The Paper's reporter Gao Dan
On September 26 and 27, based on the novel of the same name and the Peking Opera "Red Rock" (1984 performance version) of the Beijing Opera House, the modern Peking Opera "Xu Yunfeng" starring Tan Zhengyan, Du Zhenjie, Zhu Qiang, Ni Shengchun, Zhou Meihui, Meng Xianteng, Wang Qianqian and others was reported and performed at the Chang'an Grand Theatre. This is the second performance of "Xu Yunfeng" after the processing and improvement performance in May this year and the performance at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in July. On July 22, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism released the "Announcement on the List of Works Participating in the Ninth Peking Opera Arts Festival", and two works of the Beijing Opera House, the newly compiled modern Peking Opera "Li Dazhao" and the modern Peking Opera "Xu Yunfeng", were selected.
"Xu Yunfeng" tells the story of Xu Yunfeng, secretary of the Chongqing Underground Party Working Committee, who was arrested for betrayal by traitors while on a mission to organize the rescue of his friends in the Geleshan concentration camp. In this purgatory on earth, he organized his fellow prisoners to engage in a wit struggle with the reactionaries. In the dungeon, he discusses a rescue plan with Hua Ziliang, who pretends to be crazy, and uses his hands to dig the tunnel to freedom. In order not to sabotage the rescue plan, Xu Yunfeng refused to escape from prison alone. He made a final spiritual contest with Xu Pengfei with the ideals, will and ambitions of the communists, and completed the rescue task with his life.
"Xu Yunfeng" is based on "Red Rock", which is a re-creation of the Peking Opera "Red Rock" created by the Beijing Opera House nearly 40 years ago, the screenwriter Wang Xinji actively created several drafts of the script during the Spring Festival, and the theater has held several special seminars on the script of the play, discussing, revising and improving the script through on-site, online and conference calls, actively promoting the desk creation of the repertoire, hoping to show the spirit of the new era while retaining the historical thickness and cultural heritage of the original work.
The screenwriter of the 1984 version of Peking Opera "Red Rock" is Yan Su and Wang Zengqi, the director is Chi Jinsheng, and the screenwriter of "Xu Yunfeng" is Wang Xinji and the director is Li Qing. In "Xu Yunfeng", Tan Xiaozeng and Tan Zhengyan, the two generations of inheritors of Tan Pai art, played Xu Yunfeng, the old actor Du Zhenjie played Xu Pengfei, the leader of the Ma Pai old student Zhu Qiang played Hua Ziliang, and the young veteran actor Ni Shengchun played the roles created by the previous artists in that year, reflecting the orderly inheritance of the Peking Opera genre art.
According to the Beijing Opera House, the development of genre art is closely related to the development of Peking Opera: if the genre flourishes, Peking Opera prospers; if the genre is scattered, Peking Opera declines. Peking Opera genre art has always supported and promoted the existence and development of Peking Opera art. As the largest and most profound state-level key Peking Opera Troupe, the predecessor of Beijing Peking Opera House can be traced back to the Beijing Peking Opera Troupe, which was formed by the convergence of mei Lanfang, Shang Xiaoyun, Cheng Yanqiu and Xun Huisheng' respective genre troupes, and the Beijing Peking Opera Troupe with Ma Lianliang, Tan Fuying, Zhang Junqiu, Qiu Shengrong and Zhao Yanxia as the lead actors. The genre style, stage style and artistic achievements of many predecessor masters have left a precious spiritual wealth and a heavy historical and cultural accumulation for the theater and Chinese culture.
Over the past few decades, the theater has made many efforts in inheriting and protecting genre art, cultivated many genre art inheritors and young actors, and continuously injected new vitality into the inheritance and development of genre art. But at the same time, it also faces the problem of the loss of some genre plays. In order to carry forward and inherit the development of Peking Opera art, effectively excavate and sort out the traditional repertoire that is on the verge of being lost and have excavation value, and solve the problem of the sharp decline in the number of traditional repertoire inheritance, the theater established the traditional repertoire studio and the Tan Pai Art Research Institute in 2019, focusing on improving the artistic quality of excavating and sorting out traditional repertoire, so that the traditional repertoire that is on the verge of being lost is presented on the stage at a higher artistic level, laying the foundation for the sustainable development of Peking Opera art.
From "Red Rock" to "Xu Yunfeng", it is an important artistic practice of the Beijing Peking Opera House, and it is also a useful attempt in the process of excavating and sorting out the lost repertoire after the establishment of the Tan Pai Art Research Institute.
Editor-in-Charge: Chen Shihuai
Proofreader: Ding Xiao