As one of the plays in this year's Shang opera art season, from May 7 to 13, the drama "Hamlet" brought by the Shang opera performance department will be performed at the Shanghai Opera Experimental Theater. It is worth noting that this performance will produce two versions at the same time, "Mandarin version" and "Tibetan version". The "Tibetan version" of "Hamlet" is also a graduation drama of the 2017 Tibetan class, directed by the famous actor Pu Cunxin.
The Tibetan class of the Shanghai Theater Academy's Acting Department enrolls students once a decade, so the performance of each Tibetan class is very valuable. The class of 2017 is the first Tibetan class in the history of shanghai opera to perform the undergraduate system, and its graduation performance has attracted more attention.
Pu Cunxin introduced to reporters that Shakespeare's "Hamlet" was chosen because it has a very important cultural meaning, that is, Chinese literature and drama can profoundly, accurately and richly interpret Shakespeare.
He is one of the "actors who have performed the most Shakespearean plays in China", and has performed many performances and adaptations such as Shakespeare's "Hamlet", "The Great General Kou Liulan", "King Lear", "The Tempest" and so on. He loved Shakespeare and once copied Shakespeare's plays by hand. In 1990, he starred in "Hamlet 1990" directed by Lin Zhaohua, and for more than 30 years, he can still turn "Hamlet" backwards like a stream. In 2018, he collaborated with director Li Liuyi to play the king in the new version of Hamlet.
"We've watched Hamlet all over the world. I really liked the Hamlet version of this show. Today we have done a lot of new processing, there will be a jump in rhythm, which is refreshing. This time, "young director" Pu Cunxin continued the exploration and practice of the drama system with Chinese characteristics.
As an adjunct professor at the Shanghai Theater Academy, Pu Cunxin said that when he talked to him about teaching work in the first year of play, he became interested in the Tibetan class, "Many students come from pastoral areas, and their Mandarin level is not very high, but their innate simplicity and sincerity are so impressive, and once their potential is developed, they will have a very unique advantage as a performer." ”
In the process of teaching, the opera also consciously chooses some plays that show the life of the 1950s and 1960s for them to interpret, and the students in the Tibetan class can often show that spirit, which is rare today, because the spirit comes from nature and comes from its unique state of life.
In the first half of 2020, due to the epidemic, Pu Cunxin could not face the students in the Tibetan class, which made him very anxious, thinking that "the children's teaching cannot be delayed", and at the same time thinking about how to carry out teaching after the epidemic eased. After the epidemic improved, Pu Cunxin personally directed the basically formed "Kelsang Rob and Dolma Tsering" for the students of the Tibetan class. This is a "Romeo and Juliet" that transplants the background of the story to old Tibet.
"I like these children very much," Pu Cunxin's own familiarity with Hamlet also helped him better adjust the performance status of the students on the stage. "Although there have been seven Tibetan classes in the history of shangju, with the joint efforts of everyone, the performance of this session is still impressive."
Yang Jia, the main teacher of the Tibetan class, said that "Hamlet" has been lined up for more than three weeks, "the students learned Pu Cunxin's working methods and performance knowledge, and more importantly, learned his behavior." ”
Since 1959, the Department of Opera Performance has recruited more than 300 ethnic minorities from nearly 20 performance classes in Tibet, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia and Qinghai to train students. At the beginning of 1962, the first Tibetan performance class brought the Tian Han drama "Princess Wencheng" to Beijing, and was cordially received by Premier Zhou Enlai, who returned to Lhasa and founded the first Tibetan repertory theatre, the Tibet Repertory Theatre.
Photo courtesy of Shanghai Theatre Academy
Author: Tong Weijing
Editor: Guo Chaohao