The enlightenment of the "heat" of the Peking opera "New Dragon Gate Inn": the best inheritance is the innovation | yangtze river review

Yangtze River Daily commentator Zhou Jie

The Peking Opera "New Dragon Gate Inn" created by Shanghai Peking Opera House and others recently debuted at the Wuhan Theater Festival. In the play, the fierce and smooth martial arts design, the exquisite and colorful actor modeling, and the performance of the protagonist Shi Yihong, who plays two roles in one person, integrates the characteristics of the four genres of "Mei Shang Chengxun", which makes the Wuhan audience addicted. After the performance, the curtain fell three times, and the audience still stood under the stage and did not want to leave.

Peking Opera "New Dragon Gate Inn" is adapted from the martial arts film of the same name, such an adaptation, whether it is a bold reference to the theme, a brave attempt at the structure of the drama, or a new role performance, a transplantation breakthrough in stage orchestration, how to see it is an innovation based on the virtual, freehand and stylized ontology characteristics of Peking Opera, and it is also a "cross-border" reform that integrates musicals, operas, dramas and film elements.

In fact, Peking Opera "New Dragon Gate Inn" is not the first "cross-border" of Peking Opera, in recent years, the Peking Opera circle across the country has launched a lot of "Peking Opera unlike Peking Opera" to explore its own path of enrichment and development. Since the adaptation of this drama in 2019, the performances in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing and other places have caused great repercussions, which proves that increasing the combination of traditional vocal cavity, unique skills and modern aesthetics of Peking Opera, and opening up the barriers between various genres and trades of Peking Opera is a feasible road for the reform and development of Peking Opera.

The "heat" of Peking Opera "New Dragon Gate Inn" also gives us some deeper thinking: for traditional culture, the best protection and inheritance is innovation. Traditional culture must take on the underpinnings of history, but also to pick up the current atmosphere, in order not to cling to the shortcomings, and to achieve a unique aspect, such as Shi Yihong's deep feelings when rehearsing this play: "New points of view need to have new ideas." ”

Now many traditional cultures, intangible cultural heritage, etc. are lamenting the lack of successors, young people do not love to learn, do not love to see, such an intergenerational barrier, to a large extent, "lack" in the current atmosphere, only talk about the original taste, only talk about authentic ancestral traditions, do not dare to cross the thunder pool, do not dare to make mistakes, tradition has become a "set" culture, bound innovation, but also strangled creativity.

Tradition as a tradition lies in its profundity and advancement with the times, just like the culture of Peking Opera, which has not only created the traditions of the Beijing school, the Hai school and countless schools, but also created the "innovation" tradition of daring to break through the genre, industry and program to "create a new day". The adaptation of the Peking opera "New Dragon Gate Inn" is to grasp the main line of innovation. A generation of drama cultivates a generation of audiences, and only in the continuous persistence and activation of history and the present can traditional culture be evergreen.

【Editor: Zhang Jing】

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