My hometown is Shanghai, known as the city that never sleeps, I don't know when many people call Shanghai the magic capital, I think it should not be a pejorative meaning, because the city has brought hope and happiness to many people of different cultures.
The most representative of Shanghai's local opera should be Shanghai opera, but the most popular should be burlesque.
Burlesque is a new type of opera that was gradually formed by the influence of Chinese and foreign comedies, farces and local operas in Jiangnan from the late Qing Dynasty to the middle of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression. It is popular in many parts of Shanghai, Jiangsu and Zhejiang. Its traditional repertoire preserves Shanghai's folklore and the unique worldliness of "Ten Mile Ocean Field", and its creative method is very characteristic of Shanghai school.
On May 23, 2011, Burlesque was approved by the State Council of the People's Republic of China to be included in the third batch of national intangible cultural heritage list.
Shanghai burlesque was born in the late Qing Dynasty and early Min. Burlesque emerged from the "new drama" (later called civilization drama) performed by Students in Shanghai at the end of the Qing Dynasty and intellectuals who returned from overseas; It takes the new drama as the carrier, on the one hand, it takes the excellent comedy of traditional Chinese opera and foreign comedy as an example to perform "burlesque drama", "burlesque new drama", "burlesque comedy" and "fun drama", on the other hand, it also makes "burlesque interspersed" in the main drama of many new dramas.
Large-scale stage burlesque "Seventy-Two Tenants"
In 1914, the enlightened new drama company of the Shifting Wind Society and Ren Tianzhi performed the first burlesque play "Who Dies First" in Shanghai, which was the representative play of the time, which skillfully integrated into the dramatic conflict, and contrasted the comedic elements such as misunderstanding and self-defeating with the narrative structure of the new play, creating a precedent for the style of burlesque performance. Later generations often applied the comical routines of this play to other burlesque plays.
After the 1930s, Shanghai burlesque has developed greatly. During this period, three people of funny were born: "veteran funny" Wang Incompetent, "social funny" Jiang Xiaoxiao and Bao Lele, and "trendy funny" Liu Chunshan, who competed to perform and show their funny talents, and became popular on the beach.
The 1930s and 1940s were the heyday of the development of burlesque, with artists performing in Shanghai's major playgrounds, radio broadcasts and church performances reaching more than 100 shows at the most. The first generation of burlesque artists also include Bao Lele, Zhao Xixi, Lu Qiqi and others, followed by the second generation of burlesque artists such as Zhu Xiangfei, Cheng Xiaoting, Fan Haha, Xiao Mimi, Xiao Xixi, Yao Mushuang, Zhou Baichun, Yuan Yiling, Yang Huasheng, Wen Binbin, etc., many of whom are also famous actors who later became funny.
At the end of 1941, the Outbreak of the Pacific War, the Japanese army occupied the concession, the Shanghai playground business was depressed, the church business was light, the radio station was blocked by the enemy and the fake, and it was difficult for the one-legged artists to make a living, so there was a large burlesque and burlesque troupe jointly performed by the one-legged artists. At the beginning of 1942, Jiang Xiaoxiao initiated and organized Yang Tianxiao, Zhao Baoshan, Zhongxinxiao, etc. to adopt the system of civilized drama, playing a comical performance technique, and performing the first original drama "A Bowl of Rice" with a storyline and characters, which satirized the rice shop owners who hoarded juqi and sympathized with the lower-class people who had no food and clothing, which aroused wide resonance among the citizens, was quite popular, and was considered to be the first play from one-legged play to burlesque. At the same time, Jiang Xiaoxiao, Bao Lele and others organized the establishment of the first burlesque theater troupe "Laughing Theatre Troupe", the initial performance of the play "absurd", "colorful", etc., subsequently, other one-legged opera artists and some civilized opera actors have also organized burlesque theater troupes, by the end of the 1940s, shanghai alone had more than 40 professional burlesque theater troupes. Since then, although the one-legged opera of quyi still exists, the drama burlesque drama has been born since then, and many actors are also one-legged plays and burlesque plays.
The burlesque of the period after 1949 staged many works that celebrated the new era and exposed the old society, which was closely related to the entire political climate of the early 1950s. Burlesque artists and troupes have been ideologically transformed, and the professional environment and artistic accomplishment have risen to a new height, and they are positive and upward, with a grateful mood, they created a number of burlesque plays that cooperated with the political movement at that time.
After the 1980s, the literary and artistic stage was rejuvenated, and a number of burlesque troupes were restored or rebuilt. In 1981, Shanghai held the first drama festival, and a total of five large-scale burlesque plays in Shanghai participated in the performance, which had a wide impact. The creation, performance and theoretical discussion of burlesque have received great attention and attention from society and academia. The new generation of burlesque at that time and the stalwarts of today's burlesques also mostly stood out from the tempering of one-man shows and were quickly familiar to the audience.
After entering the 21st century, the theme of burlesque drama has shown diversity, including "Twelfth Night", which transplants foreign comedy classics, "The Cause of Laughter", which restores the inheritance of dialect drama masterpieces, and "Love Model House", which integrates fashion elements, etc., and the practice is further expanding.
Yao Zhou brothers
In the 1990s, the most famous burlesque performance artist Yao Mushuang, the Zhou Baichun brothers were the masters of the two-character students who later became active in the burlesque stage, and were the most influential burlesque actors in Shanghai and even the whole country. The young man saw that there was nothing to perceive, but the Shanghainese who were slightly older were all ignorant of the big names of the shanghai comics heroes- Yao Mushuang and Zhou Baichun.
Yao Zhou took a group photo with his two-character apprentices
The repertoire of burlesque plays can be roughly divided into five categories: the first type is developed and adapted according to the "paragraphs" of one-legged plays. Among them, "Sanmao Student Intention" and "Seventy-two Tenants", because of their profound ideology and complete artistic integrity, have become excellent traditions of burlesque to retain the repertoire and have been put on the screen. The second category is transplanted from the drama of civilization. There are mainly "Fang Qing Sees the Girl", "Bao Gong Catches the Hat Wind", "Ji Gong" and so on. The third category is transplanted and adapted from dramas, operas, and film scripts in the early days of liberation. Transplanted local drama repertoire, including "Suzhou Ergong" (i.e. "Lianyin") and "Mr. Good" (i.e., "Three Family Blessings"); Adapted from the drama script, there are "Happiness", "West Looking at Chang'an" and so on; Based on the drama script, there are "Little Nine Sisters" (that is, "Dragonfly Girl"),"Foolproof" (that is, "Tianluodi Net") and so on. The fourth category is a play adapted from a foreign script, such as "The Living Bodhisattva", which has been performed for one year and nine months, setting a record for the most performances since the existence of burlesque plays. The fifth category is newly created repertoire. Such as "Sample Pipe", "The Village That Never Sleeps", "Spring In the Garden", "Life Pass", "One Thousand and One Days" and so on. In September 1981, when lu xun commemorated the centenary of his birth, the burlesque "The True Biography of Ah Q" was listed as one of the key plays of the Shanghai commemorative performance.
In recent years, Yao Mushuang, Zhou Baichun, Yang Huasheng, Lu Yang and other masters and a number of "double-character" artists have left one after another, which has made many audiences who love the art of burlesque and one-man show feel sad and worried.
In the 1980s, there were more than 1,000 people in the Shanghai Burlesque Troupe, the Shanghai People's Burlesque Troupe and the Shanghai Qingyi Burlesque Troupe, and now there are fewer than 100 people.
Seeing the news about Shanghai burlesque, most of them are words such as "decline", "lost", "eating old books", etc., which are in strong contrast with the phenomenon of "brushing the screen" of funny performances and comedy programs in TV programs in the past, and the burlesque plays in offline theaters are almost extinct. The small number of excellent works, the small number of large-scale performances, and the lack of top actors have become a fact that the Shanghai burlesque community has to admit.
On the other hand, those burlesque actors who came from the class carried the banner of traffic one by one and did things that had nothing to do with burlesque. Advertising, running announcements... How many people are willing to sink their hearts into doing script grinding skills? Some people even joked that "burlesque is not funny is the biggest funny".
The impact of online media on burlesque should not be underestimated. Similar to the "shaking baggage" of cross-talk, Shanghai burlesque dramas and one-man shows jokes called "gimmicks". Compared with the efficient communication characteristics of online media, a news hotspot can often be kept up with in a few minutes, and this wave of rhythm is far beyond the reach of burlesque. The laughs are outdated, and the corresponding result is that the audience no longer buys it.
In the late 1990s, Oriental Television was preparing to create a sitcom that could compete with the Northern I Love My Home series of sitcoms, and launched an indoor sitcom directly named after "Old Lady Uncle". With Shanghainese as the main language, it was a great success as soon as it was launched.
TV sitcom "Old Lady Uncle"
The "old lady uncle" (played by Li Jiusong) in the play is upright and kind, enthusiastic about community affairs activities, but likes to be nosy and makes a lot of jokes. All the episodes from "Uncle Old Lady" to "Old Lady and His Neighbors" revolve around the various things that old lady experiences. Starting from "Old Lady Uncle and His Children and Grandchildren", the frequency of "Old Lady Uncle" in the series has gradually decreased, and the focus of the overall situation has shifted to the life of Ah Qing, Du Luguan and Ade in the happy community.
In addition, it is worth mentioning that Zhou Libo, who was very popular in previous years, aside from the negative news of the flowers and greens, put aside the script of the Mary Sue heroine, we return to Zhou Libo's work itself, and take a look at the "30 Years of Laughing Kan", "Laughing at Shanghai", and "One Week Libo Show" that were popular in the streets and alleys of Shanghai in those years.
Zhou Libo
From the glory of the past to the current decline, in addition to other factors, perhaps the danger of the inheritance of Shanghainese is also a key factor, not exaggerated at all, leaving aside the decline of burlesque, there is no Shanghai characteristics of the talk show, the production level is not high level of sitcoms... Now even the Shanghainese dialect is in danger of being "lost.".
Losing the Position of the Shanghai dialect, in addition to the exit is pidgin, what is even more terrible is that it will not speak.
For me after the 70s, no matter how the times change, in my heart, burlesque is still the most wonderful memory of childhood, and I will open the funny drama audio data saved in the computer hard disk from time to time to relive the beauty of my year.