Source: People's Daily Overseas Edition
After 100 days of study, Li Long (first from right) performs a clip of "Three Forks" with actors from the National Peking Theatre.
The short video "See How I Play Peking Opera" introduces the knowledge of Peking Opera to overseas netizens. Images in this article are courtesy of the National Peking Theatre
What can a foreigner with zero foundation learn Peking Opera in 100 days? What kind of spark will emerge when China's national classics meet young foreigners? Recently, Beijing Mei Lanfang Grand Theatre ushered in a special performance of the Peking Opera reality show "Peking Opera Trainees", on the stage, after 100 days of seeking a teacher and asking for art, Li Long (Nadim), a foreigner who has been looking for a teacher and asking for art, has comprehensively demonstrated to audiences at home and abroad how to learn Peking Opera from scratch and successfully challenged the results of the "Three Forks" fragment of the play. Following his study and performance, many audiences, especially foreign audiences, have a deeper understanding and experience of Peking Opera, a traditional Chinese art.
Show the whole process of foreigners learning Peking Opera
Originally from Lebanon, Li Long has lived in China for 9 years and is currently a foreign host at the New Media Editorial Department (CGTN) of the English Global Program Center of China Central Radio and Television Corporation. In June 2021, from the reality show "Peking Opera Trainee" jointly created by the National Peking Opera of China and CGTN, he ushered in a new challenge - learning Peking Opera.
Peking Opera is the most influential and representative genre of Chinese opera, and is known as China's "national essence". As one of the most influential artistic varieties of traditional Chinese culture, Peking Opera is the most well-known Chinese opera genre for foreigners, and is favored by more and more foreigners, including Li Long.
In 2012, when Li Long first arrived in China for graduate school, China was a rising power, and Chinese culture deeply attracted him, and Peking Opera was one of the pearls. Once, Li Long saw a video of Peking Opera on the Internet, and although he didn't know anything about Peking Opera at that time, the actors' performances, costumes and accompaniment immediately attracted him. Therefore, being able to learn Peking Opera as a "trainee" is both exciting and nervous for Li Long.
As the highest hall of Peking Opera performances, the National Peking Opera House sent old, middle-aged and young actors to guide Li Long this time. First of all, Liu Dake, a first-class actor of the National Peking Theatre, served as his "leader". Through the understanding of Li Long's physical condition, Liu Dake helped Li Long choose "Three Forks" from the three plays of "Qiu Jiang", "Three Forks" and "Big Trouble in the Heavenly Palace", so that he could learn the role of Ren Tanghui, a martial artist in the play. Immediately afterward, Zhu Lingyu, Yu Huikang, Bai Weichen, and Yishan were arranged to teach Li Long's basic skills, repertoire learning and stage coordination.
"There is an old saying in the Peking Opera circle called 'drama is easy to learn, but it is difficult to practice'. Without kung fu, the performance is like boiling water. In our ten-year class, the first two years of the play were not taught, and we had to practice first. So the plan I made for him was to start with practice, starting with skills such as leg and waist exercises. Zhu Lingyu said.
Press the right leg, press the side leg, press the cross leg, practice lunge, run the round field, take the top, spin the spinner, tiger jump... After 100 days of hard work, 32,580 minutes of practice, 3 injuries, and several near-collapses, Li Long learned 16 professional skills and movements and condensed them into an 8-minute excerpt from "Three Forks", which was also recorded in the original version of the "Peking Opera Trainees" program.
After the program was launched on the overseas platform, it attracted a group of overseas audiences to "chase the drama online", with a cumulative broadcast volume of 2.124 million. On the day of the performance, the live broadcast reached 124,000 views. Overseas audiences have left messages and likes - "Unbelievable to act so well", "It's a really good cultural experience", "I like Peking Opera very much, if you are in China, you must watch a Peking Opera performance on the spot".
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"The 100 days of Studying Peking Opera made me truly understand the beauty of this traditional Chinese art." Li Long said. In these 100 days, he not only practiced with real swords and guns, learned to perform, but also visited the Beijing People's Theater, Mei Lanfang Memorial Hall and other places to visit the exhibition to understand the history of the development of new Chinese theater, the development history of the National Peking Opera, and the artistic career of Mei Lanfang and other Peking opera masters. At the same time, he also went to some parks in Beijing to find ticket friends and feel the vitality of Peking Opera "living" in the present and "living" in the folk.
In the view of many "teachers" in Li Long, this new experience is a new form of Peking Opera going out. "A foreign friend who systematically learns Peking Opera from scratch may be an unforgettable experience for him. For the audience watching the program, it enhanced their perceptual understanding of Peking Opera. This provides a new way of thinking and a new model for Peking Opera to go out and truly let friends from all over the world embrace Peking Opera. Liu Dake said.
Judging from the response of "Peking Opera Trainee", this attempt was very successful. By watching Li Long's practice process, many foreign netizens have a better understanding of the differences between Chinese opera and Western drama, the meaning of some stylized movements of Peking Opera, and the mysteries and hardships behind the art of Peking Opera.
"Western drama is realistic, while Peking Opera pays attention to freehand. For example, in "Three Forks", the lights on the stage are very bright, but in fact, it shows what happens in the night, which is very dramatic and contradictory. On the Peking Opera stage, two or three people can perform thousands of troops and horses, and two or three steps can walk out of thousands of mountains and rivers, and these interpretation methods are very Chinese characteristics. Liu Dake said.
In order to let friends from all over the world better understand Peking Opera, since 2020, the National Peking Opera House and CGTN have successively launched columns such as "Mid-Autumn Festival" and "Mid-Autumn Festival Vlog" on overseas social media platforms to start the online journey of Peking Opera. In "Jokes in the Mid-Autumn Festival", famous Peking Opera performance artists Yu Kuizhi and Li Shengsu shared the front and back of the stage of the performance of the classic Peking Opera excerpt "Changsheng Temple", popularizing the knowledge of Peking Opera to overseas audiences, telling the growth experience of Peking Opera actors, and the passing on of the torch of Peking Opera art. Then, a series of original videos such as "Peking Opera Vlog", "See How I Play Peking Opera", "Peking Opera Trainees" were successively launched, introducing the makeup, costumes, bands and different Peking Opera trades of Peking Opera, using high-tech means such as VR and AI action decomposition to bring the audience a virtual immersive experience. In addition, 14 live exercises were launched, hosted by Chinese and English bilinguals, leading netizens into the daily rehearsals of Peking Opera actors and exploring the background of Peking Opera performances.
"Each live broadcast has become a scene for overseas netizens to discuss Chinese culture. After watching the live broadcast and short video, many people spontaneously inquired about the knowledge of Peking Opera and participated in the discussion, and some people also had the idea of coming to China to watch Peking Opera. Yi Ling, deputy director of the office of the National Peking Opera of China, said. According to her, through a series of Peking Opera online overseas projects, the theater has a stable overseas fan base, these "cloud ticket friends" thousands of miles away, by subscribing to the theater's social media channels to pay attention to the performance dynamics, deepen their understanding of Peking Opera art and traditional Chinese culture.
"In the future, we will continue to adapt to the aesthetic needs of global audiences in the Internet age, make well-made videos and graphics, recommend Peking Opera products to netizens at home and abroad, and open the door to national art and China's excellent traditional culture for more foreign friends." Yi Ling said. (Reporter Zheng Na)
People's Daily Overseas Edition ( 2022-01-03 Issue 07)