The Paper's reporter Wang Yi
On the evening of June 28, fireworks rose from the sky for four degrees, reflecting the sky above the bird's nest dazzlingly; on the evening of July 1, the audience waiting in front of the big and small screens saw the golden party emblem as high as 16 meters rise solemnly, shining brightly... Although the theatrical performance "The Great Journey" celebrating the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China has come to an end, the evening party, which was performed by more than 8,000 people and included artists from all over the taiwan strait, is still unforgettable. During the performance of nearly two hours, music, song and dance, drama, opera, poetry... All art forms vividly interpret the earth-shattering cause of the CPC in leading the people of the whole country to carry out revolution, construction and reform over the past 100 years, and paint a magnificent picture of the people of Chinese from standing up and getting rich to becoming strong.
The great journey, calling for the great epic, just like the name of this evening, "large-scale situation epic". Behind this scene is the hard work and hard work of thousands of people. A few days ago, Tian Qinxin, deputy director of "The Great Journey" and president of the National Theatre of China, accepted an exclusive interview with the surging news reporter in Beijing to describe the creative process after the literary and artistic performance.
Tian Qinxin
"Every dramatic story presents a living slice of the times"
After the Spring Festival in 2019, under the guidance of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the centenary of the founding of the Party began to be planned. "The party plan has actually been polished, even during the epidemic in 2020, the creation has not stopped. Before I was the director in charge of the drama part, after the end of the two sessions this year, I officially received the deputy director of the large-scale sitcom epic "The Great Journey", and together with another deputy director, Sha Xiaolan, I was responsible for the directing of the entire evening video part and the drama video group, which included 'Departure' and six theatrical passages in the four chapters, as well as the theatrical performances and poetry recitation parts in the performance program. Tian Qinxin recalled.
"The Great Journey", as a grand evening party, should show the picture of the flourishing of contemporary Chinese literature and art. "The evening dance includes folk dance, classical dance, ballet, modern dance; singing folk songs, bel canto, mintong, meitong and popular singing, as well as musicals and Peking opera performances that are the culmination of Chinese opera. In this large-scale evening, Chinese drama is a unique story situational expression. The whole performance requires accurate length, every minute and second must be calculated accurately, the average length of a theatrical performance is only about one minute, the longest is only more than two minutes, but it is an important node on the timeline, and each drama story presents a fresh slice of an era, to hit the softest place in the audience's heart. Under the leadership of The Chief Writer Zhu Hai, we have been 'grinding the drama'. Tian Qinxin said.
Large-scale performances, again at the National Stadium, if there is a theatrical content, what kind of appearance should it be presented? "The stadium is mainly about watching competitive matches, and the athletes are the protagonists on the field. The audience looks at their heroic posture in the competition full of power and speed, and will not pay special attention to their micro-expressions, but the drama focuses on expression expression, micro-expressions to convey feelings, and the actors need to present their vivid performances. The plan given by Tian Qinxin is to increase the theater performance space on the rotating platform on the left and right sides of the large left and right sides, and add LED screens to become a fixed venue for theatrical performances, "Without affecting the song and dance scenes, the actors performed a drama on the turntable with a length of only 15 meters." ”
"Shou Chang (Li Dazhao), look at these suffering people." "Brother Zhongfu (Chen Duxiu), China does not have a group that can really express the power of the people, and if we can set up a strong and sophisticated organization, then there is hope for a complete and great change in China." In the "Departure" section, the drama and dance program "Breaking Dawn" has two episodes involving theatrical performance, which are completed on the left and right revolving stages: "Southern Chen Bei Li" meets to build the party; and the young Mao Zedong said loudly, "We don't say, who says?" If we don't do it, who does it? Together with Chen Wangdao, the translator of the Communist Manifesto, and Qu Qiubai, the translator of the Internationale, he performed "The Road of Light" together.
Subsequently, the zunyi meeting was presented in the first chapter of "Moving Forward in The Fire", the drama and dance program "Long March"; the second chapter, "Wind and Rain", the scene chorus and dance "Battle Flag Is Picturesque" in "A Family Letter"; in the fourth chapter "Splendid Future", the song "Singing Mountain Songs to the Party", the first half of the song "Singing Mountain Songs to the Party" first showed the poverty alleviation theme of "getting rid of real poverty and really getting rid of poverty" with two "poverty alleviation" stories. Among them, "Minning Town" tells the model of East-West cooperation, Fujian helps Ningxia, Minning Town "from drinking yellow soup soup water to drinking cool Yellow River water", here the plot of "Mountains and Seas" has been restructured, and Zhang Jiayi, Huang Xuan, Yan Ni, Huang Bo and other actors have been invited to perform. The "Eighteen-Hole Village" is the location where the general secretary proposed "seeking truth from facts, adapting to local conditions, categorical guidance, and accurate poverty alleviation".
As the chief screenwriter and director of the national song and dance drama "Poverty Alleviation Road" staged in the golden autumn of last year, Tian Qinxin has a deep affection for the poverty alleviation cadres, and this emotion is her personal experience of going to the countryside many times to collect style, "one sweat, two feet of mud", but in her opinion, compared with Huang Wenxiu, the first secretary who died on the road to poverty alleviation, the art reproduces the hard work and dedication of the poverty alleviation cadres, and it is worth it to suffer no matter how much suffering. In the play, wang Lei, an actor who plays the first secretary, said with tears in his eyes, "Eighteen-hole village is my home, and I am willing to make my home more and more prosperous." Hearing this, I also burst into tears. I really feel empathy, why should I follow the Chinese Communist Party? It is precisely because the Communist Party is a political party that serves the people wholeheartedly. On the occasion of the centenary of the founding of the party, we literary and art workers used a literary and artistic performance to express our love for the party Central Committee and our respect for the vast number of cadres who have helped the poor. Tian Qinxin said.
"The Power of a Powerful Country" is the last poetry recitation program of the whole performance, led by Chen Daoming, Zhang Guoguo, Chen Baoguo, He Bing, the four most famous male actors in China at the moment, "They are all artists with great talent for acting, and their oratory skills are even more outstanding, even so, these four have been seriously rehearsed for nearly three weeks." Tian Qinxin said that on June 13 this year, all the well-known star actors in the party were in place, "due to epidemic prevention requirements, all star actors live in a building and cannot go out." At the rehearsal scene, there are no big stars, everyone is the party's literary and artistic workers, and every time they rehearse overnight, the actors are there. ”
Tian Qinxin and the "Great Journey" drama director team
Tian Qinxin at the National Stadium
"Instant shooting, instantaneous guide, real-time screen projection"
Located in the south of the central area of Beijing Olympic Park, the National Stadium (Bird's Nest) has a construction area of 258,000 square meters and can accommodate 91,000 spectators at the same time. On the evening of August 8, 2008, the grand scene of the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games may still be vividly remembered. On the evening of June 28, 2021, the theatrical performance "The Great Journey" held during the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China will also be recorded in history. According to the audience who watched the scene, after entering the stadium, the first thing that came into sight was the 180-meter-long giant screen standing behind the stage - you know, the radius of the bird's nest is only 142 meters, and it is conceivable that this screen will definitely occupy the center of the vision.
"This should be the first time that the National Stadium has set up this large screen, which can fully display the historical picture of the Chinese Communist Party through the past century, in addition, the introduction of new technologies can help the artistic expression of the party and provide a broader imagination space for the creation of the party." Tian Qinxin introduced. But returning to the characteristics of theatrical art itself, how to present the actors' affectionate and meticulous performances on the big screen? This is a problem.
Tian Qinxin later gave a solution that combined technology and art innovation, and the twelve words were summarized as "instant shooting, instantaneous guidance, and real-time screen projection". "There was an OB van for live shooting, and we instantly edited and projected it on the giant screen in real time, which had to be done with 5G transmission." This process was actually used in her previous drama work "Wild Ride", "but the volume and difficulty of operation are far less so big." How big is a theater? This time, we want to make it possible for tens of thousands of spectators to see it. ”
"When thousands of 5G base stations are put into use, China, which is independently networked, will @ the future in the name of 'Internet of Everything'." The recitation of actor He Bing in "The Power of a Powerful Country" is exactly a portrayal of the use of new technologies in the entire performance of "The Great Journey". On the night of the performance, the scene-based drama performance shooting screen was transmitted to the guide console in real time through 8 channels of 5G+4K ultra-high-definition video, and the real-time lens editing and real-time color grading were processed, and the delicate film texture picture was presented on the main screen of the scene in real time, providing an immersive viewing experience for the audience.
"The concert is to follow the actors, we are in accordance with the filming method of the film, shooting at the actors at the same time, the camera position must be moved at any time, to adjust." Through the change of the relationship between the film scenes, the effect of the film narrative is presented. To this end, we have also set up a special team to overcome difficulties, and here we would like to thank China Mobile Migu Company and Beijing Company for the world's first 'drama performance 5G real-time film shooting' technology. ”
Theatrical performance screen
In the drama and dance "Breaking Dawn", the song "Zunyi Conference Shines" and other program scenes, the use of "5G real-time film shooting" technology allows the audience to freely shuttle between the present and history at the same time, immersed in the great changes of the past century; in the scene song and dance "Battle Song of the Strong Army", the children's chorus and dance "Destiny and Common" and other program scenes, the use of "bullet time" seems to freeze time and space, showing the beauty of large-scale scenario epics in the form of film special effects.
The performance was very effective, but the rehearsal and commissioning process in the early stages was arduous. In the "B venue" of the pre-preparation rehearsal, director Sha Xiaolan and stage designer Sun Tianwei built an equal proportion of stage for the convenience of rehearsal, "25 student photographers from the Beijing Film Academy trained with us, each photographer carried an ultra-low latency 5G backpack to test repeatedly, it is very difficult to switch the actor's performance rhythm into it, plus how to make the audio and video signals not delayed?" How to do the large-screen delivery (signal) does not drop the sign? After two months of continuous struggle, I was finally able to produce a short video 'blockbuster' on the spot, without a set of repetitive shots in six dramatic segments. Tian Qinxin said.
The drama video group of the party totaled more than 200 people, and Tian Qinxin jokingly called it the "night group". "Our daily working hours are from 11 p.m. to 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning, because it is a square art presented in the form of a party, and the exposure of the instant shooting cannot be verified under the sun during the day. And from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m., it will take up the time of young dancers, many of whom are college students, and it is when they grow up, or do not want them to stay up all night every day. Tian Qinxin said that during that time, they were most afraid of the dawn, and as soon as they arrived in the east, the fish belly was white, and she shouted at the scene, "There is no time, everyone grasp it!" ”
After nearly three months of running-in, and after seven consecutive days of "night battles", "I remember clearly, at three o'clock in the morning on May 18, the screen was finally successfully cast, and everyone cheered." When I was on the main stage steps, I was in a bit of a trance, and one fell unconsciously, resulting in a fractured left ankle. "At Jishuitan Hospital, experts recommended surgery after consultation. On June 6, Tian Qinxin, who was in the hospital, returned a "Shun" word to the director group and quickly returned to work, "In fact, I am still taking painkillers every day." After the fracture, I thought about things that I had not usually thought about, the Communist Party of China has gone through a hundred years of history, every step forward, have to pay the arduous price of bloody sacrifice, because of the excessive pain after their own surgery, but also thought of the soldiers to resist the United States and aid Korea, they were wounded in the battlefield, there was no timely anesthetic, that pain is really cone-heart-wrenching, I actually experienced it this time. However, for the centenary party, I also fought! Tian Qinxin said.
Editor-in-Charge: Chen Shihuai
Proofreader: Ding Xiao