From April 19th to 21st, Fujian Happy Twist's Xiamen original urban drama "Sea and Sky" was performed in Xiamen Art Theater for 5 consecutive performances.
"Sea and Sky" is set in the background of contemporary Xiamen's urban style and social life, and tells the story of young people protecting and innovating traditional culture. While fully retaining the characteristics of Happy Twist's stage works, the play integrates the wonderful scenes of the Southern Fujian dialect opera and the national intangible cultural heritage project - Gezai Opera, which is also the first time that Happy Twist presents the elements of Gezai Opera in a stage play.
"Broad Sky" invited Zhuang Hairong, deputy director of Xiamen Gezai Opera Research Center, and Su Yanrong, a national first-class actor, as artistic directors to deeply explore Xiamen's regional culture and the unique charm of Gezai opera. It is reported that "Sea and Sky" is the second original repertoire created by Happy Twist based in Xiamen, which perfectly integrates various elements such as classic twist style + modern story, wonderful lyrics in Hokkien + exquisite costumes.
It is understood that "Broad Sea and Sky" invited Su Yanrong, the first "plum blossom" of the opera, to serve as an assistant guest and play the mother of Li Shuyue, the heroine of "Broad Sea and Sky". This is Su Yanrong's first cross-border participation, and she also plays a famous singer in the play. "The century-old opera is very young and inclusive, and traditional opera also needs to go out to attract more young audiences. Su Yanrong said that Happy Twist is a well-known brand in China, and Gezai Opera is a local opera culture in Xiamen, and the combination of the two is a new attempt, which has brought her a lot of inspiration and thinking, "such as how to integrate the traditional elements, styles and concepts of Gezai Opera into modern musical dramas, so that the audience can be interested in learning about traditional opera, and then attract the audience into the theater."
According to Li Yiyang, an outstanding young director of Happy Twist, "Broad Sky" premiered at the Xiamen Art Theater in December 2023. After that, the script was continuously polished and upgraded, adding content such as singing sections of singing and singing of operas, and water sleeve dances of operas.
"Creating this play was a challenging thing. Li Yiyang told reporters that the performance of opera and pop music on the same stage is not only to put the two performance forms together, but also to have reasonable story logic to support it. How to build the story structure and straighten out the relationship between the characters, he and all the main creators work together every day to polish the details and improve the script.
Source: New Fujian