoclassical aesthetic conception in the illusion of white expanse.
Some spectators who watched the first round of performances said: "It seems to have a dream for a day in the Grand View Garden. When the dream was finished, it was as if the body and mind were at peace. It is the cleanest, most extreme and most complete version of "Dream of the Red Chamber" that I have ever thought of as beautiful. And the audience praised "the dance beauty and overall atmosphere of the drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" are so beautiful!" Totally long on my aesthetic. ”
Screenwriter Yu Rongjun's original script was written for 12 hours, cut by half to have a six-hour version, "but 'Dream of the Red Chamber' is worth six hours." The original work is like a dictionary, he combines his reading experience and personality expression, from the perspective of contemporary people to "read" and "interpret", "on a stage built by a breeze to perform a dream about reality."
The whole stage is based on "no dirt", which seems simple but all-encompassing. The huge space, all reserved for the performance of the actors, shows the rhythm of the performance to the greatest extent.
"Bao Dai Chao" is played by young actors Chen Shan, Fu Yawen and Li Li. Derived from the traditional opera stage, the "hand-eye-body step" often appears in the charming moments of the characters walking around, creating a beautiful figure shape. Wang Xifeng, played by Ding Meiting, Jia Mu, played by Tian Shui, and Jia Zheng, Jia Zhen, xing'er, etc. played by He Ping alone can all be remarkable, and the performance is infinitely close to the shape and god of the characters in the novel.
Jia Mu's actor and director of the drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" said that Chinese opera has given the drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" unlimited "nourishment", "Opera talks about qi rhyme, even if the actor exists as a background, 'qi' can not be dropped." "The roles on the stage are played by more than 30 actors, and a large number of opera and modern dance training has been carried out in the preliminary workshop to help the actors better establish classical charm."
"Dream of the Red Chamber" is a strange book that has attracted countless people to dismantle it. The dance drama version of "Dream of the Red Chamber" led by Li Xing and Li Yanchao, and the full book of "Dream of the Red Chamber" by Shanghai Yue Theatre are all popular works on the Shanghai stage this year. Lin Yihua's stage play "Dream of the Red Chamber" also met with young audiences on the stage of SAIC Shanghai Culture Square.
There are many challenges in adapting famous works: to break the "image" created by the previous work and establish a new sense of beauty; to achieve not only to not lose the literary and spiritual nature of the original work, but also to give the creation a new aesthetic dimension. How was this version of the drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" completed?
Interpret the compassion and affection in the classics with the beauty of "neoclassical"
Director Cao Yan believes that "Dream of the Red Chamber" contains Chinese traditional oriental philosophy, which is a great tragedy in the true sense. It reflects the confrontation between people's free will and irresistible fate in survival, experiencing setbacks in confrontation, feeling nothingness in failure, introspecting themselves because of their perceptions, and obtaining liberation and detachment.
The drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" is not only a story, but also a spiritual core of the story. The drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" attempts to open the spiritual world of "Dream of the Red Chamber", establishes an expressive psychological time and space in the theater, reflects the appearance of life and psychological reality, shows the spiritual map of a sentient being, and pursues the inner spiritual integrity of "Dream of the Red Chamber". The audience can follow the people in the play to travel through the dreams of life, experience the spiritual shock of "love", and feel the ups and downs, beauty and disillusionment.
The drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" is based on the original work, and is read and interpreted from the perspective of contemporary people to think, think, choose and express, and use this as a communication with contemporary audiences. The story in the play is not separated from the original work, it is a synthesis, condensation and reorganization of the original storyline, a history, two major families, Jia Baoyu, Lin Daiyu, Xue Baochao's three-person friendship and the fate of all sentient beings are all very critical and classic parts of the play.
Screenwriter Yu Rongjun said that the original "Dream of the Red Chamber" is a rare novel that first says the ending and then the original commission. The same is true of the drama "Dream of the Red Chamber", where the audience can see the fate and ending of some characters at the beginning or in the play. However, the structure and form of expression of drama and novel are different, and the way of telling stories is also different. He breaks the timeline of the original work, based on the relationship between the characters, the relationship between people and the family, politics, society, dreams, illusions, mirrors and reality, past, present and future dialogues, etc., and reconstructs the play with the struggle and connection between people and fate. Including the classic scenes of "Dream of the Red Chamber" that readers are familiar with, there will also be new interpretations and expressions.
The stage design by Liu Xinglin is minimalist and in line with contemporary aesthetics, and a large number of blank spaces leave enough room for the audience to imagine, and the first round of performances is enjoyed by the audience. The whole stage is based on white, and three huge "white walls" open and close with the plot, just like books that are opened on three sides, which are also carefully set, such as the hollow text on the iron structure set is from the poem "Good Song" from "Dream of the Red Chamber", such as the "falling red" flying in the sky, and such as the exquisite wooden palanquin, carved tables and chairs, pavilions, etc., with a small number of elements to hint at the world of the Red Chamber.
In "Dream of the Red Chamber", the statement that "the land is really clean after falling into a white expanse" is not only the end of the story, but also means that there is and is not in the world, and it is good to have a continuous cycle. Liu Xinglin said that from the beginning, this point is taken as a concept or visual theme of stage design, and then transformed into a specific time and space structure, and based on this, it carries the actors' actions as flexibly as possible, suggests scenes that are synchronously converted with the jumping narrative, and presents a metaphor like a dream.
In addition, the music, lighting and costumes of the drama "Dream of the Red Chamber" are tailor-made for the play. Composer Qi Feng grasped the "soul" with the theme of dream in the process of creation, and the music matched the plot to lead the audience into a new "dream in the Red Chamber". In the "white expanse" stage set, the lighting design Tan Hua cleverly uses subtle lighting changes to create an extreme vocabulary.
All the character costumes in the play are mainly made of white, and are cut and designed in a modern and simple way on the basis of classical Chinese costumes. In the play, traditional Chinese fabrics such as silk and ramie are heavily used, supplemented by traditional Chinese pattern embroidery techniques. Yang Donglin, a costume designer, said that white seems simple, but it is all-encompassing - there are tea white, moon white, tooth white, silk color and so on. According to the identity, personality and fate of the characters, supplemented by cinnabar, crimson, daisy, crow green and other colors, it is intended to construct the unique aesthetic world of this version of the drama "Dream of the Red Chamber".
Stills were provided by Shanghai Dramatic Arts Center
Author: Tong Weijing
Editor: Wang Xiaoli
Editor-in-Charge: Wei Zhong
*Wenhui exclusive manuscript, please indicate the source when reprinting.