"There may be a wonderful pearl hidden in every mussel" - the 10th Wuzhen Theater Festival Youth Competition

Stills from "Mussel and Pearl" (provided by the Organizing Committee of Wuzhen Theater Festival/photo)

During the day from October 20 to 26, 2023, at the entrance of the Bengwan Theater in Wuzhen's Xizha, there will always be a queue waiting to see the play, and the longest time can stretch to the river. In September, the free tickets for the Wuzhen Theater Festival Youth Competition (hereinafter referred to as the "Youth Competition") were sold out at the beginning of the ticket opening. This is one of the most important units of the Wuzhen Theater Festival every year, and it is also the only competition unit, where the works of 18 groups of young theater artists will be awarded the Best Drama Award, the Best Individual Performance Award, and the Special Attention Award.

In front of the fence outside the Bangwan Theatre, there is a sign indicating that the youth competition will be able to enter X.X.X. audience. Inside the theatre, 18 groups of young theatre artists take turns to stage their works, and a screen is temporarily hung on a stone wall outside the theatre for the audience who cannot enter the theater to watch the live broadcast, and there are always five or six rows of enthusiastic audience seated on the ground under the scorching sun.

Since 2013, the Wuzhen Theater Festival has been held for 10 years, and the Youth Competition has also been held for 10 years. Bengwan Theater is named after the earliest place name here, Huang Lei thinks it is good, "There are a lot of mussels in Bengwan, and each mussel may have a wonderful pearl hidden in it." ”

Huang Lei, one of the initiators of the Wuzhen Theater Festival and an actor who has taught at the Beijing Film Academy for many years, has a "deep gratitude" and "deep reflection on the inadequacy" of traditional art education, and he brought some ideas that cannot be practiced in school, which he brought to the Wuzhen Theater Festival. This year, two days before the opening of the 10th Wuzhen Theater Festival, in a handwritten letter to the Youth Competition, Huang Lei wrote, "At the beginning, when the Wuzhen Theater Festival was just a small idea, young people were already the protagonists of the festival, and all the origins and goals were for the young people. ”

The rules of the Youth Competition are very simple: each of the three initiators of the Wuzhen Theater Festival will propose a prop to form the proposition of the year - use these three props to rehearse an original play in 20-30 minutes, no more than 5 people.

In May this year, Huang Lei, Lai Shengchuan, and Meng Jinghui, the initiators of the Wuzhen Theater Festival, wrote questions for the Youth Competition: World Famous Paintings, Train Tickets, and Horses. "The fundamental purpose of the 3 props is not to test how you use the props, but to test how you use the environment, find an effective stage fulcrum, and maximize the energy density of the play per unit of time. Youth competition judge Li Bo said. In August, more than 500 entries were submitted, in September, 18 shortlisted entries were announced, and in mid-October, a lottery was released for the group performances at the Wuzhen Theater Festival.

The stage of Bengwan Theater is small and the layout is simple: overhead lights, curtains. The audience forms a semicircle and wraps around the stage.

The small stage of the Youth Competition has produced many drama people over the years. In 2013, Chen Minghao won the championship in "Baba's Mama", and this year he is known to the public for his performance in "The Long Season", and in 2015, Wu Pi won the Best Drama Award for "Still", and this year he is both a judge of the Youth Competition and an actor in Lai Shengchuan's new drama "Long Alley". Wu Bi once said that Wuzhen is the biggest turning point in his career, "You can have no cost, nothing, but do what you want to do, and give everyone a stage, so many people come to watch." ”

Wuzhen Theater Festival Youth Competition Unit Judge Li Bo (provided by the interviewee/photo)

Li Bo participated in the first three Youth Competitions as a contestant, and his works entered the top three, and from the fourth session, he became one of the judges of the Youth Competitions, responsible for selecting 18 groups of shortlisted works from hundreds of works, and then selecting 6 groups of finalists from 18 groups.

In his early 20s, Li Bo studied in the acting department of the Beijing Film Academy, enjoying freedom and romance in an ivory tower, and later became a university teacher. Participating in the Wuzhen Theatre Festival is of directional significance to him, and he says that it is a way for more people to understand his theatrical philosophy.

During my 10 days in Wuzhen, I spent a long time at the Bengwan Theater, and from these youth plays, I could see the disappearance of the love between men and women, the hidden pain caused by the bond between mother and daughter, father and son, and the individual's reflection on the tearing of the world.

The story of "The Fifth Floor, Nine Floors", which won the Best Drama Award, is set in a faulty elevator, where the boy on the fifth floor and the girl on the ninth floor reflect on their intimate relationship for half an hour, one feels that he is trapped by his boyfriend, and the other may be trapped by his girlfriend. They all want to escape and get a hypothetical train ticket to the north to see the aurora.

Stills from "Fifth Floor and Ninth Floor" (provided by the Organizing Committee of Wuzhen Theater Festival/photo)

"The Mussel and the Pearl", which won the Special Attention Award and the Best Individual Performance Award, is the protagonist of a controlling mother who, with the help of a psychiatrist, uncovers the trauma of her teenage assault. At the end, the daughter takes a picture of her mother, and the mother looks back and becomes a "girl with a pearl earring".

"I and Liu Hongmei at the Station", which also won the Special Attention Award, had only one actor from beginning to end, "I" left the big city and returned to my hometown to become a staff member of the amusement park carousel project, and met "her" several times (my grandmother who had lived all her life in my hometown), at the age of 15, she wanted to go to the river to swim secretly; in her twenties, she wanted to go to Beijing and Shanghai, but she lost her train ticket and cried in a hurry; at the age of 82, she was thin, silent, and old, and time was speeding up on her; finally, "I" took the 6-year-old "her" to touch the merry-go-round.

Stills from "Me and Liu Hongmei at the Station" (provided by the Organizing Committee of Wuzhen Theater Festival/photo)

One night during the festival, Li Bo lined up in the Pillow Water Carving Hall to watch Meng Jinghui's new play, and listened to an audience member complain about a certain youth competition. Li Bo thinks it's very interesting, which just reflects the diversity of the standards of the Youth Championships, "It is true that the audience has mixed reviews, but in the past 10 years, it is the only one-man show performed in this way on the stage of the Youth Championships. We want to encourage it, maybe in the future, it will form a unique style. Young people's plays should do a lot of exploration, and if the tricks are done very neatly, it is Mr. Lai, right?"

The finalist works of this year's Youth Competition "Open the Window That Can't Be Opened" The crew curtain call (Southern People Weekly reporter Zhang Yuxin/photo)

After the finalists were released and after the festival, Li Bo was interviewed twice by Southern People Weekly. Here's what Li Bo had to say:

Youth is a school that allows you to have lovely blemishes

On October 26th, we discussed the six shortlisted plays, and we wanted to take an official photo of the judges discussing the finalists, and we all sat upright, holding the list of commentators. Later, who said a point of view, Director Cheng Er was the first to stand up and said, no, this stage is so rare, this play must be the language of drama. Later, they all stood up and argued: what is the awe of the stage, what is the language of the drama, how to perform the small theater, how to use the three props, what to do if the performance is overtime...

There are more than 500 works registered, and we have to take care of a variety of themes, styles, and expressions.

Youth is a school that allows you to have lovely blemishes. However, the plays that were shortlisted for flaws at that time were almost out of shape on the stage of the Youth Championships.

There is a play, the registration deadline is August 20th, I saw that they recorded it on August 19th, and it was too late to record it. The video is in a piano shop, and the first shot is still shaking. They are acting in light comedy, and the actors must be absolutely relaxed, just because they may not be shortlisted, and they encountered a lot of spiritual and high-level comedy lines on the spot, and the ear guide their group brought up this scene. I was in a meeting out of town, and I was bored, so I wore headphones and watched the video. They were both relaxed and playful, and I was particularly happy to watch. The actor forgot the word Quack, and I also Quack.

Later, when the finalists were announced, the organizing committee called, signed a confirmation letter, designed a poster, went to Wuzhen, arranged three public rehearsals, an interview, a few rehearsals, and then three rounds of performances. They began to realize that it was a game and were nervous. As soon as you are nervous, you become unfree.

The official Weibo announced the list of finalists, and there was a message saying that these 6 scenes are solid, congratulations to them. This evaluation is the greatest encouragement for our work, some of the plays may look very good and rich, but they are very floating, and they have no taste when they are touched; some of them look stable, but the whole presentation has a stability that is rare for young people.

This year is the highest level of work I have seen in my 7 years as a judge. This year's final 6 is really able to choose 6, and we are finally choosing. I happened to come across a play that I liked very much, and some of the judges didn't like it very much, so the two of us kept arguing, but it was academic, not personal. When I work in a unit, I tend to answer "yes" and "yes, you're right", but this problem does not exist at the Wuzhen Theater Festival, and I have also argued with Mr. Lai.

This year's props are a horse, a world-famous painting, and a train ticket. In addition to the performance and text, the most important thing is to see how the three elements are used, because this competition is supported by three elements. When we judge, if the presentation of the two scenes is similar, we look at the props. Each of the three teachers gave a prop to prevent the old work from being adapted.

The use of props especially tests the professionalism of a crew. For example, when we didn't win a fight, a knife suddenly appeared, and everyone wanted to grab the knife, which caused a turning point in the drama and changed the direction of the play, which is a relatively common usage.

In terms of props, just to mention, is this the simplest, or does it play a key role in the turn of the play? Or does it serve as an image, a symbol, that lingers in your mind throughout the play? These are three completely different levels.

The most difficult thing in this year's props is the world's famous paintings, because we Chinese rarely have the experience of seeing art exhibitions. Some of the plays are parodies of "The Girl with a Pearl Earring", some are family members who regard her works as world famous paintings, and some are actors who imitate "The Scream", all of which are very cute.

"Liu Hongmei and I are at the station", several of our judges all passed the finals. I think it should be inseparable from the use of props in the finals. The imagery of the horse is present throughout the text. We learn to act, whether the props are used as the fulcrum of the stage, or the key items that promote the development of the plot, how can they appear on the stage, but they do not appear in this play. The script mentions the game of the merry-go-round, "I" walked around the stage, like a merry-go-round, meeting "my" grandmother, and every time I walked around "I" saw Liu Hongmei at different stages, different things happened, which was related to Liu Hongmei's fate. Eventually, I went back to work and drove the merry-go-round for the other children. So fresh, so natural.

The performance of the play "Then the Tide, the Sun, the Moon" ended (Southern People Weekly reporter Zhang Yuxin/Photo)

You don't have to be cool or cool, just focus on the story

That day, I also said at the reading meeting that you can get chicken soup in 140 words on Weibo, and Kuaishou Douyin can achieve all your desires in one minute, why would anyone consume two hours of life in the theater to go to the play? First of all, this play must have temperature. Second, the things you talk about in the play are not often seen on Douyin Kuaishou Weibo, and you have to lead the audience to pay attention to people in life that we have not paid attention to.

So far, among the previous youth competitions, I think the best is "Karma" in 2016 (reporter's note: The theme of the youth competition that year was a drop of blood, a suitcase, and a meteor. The protagonists of "Karma" are a mother and daughter, for many years, Grandma can't let go of Abba who left home to practice and become a living Buddha, the living Buddha is dead, Grandma firmly believes that the living Buddha can be reincarnated back home within 49 days, hoping that her daughter Karma is pregnant; The mother and daughter plan to go on their own pilgrimage, and finally reconcile on the way to Shenhu), the two graduate students of the Shanghai Theater Academy did the only time in the history of the Youth Competition that the best individual performance award and grand prize were given to a team. Acting on the stage of faith is generally complicated, but that scene is very simple, a chair, two girls, one of the girls plays two roles (the grandma who never forgets her husband, and the granddaughter who is reincarnated by Gesang Hua), it is so simple, but it is so transparent. After they kowtowed, they looked into the distance, and a cold light hit, and boom, it was a lake. Tibetan music sounds, and it feels like we're in the snowy plateau.

From the first session to the present, all the dramas that have won awards have been small and big, and they have talked about life in a down-to-earth manner. You can catch any person from Xizha, over 10 years old and under 90 years old, and you can understand it by sitting there.

The stage of the Youth Championship is very close to the audience, really, is the most important thing. Does the core of your drama tell us through a trivial matter, or through a philosophical event? I don't like to tell us something, or force something to be indoctrinated. Including the judges' voting, the results of this kind of play are not good. Young people's drama doesn't have to be so complicated, come up and discuss To be or not to be, I'm sorry, you really don't have that ability, sometimes thinking and acting are two different things. I still hope to tell the story clearly: there are ups and downs, characters, conflicts, and themes, even if there is no intention, it is very rare.

You see how simple Liu Tianqi's "Chicken and Rabbit in the Same Cage" (reporter's note: the winner of the Best Drama Award in the Youth Competition) is, the son went to see his father in prison, and the two had a conversation. There is a big world in a small play.

I still think that young people don't need to be cool and dazzling, they should be down-to-earth, and they should focus on the story, how the story is structured and how it unfolds, and the performance must be restrained. I especially hate the kind of sprinkling performances that can be seen in short videos, but many people may be affected and feel that our drama must be "started". I told the contestants of the Youth Championship that the drama with turbulent hearts and calm appearance is the most difficult to perform. Marlon Brando, Robert De Niro, and Al Pacino howled when they encountered something that had broken his faith?

We need to learn this on stage as well. The performance must be subtle, restrained, and forbearing, and don't let the play fly away because of the audience's shouts and applause, so as to dominate the audience. Some of the dramas are particularly loud, but we feel that it is a bit pleasing to the audience, and after performing once, we know which burden is in which place, and the second time we perform desperately, there is no even control and no rhythm. "Me and Liu Hongmei at the Station" is particularly stable and does not cater to the audience.

One-man show is not easy to perform, one person has to interpret many people.

We watched the registration video, and there were a lot of one-man shows. A lot of it is like what we did when we were in school - a person encounters a dilemma in a unit of time, and through the struggle between man and man and the natural environment, the problem is pushed to a certain climax. But we should show the audience who comes to Wuzhen something new, something real. We chose 3 one-man shows this time, such as "Me and Liu Hongmei at the Station", which are not one-man shows in the traditional sense, more often they are talking and revealing, in a particularly plain state, but there is content in the heart.

I think the Bengwan Theater and Youth Competition in Wuzhen are an experimental field for young Chinese theater people, as long as you have the ability, you can put your own experimental things on the stage, the audience is tolerant, and our judges are also tolerant.

Outside the Bengwan Theater, the posters of all the works of this year's Youth Competition are pasted on the gray stone brick wall (Southern People Weekly reporter Zhang Yuxin/Photo)

If you don't do drama, we can certainly understand

When I was 33, 34 and 35 years old, I participated in the youth championships as a player, which was very memorable and worthwhile. In the first year I did the only comedy out of the 12 plays, in the second year I did the only physical play with no lines, and in the third year I did the only montage play, which relied on light to explain the performance. Now I am still a teacher, but I definitely can't get rid of the same thing as those three years, people are getting richer and richer, and they are becoming less and less courageous. Especially when working at a university, imagination is not so wild.

In the first year of the Youth Bidding Competition, we lined up at two or three o'clock every night at school, and lined up for students to give up, saying that these judges must have high specifications and could not be shortlisted. I said, I have been a teacher for so many years, I have also done scientific research and won awards, and the competition without registration fee must be a good competition.

I teach in two public colleges, and there is a gap between students and Nortel in terms of enrollment. My first student in the competition, the "survival rate" is very high, one is in Happy Twist, one is in Dalian Repertory Theatre, one is now an anchor with goods, and he is doing very well, I have watched his live broadcast, his live broadcast skills and performance are linked, he will hang up, smash hanging, not so much watching his live broadcast, but watching him act in a play.

I also rehearsed plays in college, and I also rehearsed plays in Wuzhen, and sometimes one brain is divided into two ideas. In fact, Chinese universities are all the same, and university education has the characteristics of universities. Therefore, young people may be very excited when they get the props of the Wuzhen Theater Festival, because they finally have the opportunity to make a comedy, tragedy or absurd drama that they really like and have the texture of life. Let's say something particularly unpleasant, Wuzhen's drama does not mean that you can perform it every day after you perform in Wuzhen, just like that, for 10 days, you won the award, and the chance of (continuously) being staged is also very small. Some plays are very immature, but because their scenes are grand enough, they have been performing.

I still encourage young people to go to theater festivals and competitions. Theater lovers from all over the country gather in one place to talk about drama, and this preciousness is something that you will linger in your mind for a lifetime.

The goal of the Wuzhen Theater Festival is very clear, if you capture 5% of the people, this theater festival can be held. There is no way for us to have a chain-like and fuel-fueling assistance like some film festivals, giving money to shoot, release, and launch. Theatre is still a niche, and there are certainly many more screens in the country than there are theatres. But we're here to give them a deep shot in the arm. Every year, the audience of the Wuzhen Youth Championship has the finalists from previous years, and if they didn't vote this year, they didn't vote, and they went back to Wuzhen to watch the play.

Everyone has their own life choices, and if we don't do drama, we can certainly understand it, because it's good to be alive. If you want to make a drama, make a good one.

Southern People Weekly reporter Zhang Yuxin

Editor-in-charge: Yang Jingru