Qianjiang Evening News Hourly News Reporter Ma Li
How did Chinese Yue opera reach the depths of Greek tragedy?
How does women's Yue opera interpret Greek tragedy?
How does Oriental drama ask the question of Oedipus's fate?
On September 30, butterfly theater, the opening of a conference, the big screen threw several question marks in a row.
Keywords: Yue opera, women, Greek, tragedy. Strung together were them on the stage: Luo Jinlin, Mao Weitao, Li Liuyi, as well as the famous national treasure artist Lydia Konyorzu in Greece, and mr. Stasis Livasinos, former artistic director of the Greek National Theatre, a "Zhaojian Sino-Greek Theater Dialogue" called the 2021 Chinese-Greek Year of Culture and Tourism.
This is a cultural exchange project implemented within the framework of the 2021 Chinese Year of Culture and Tourism, guided by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the People's Republic of China, hosted by the Information Office of the People's Government of Zhejiang Province, the Department of Culture and Tourism of Zhejiang Province, the National Theatre of Greece, the Chinese Embassy in Greece, and jointly organized by Baiyue Cultural and Creative Co., Ltd. and Zhejiang Vocational College of Arts.
This zhaojian also picked up the promise of Mao Weitao and Li Liuyi more than 20 years ago to cooperate in a small theater Yue opera. This time, Li Liuyi and Mao Weitao co-created the Yue opera "Oedipus King" (fragment), Mao Weitao played the Oedipus King, and the scene also played a special location version - the 5300-year-old Liangzhu Yaoshan Ruins, an encounter between Oedipus King and Liangzhu King. This is also the first time that the Yaoshan ruins, which have just been opened to the public (September 29), appear in theatrical works.
This still is so good-looking, please rotate your phone to the left to feel it -
Among the three Chinese guests, Luo Jinlin, former vice president of the Central Academy of Drama and an expert in Chinese Greek theater culture, can be said to be the "first generation", in 1986, he first rehearsed "King Oedipus", and since then he has created more than ten ancient Greek tragicomedies, and he is also the son of Luo Niansheng, a Chinese Greek cultural scholar.
"I only know the tip of the iceberg of Greek drama, the fusion of Eastern and Western drama, which I understand more deeply. The word drama in Chinese has a broad and narrow meaning, which refers to all dramas and dramas in the narrow sense. Drama was brought to China in 1907 by Ouyang Yuqian and seven other international students, and drama has a history of more than 100 years in China, but the source is ancient Greek drama. My father was the first Chinese student to study drama in Greece, engaged in the study and translation of Greek drama all his life, and then I used Chinese opera to directly stage ancient Greek tragedies, and I had a great experience that Eastern and Western dramas are very different, but they are similar, such as ancient Greek drama and art, solemn, concise and shocking. Chinese opera, virtual, symbolic, freehand. Oriental aesthetics, how to integrate, is the way I have been exploring. I think it can be seen that it must be integrated, not simply combined, otherwise it will become a fit. It's coffee and milk, I have you, you have me. ”
(ii)
- Who can save us, who can save the city-state?
- King, do you see that your city is being destroyed, and your people are living and dying?
- Here comes he, God's guide.
- A person who has lost his happiness, a person who is responsible
- The murderer of the father, the husband of the mother
- You should die!
- Why should I live like this?
- I want to listen to the wind and the beautiful autumn rain...
Mao Weitao and the chanting of the song team, like chanting, like chanting, echoed at 6 o'clock in the morning on Yao Mountain. More than 5,000 years ago, the Liangzhu people walked up to the altar and looked at the place where they reached the heavens and the earth, sacrificed, watched, and talked with heaven and earth. Did King Oedipus break King Liangzhu's heart? What will be the scene of a woman playing the role of King Oedipus, who meets Queen Liangzhu here?
Mao Weitao said "I should be damned" and pulled me back.
Female Yue opera is good at male and female love, talent and beauty, this Greek tragedy for Mao Mao, very similar to that year to meet Kou Liulan in "Kou Liu Lan and Du Li Niang", "I can't find the image of king Oedipus. ”
"You deserve to die." The crowd said.
That day, after rehearsal, she suddenly had an epiphany and sang a High C - "I am damned".
Breaking Yin Pai's singing voice, and fusing the lingering percussions from the tragic characters— I'm damned — she didn't know where this sentence came from, and at that moment suddenly felt solid, and the musical image of King Oedipus seemed to have found it.
"I am King Oedipus in the Zegna shirt." Mao Weitao smiled, she always carried the title accurately.
This king, white shirt plus black trench coat, collar "tuk tuk" up (Hangzhou dialect, stand up). Without water sleeves, fans, how to represent characters? Still looking for it from the four skills and five methods of the Yue opera tradition.
Although like shooting a men's trench coat advertisement, in the first act, she still wears Xiaosheng's iconic boots and bright boots, ascends to the altar, runs a large number of rounds, the dignity of identity, and the boots are pointed.
But in the second act, she broke again—taking off her boots too and performing barefoot on stage. This is the first time Mao Weitao has performed barefoot on stage – not yet a traditional stage, but the Liangzhu ruins more than 5,000 years ago.
Everything was broken, and like Kou Liulan, she couldn't find the feeling, and was still slowly looking for it.
Oedipus pierced his own eyes—after I took off my boots, my armor was removed, all the comfort of Kunsheng was gone, and I never felt that way when I performed naked on stage. I wanted to get closer to the state of king Oedipus at this time, to question, to redeem himself, to take off his boots, and to become the inner space of the king. I'm playing a soul under the body — I'm damned — it's a soul of compassion that still comes from the Yin Pai's singing voice, the rare and vigorous side of the Yin Pai.
She continues that it is not only the female body that plays the male role, but the soul that has wandered for more than 2,000 years of human suffering, which is the search for the self. Who I am, from birth to death, we have been searching. Although this play currently has only two acts, it is a feeling that cannot be experienced in the narrative of one thing and one person in the past.
In the black box of the Butterfly Theater, a sentence of "I am damned", she found the feeling, but still had no bottom. At 5 o'clock in the morning on September 27, she came to the Yaoshan ruins and performed in the real scene.
At the top of the high platform, the corners of the stone wrapped edge to trim the mountain are neat and strong. Below the high platform, especially in the west and south, there are many roads piled up to reinforce the soil and frame the scope of the stone ridge. The difference between the westernmost stone ridge and the top surface of the high platform is up to 5 meters, and the height difference between the southernmost stone ridge and the top surface of the high platform is about 3 meters, and the overall slope is shaped.
She climbed the stairs.
At the top of the platform there is an intriguing "Hui" shaped gray earth square, that is, the "altar", and these gray soils were deliberately carried from outside the mountain. The laterite is located in the center of the box, the mountain outside the box is corrected with loess, the triple earth color is clear, the corners are square, the layout is regular, obviously carefully designed, carefully built, and attracts people's imagination.
The design of the height is obviously conscious. Archaeologists believe that this kind of earthen altar is an altar whose main purpose is to sacrifice heaven and earth.
After the altar was abandoned— or if the altar was set up specifically for high-grade cemeteries, it became the burial ground of another king dedicated to the burial of high-ranking nobles, and 13 large tombs were found, in the north and south, with men buried in the south and women buried in the north.
Standing on the altar, her confidence came.
"After coming down, I told the director that I played chaotically today, many moments, sunset, mountains, light, birdsong, at this time I was completely improvised, as if connected to the essence of heaven and earth, surging inside."
(iii)
At the end of July, director Li Liuyi came to Hangzhou to shoot the scene and walked up to the altar of Yaoshan Mountain, and he asked a question: Since Yaoshan is the earliest tomb of Liangzhu, is the jade found rougher than the jade found in the tomb, or is it as delicate as the jade found in the tomb?
The director thinks a lot, very carefully.
In 2013, Li Liuyi directed "Oedipus King" for the first time, which is a drama. This time it's opera, and it's women's Yue opera, where women play male roles, and he wants to "return to classical civilization."
The music we hear in the performance, all improvised and unadorned, "is unconventional, but it is alive and alive." ”
He was exposed to Greek tragedy at the age of 19 and read a book translated by Mr. Luo Niansheng. Studying directing, the work he completed in stage design was "Antigone". For a long time thereafter, he bid farewell to Greek theater for a while, until 2000, when he suddenly realized that he wanted to return— not only from the theater, but also from the speed of change and development in China and the world.
"Wars, crises, the world's problems are many, maybe the logic of nature, what to do? These problems are reflected in drama, art, what do we do? After 2000, I began to comb through again, returning to classical philosophy and classical civilization, trying to discover something that had enlightenment for contemporary society. Reflected in art, it is our Greek tragedy. Personally, I think that when we look back, it seems that we can find some basis and solutions. When we go back to classical civilization, Greek philosophy more than 2,000 years ago, and our Spring and Autumn period philosophy, there are many similarities. I have found that there is no difference between Eastern and Western civilizations, the light of wisdom of human civilization, the relationship between man and the universe, the relationship between man and nature, all relations, there are many similarities, enough to solve many problems in our world today. ”
In 2012, he proposed the "Made in China" drama project, looking back at Greek theater, he chose three tragedies: "Antigone", "Oedipus King", "Bound Prometheus", this time with Mao Weitao, he still wants to "return to literature, back to the philosophy of thought and philosophy, to solve the problem of drama." ”
"This time found a bridge, the dialogue and integration of the two civilizations, far beyond the value of drama, the internationalization of Chinese opera, the performance of the 5,000-year altar, the value has been strongly reflected, the self-confidence and internationalization of our culture, the Liangzhu ruins are a holy place that empirically proves the history of Chinese civilization for 5,000 years, when the opera is performed here, my heart is very, very wild, we should do these things." The performance of Yue opera must have philosophy and literature, it is universal. According to The Classics, it is not the fusion of the repertoire, but the fusion of cultures, and it is the Yue opera that has entered the contemporary world civilization.
King Oedipus is still there, and in our lives everyone has his confusion and his spiritual pursuits. "He pierced his own eyes, and when he was bright he could not see the world, when he was blind he saw the world. I especially don't want us to be blind to see the world. I especially hope that when our eyes are bright, we will see the truth of this world. We cannot repeat the tragedy of King Oedipus. ”
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Source: Qianjiang Evening News