Yao Mu Shuang Zhou Baichun, the secret of sixty years of great red and purple

Other places, I don't know, only know that in Shanghai, "Yao Zhou" is no one who does not know. There are two reasons: one is that there are too many people in Shanghai who like to be funny, so it is not too difficult for artists to become famous; the other is that the two have been working together for too long, so they can influence several generations continuously. After Yao Mu became a double artist, he sang funny on the radio, and only worked with an artist for two months, then he found a little brother as a partner, and from then on, he went all the way to the end. The little brother has no teacher, gets on the radio, opens his mouth and comes, very likable. However, the younger brother is only seventeen years old, still studying, in order to avoid trouble, the elder brother named the younger brother with his mother's surname "Zhou Baiyin", but unexpectedly mistakenly made "Zhou Baichun" when introducing to the audience. I think this anecdote is implicitly in line with the way of funny, because the ancient books say that the slippers are chaotic and the same, that is, to gather the things that are confused and show them to others.

There are rules for the ranking of funny lines, the first hand is in the front, and the lower hand is in the back. Zhou Baichun got started, Yao Mu doubled his hands, and it was reasonable to say that "Zhou Yao" was. There are two reasons: one is that the brother works with the brother, and in the early days, the brother teased the brother; the other is caused by the characteristics of this art. The jargon cloud "three points to make seven points to praise", three points of seven points does not refer to the number of jobs, but refers to the weight of the work. To get started, you only need to follow the prepared way to talk, pay attention to the rhythm when you gage, even if there is improvisation, it is within your control, which is easy. However, the first hand must be followed all the way by the hand, which guides the topic, paves the way for the gimmick, and makes the finishing touch to the whole article. If you encounter improvisation, you must respond flexibly and appropriately, which can be described as heavy. There is a cross-talk called "On Teasing", the first hand is sarcastic and started is "marrying a daughter-in-law to play a banner - join in the fun" and "deaf ears - pure decoration", the next bet does not cooperate, and even deliberately attacks, so that the upper hand is exhausted and ends. If you understand this crosstalk, you will find that although you can speak the Tao, you will not actually have direct contact with the audience; although you are silent, you actually represent the audience and speak for the audience. Where stage art, actors and audiences are indispensable, only the hands are not started, which means that as long as the actors do not want the audience, they must not.

This is certainly not to say that Yao is smarter than Zhou. Before the brothers partnered, Yao Mushuang acted in a single file for a while, the response was light, and the business was not good. After the brothers partnered, Yao Gaoming flattered Zhou Gaoming, and the duo's cleverness together created the cleverness of funny art. This is the reason why "Yao Zhou" has been a big hit for sixty years.

The program of "Yao Zhou" is natural and unique. They have all studied in the church school, the English foundation is good, so they contrast the correct pronunciation with the pidgin pronunciation, the jokes are self-generated, and they can speak "Learn English" and "English Translation" uniquely; they are all proficient in dialects in various places, master all kinds of jokes caused by communication difficulties, and can speak "Dialect Miscellaneous Talks" and "Tangtangs everywhere" interestingly; they are not highly educated, have a lot of knowledge, and can speak "MinglunTang" and "High Price for Advice" full of books; they are all Ningbo immigrants, familiar with local traditional customs, And adapt to the modern urban fashion, can say "fortune telling" and "new and old law marriage" to the wind and water... All gimmicks, the so-called Western School of Shanghai, come from history and reality, and all truly and artistically reflect the social structure of Shanghai's Huayang miscellaneous places and five-way miscellaneous places, and the cultural style of the intersection of Chinese and Western, and the mixing of old and new.

The comical humor of "Yao Zhou" is interesting and meaningful. In "Eating Wine", Yao Mushuang talked about the "skill" of eating more than others at the banquet - eating white chopped chicken can not be clipped straight, but must be copied horizontally, at least two or three pieces; and then eating fried shrimp can not first scoop a spoon, but to scoop half a spoon, swallow and spoon a spoon, so that you can eat a spoon and a half; and if you eat two sides of yellow, you can not gently pick, but you have to insert it into the noodles, and each hand holds a chopstick to roll, so that in less than half a minute, a whole plate of noodles is all on his chopsticks... There is also a truth to this, which is called old skin and full mouth. "Yao Zhou" is selfish and overly shrewd on the surface, but it contains the pressure of survival in big cities and the difficulty of living with small citizens. The brothers came from a well-to-do family, but due to the war and the economic downturn, the father lost his job and the son had to drop out of school to earn a living. So what is related to this experience, they play the most vivid and deepest. In "Student's Intention", Zhou Baichun said that he went to the church and was a helpless choice in the middle of the family road. So when he answered that he heard the wrong account reported by the guy, did not collect money and pasted an umbrella upside down, and ate a loss; then said that he was holding sixteen bowls of rice in one hand, holding a hot tofu soup in the other, and happened to step on a banana peel at the staircase, the soup bowl came from top to bottom, and the sound of "meow" was buckled on the bald head of the boss downstairs, because of "hot expansion and cold contraction", he could not pull it out... It can make the audience laugh and ensure that these gimmicks are not frivolous and meaningless. Some artists are good at imitating the "Yao Zhou" gimmick routine and tone of voice, I think none of them are like it, because they only have their skin and flesh, and they have not obtained its essence, that is, inner sentimentality and deep compassion. For the comical art of "Yao Zhou", many people know that it is a smile with tears, and few people know that it is a tear with laughter.

The performance of "Yao Zhou" is yin and yang and gives birth to dialectics. Zhou Baichun's opening was mostly slow and logical, cold and cunning; Yao Mushuang's speech was mostly straightforward and straightforward, enthusiastic and clumsy. There are also cases of hot and cold weeks, and the contrast is also large. Especially when Zhou Baichun played a correct role or put on a reasonable posture, Yao Mushuang always acted as a villain, exposing people's weaknesses, credulity, greed, and the belly of a gentleman with the heart of a villain; when Zhou Baichun played a role against him or preached crooked reasoning, Yao Mushuang often acted as a decent person, showing people's virtues such as kindness, honesty, sympathy for weakness, and willingness to help others. The so-called yin and yang laughter, all the hot and cold praise, are all dialectical guarantees of human good and evil. Aristotle's theory of funny, to the effect that actors imitate those who are "worse", the so-called "worse", rarely evil, more ugly, in order to remind people to constantly change the ugly and turn into beauty. I thought that "Yao Zhou" had reached this aesthetic standard, achieving a balance between beauty and ugliness and the coexistence of elegance and customs. Clever art is to maintain balance, funny art to express ugliness is to declare beauty, reflecting custom is to pursue elegance. There are too many things in the world that can be ridiculed and ridiculed, which can be described as inexhaustible and inexhaustible, and if they are only gimmicked and gimmicked, and laughed only for laughter, they are bound to destroy the balance, go to extremes, and become extremely vulgar and extremely ugly or even extremely evil. In this regard, many burlesque artists are aware and have achievements, but unfortunately, they are either not as expensive as Yao Zhou in persistence, or not as natural as Yao Zhou. It's exactly --

The tongue shakes the lips, and the understanding is biased.

Only because the children do not know the suffering, but they laugh the most in the world.

A few years ago, I was invited to attend the commemorative meeting of "Yao Zhou" and listened to the speeches of several "Yao Zhou" disciples. They are all famous burlesque artists, and they all have a certain essence of "Yao Zhou", change and develop, and become a family. When they talk about emotion, they choke up and even cry silently, which I have never seen before. By endowment and practice, a person becomes a person with artistic ability, and then a person with a name by creation and experience. But no matter how clever and famous, it is still human.

Zhou Baichun once said that to the vast audience, he seemed to be just an embodiment of happiness. In fact, like everyone else, he is full of joys and sorrows, and there are many varieties of flowers. If this statement is true, then the burlesque artist is actually overdrawing his joy and happiness in front of people, suppressing his anger and sorrow. The higher the achievement of the former, the greater the energy of the latter, no wonder there is news of a famous comedian suffering from depression in China and abroad. In this regard, how does "Yao Zhou" deal with it and how to balance it? Other things, I don't know, only that they smile every time, nod and bend over. Before they died, they thanked the doctors and nurses, and Zhou Baichun gently sang a song for them in a hoarse voice. (Hu Xiaojun)