The 10th Beijing Huimin Cultural Consumption Season builds a new activity system led by more than 20 main activities and coordinated by more than 400 boutique market activities, focusing on the six major fields of cultural creation, performing arts, books, film and television, entertainment and tourism, and creating a rich cultural consumption atmosphere that attracts people of different age groups and different preferences to participate together.
As one of the key activities of the 10th Beijing Huimin Cultural Consumption Season, the "Young Directors Creation Support Program" was staged on September 1st, Ding Yiteng's directorial work "◯", showing classic masterpieces from a different perspective than before, and inviting you to "visit the garden and dream".
Du Bao faced his daughter who had come back from the dead, his son-in-law who had gone to high school, and then looked at his ecstatic wife, only to feel that everything in front of him was full of charm and fire, but it was like a dream, as if it were not true. Du Bao didn't know whether it was a big dream in the past three years, or a dream at this moment?
Get inspired by the complexities of human nature
"I don't know what to do, but I go deeper, and the living can die, and the dead can live." For thousands of years, Du Liniang and Liu Mengmei have transcended the world and sung the love that transcends life and death for the world. When we open "Peony Pavilion" again, we may find that Li Niang is tenacious and persistent, Liu Mengmei is loyal and unswerving, and although their personalities are shaped and bound by the feudal society's "survival of heavenly reason and the desire to destroy people", their bones contain rebellion against traditional etiquette and rebellion against cruel reality. In the book, Li Niang's father, Du Bao, is a typical representative of the decent figures of the feudal ruling class.
As an official, Du Bao was honest and fair, quite famous, and won the emperor's appreciation and the love of the people; As a father, he single-mindedly raised his daughter to become a model of a virtuous wife and a good mother, adhering to the principle of "preserving heavenly reason and destroying people's desires", regarding feudal etiquette as a matter of course, facing his daughter who came back from the dead and his son-in-law who came to the door, he actually went to the court to verify his true identity. It can be said that Du Bao is the defender of feudal etiquette, but he cannot be simply regarded as a villain. It is also the complexity of Du Bao that allows director Ding Yiteng to have a rich association of creation. "Regarding Du Liniang's father, Du Bao, his change of perspective and attitude at the end of the whole play is actually the most arousing to my imagination. Because Du Bao did not fully acknowledge or approve of his daughter's resurrection in the final reunion, and recognized the relationship between Du Liniang and Liu Mengmei. This in particular triggered my imagination of the complexity of his thoughts, of his whole psychic dimension. So I started a very interesting creation around Du Bao. ”
The drama "◯" takes the last play "Round Driving" in "Peony Pavilion" as the theme, in Ding Yiteng's view, "◯" is a symbol, which represents "reincarnation", "cycle", "perfection", "trap" and "trap", such a symbol also expresses the theme of this play.
The constant exploration of "new programs"
In the face of the huge differences between Chinese and Western cultures, Ding Yiteng proposed the creation method of "new program" in his exploration. "A very simple idea is the fusion of Eastern and Western cultures, which is actually a worldview of the new program."
In his view, each work has its own taste, and each classic original has its own charm, so the exploration and application of the new program also presents different effects in different plays. This can also be seen everywhere in the work "◯". In the process of creation, Ding Yiteng will borrow some of the creative methods of the Odin Theater Company in the West, and will also learn from others, such as the creation methods of some films, and finally "present the most open and free contemporary theatrical version of "Peony Pavilion" that I think is the most open and free." "Turning differences into characteristics and conflicts into harmony, new programs are presented everywhere in Ding Yiteng's works, and they are different everywhere."
Return to the original intention in classical translation
From "Dou E" to "New West Chamber", Ding Yiteng can be said to be familiar with the dramatic adaptation around traditional Chinese classic texts. The modern translation of "Peony Pavilion" in the "Young Directors Creation Support Program" made him feel that he had "returned to his original heart" - a free and open mind. Not bound by any story or form, but exploring their own fun, about classics, about opera, about contemporary drama...
"The nourishment of my contemporary drama comes from traditional Chinese culture and traditional Chinese opera." When there is no inspiration, go to see Mr. Mei Lanfang's "Noble Concubine Drunk", Mr. Cheng Yanqiu's "Locking The Spirit Bag", etc., these traditional Chinese operas are the inspiration for his creation. As for the dilemma of the changes in the era environment faced by the modernization and translation of traditional culture, Ding Yiteng, as a young director, also has his own understanding. "No matter what changes, people are unchanged. The sensitivity of human nature, the desire, and the upward energy, are immutable. The same theme runs through from ancient times to the present, from west to middle. Whether it is tradition and modernity, East and West, in his view, there is no "view of the door" that can be integrated with each other.
The modern translation of classic masterpieces is not a patchwork of original famous heads, nor is it a makeover in the name of modernity. Integrating their own thinking into the classics, integrating the elements of the times and even Western techniques, and translating the classics into works that do not lose their original appearance, do not change their style, and can be understood and loved by contemporary audiences, is what every young director should pursue in his creation. We have seen the "new formula", and perhaps, in the future, more and more young directors will create more excellent works on the nourishment of traditional Chinese culture.
Editor: Dai Shiyu
Editor-in-Charge: Warm
(Source: China Performing Arts)