On the theatrical stage, "Thunderstorm Fever" is here again! Recently, at the same time as Beijing Renyi launched "Thunderstorm" directed by Pu Cunxin, "Thunderstorm" and "After Thunderstorm" produced by Poly Yanghua were also staged at the Shanghai Grand Theatre last weekend on the occasion of nearly a year of touring. Mr. Cao Yu's debut work written more than 80 years ago not only ignited a boom in theater viewing in "one south and one north", but also pushed the contemporary issue of classic drama adaptation to the front of the stage again.
Yesterday, sponsored by the Shanghai Art Research Center, the Shanghai Script Creation Center, and the Shanghai Literary and Art Critics Association, the "Dialogue between Classics and the Times--Seminar on The Taiwan drama "Thunderstorm" and "After the Thunderstorm" was held in Shanghai. It is worth mentioning that "After the Thunderstorm" is the "continuation" of his father's works by Mr. Cao Yu's daughter and writer Wan Fang, when time washes away all the emotions, calculations, pains and sufferings, leaving only Zhou Puyuan, Fanyi and Shi Ping, three old people facing aging and death.
In the view of Xu Zhengqing, screenwriter of the Shanghai Script Creation Center, "After the Thunderstorm" is not as fierce as the fate of the lightning struck by "Thunderstorm", but a state of life presented by several elderly people after a long period of suffering, "I think it has a strong personal color of Wanfang, showing the understanding and tacit understanding between father and daughter." ”
"When I created 'After Thunderstorm,' I didn't think that it would one day have a dialogue with my father's work in the form of a 'stage play'," Wan Fang said.
"Classic art, its vitality lies in the scale of humanity it shows, so we firmly believe that 'Thunderstorm' has not become obsolete, but new creations cannot be bound by old expressions," producer Wang Keran specially invited french director Eric La Cascascade to join, who has three times directed the play at the "Palais des Papes" theatre, the main venue of the Avignon International Theatre Festival, and the "Chekhov" trilogy has caused a sensation. It is reported that when he finished reading the script of "Thunderstorm" sent to France, Eric was amazed, "When I first read it, I was very fascinated by the multiple tragic situations it presented and the problems it caused. Since ancient times, human beings have been troubled by intense passions, and since ancient times, they have tried to understand these passions without being struck by the lightning of fate. ”
In 1934, Cao Yu's Virgo "Thunderstorm" came out, which is of great significance in the history of modern Chinese drama, and it is recognized as a sign of the maturity of modern Chinese drama. Professor Ding Luonan of the Shanghai Theater Academy has seen no less than eight or nine versions of "Thunderstorm", but this version has impressed him, "How does a Frenchman look at Chinese drama classics, where is the innovation?" His perspective is passion, 'study passion through two completely opposite families', and this phrase is a key. Ding Luonan said that Mr. Cao Yu's works have always been celebrating vitality, exploring the reasons for the fading of Chinese passion, and for a long time, in many contemporary adaptations, this important value has often been ignored.
"Interpreting Chinese classics with the eyes of the world is a bold attempt to cross time, space and culture." Cheng Hui, a literary critic and curator of the festival, said that in addition to those Chinese IP that are familiar to foreigners, Chinese culture should build more channels to go global, and more new works that can resonate with the soul are needed. ”
In addition to going abroad, how to enter the hearts of generations of audiences is also the biggest challenge that drama classics face in the adaptation. At the seminar, some scholars also mentioned the "laughing field incident" of "Thunderstorm", "Can young people still get touched and resonated with the breakthrough and struggle against fate portrayed in "Thunderstorm", based on the breakthrough and struggle of people shown by family ethics? Among them, there are actors' understanding of the script and characters and performance biases based on understanding, as well as differences in the cognition of social and emotional issues such as "family" and "ethics" between different generations.
Professor Ni Wenjian of the Department of Chinese of East China Normal University called on people to pay attention to the "prologue" and "epilogue" of "Thunderstorm". In fact, after the birth of "Thunderstorm", these two places were deleted as "cumbersome" in the process of stageization. Only in 2003, Xu Xiaozhong's plum blossom version of "Thunderstorm", the prologue and epilogue were fully performed.
Cao Yu himself mentions in the preface to Thunderstorm that "the 'prologue' and 'epilogue' seem to have the function of part of the Greek tragedy Chorus, directing the audience's emotions into a wider sea of contemplation." "I just want to send people who watch the show home with a sense of sadness..." While people debated its trade-offs, Wanfang built her own world based on the temporal and spatial background of "many years after the stormy night".
"After the Thunderstorm" is a 'sigh' of life, Wan Fang said, "After the waves of the years washed away layer by layer, "Thunderstorm" shows the truth buried underneath." In fact, my creation is the process of finding "Thunderstorm". ”
Beginning with his debut film Thunderstorm, Cao Yu has written accurately and profoundly about the complex and heavy human pain experienced in modern China. When theater audiences become younger and younger, how can the inheritance of classic drama be "kept" and how can it be "changed"? All kinds of interesting and valuable creative intervals are spreading out in front of Chinese dramatists.
Stills are provided by Yanghua Drama
Author: Tong Weijing
Editor: Wang Licheng
Editor-in-Charge: Xueying Wang
*Wenhui exclusive manuscript, please indicate the source when reprinting.