Gao Yuqian, a famous Peking Opera performance artist, a disciple of Mei Lanfang, and the actor of Grandma Li in "The Red Lantern" passed away at 2:47 a.m. today at the age of 92.
Gao Yuqian, born in 1927, a native of Beijing, was formerly known as Gao Chen. Peking Opera Danjiao, the original Gong Hua Dan, the reform of Lao Dan. He successively studied under Wang Yaoqing, Yu Lianquan, Han Shichang, Xue Yanqin, Ouyang Yuqian, Cheng Yuzhen and so on. After the dissolution of the China Drama School, he was promoted by Li Shaochun and joined the class to perform. In 1947, he joined the Alumni Theater Troupe of the Chinese Opera School of the Beiping Art Museum sponsored by Jiao Juyin and performed new commentaries. In 1950, he joined the New China Experimental Peking Opera Troupe, which was later changed to the China Peking Opera House. Her voice is bright and passionate, and she has participated in many operas and film and television dramas. Playing Grandma Li in the modern Peking Opera "Red Lantern", she is very outstanding and is one of the actors loved by the audience.
Gao Yuqian once said: "A modern Peking Opera "Red Lantern" changed my artistic life. At that time, Gao Yuqian played Danjiao in the Peking Opera House in China. In 1964, theater director A Jia gave her the script of "Red Lantern", she read it from beginning to end, read it with tears, and felt that this was really a touching and exciting drama, but she did not expect to play any role in this play. The next day, A Jia said to her, "How about you play Grandma Li in this play?" "Can I?" What the!? I'm going to play Grandma Lee? Hearing this, Gao Yuqian was very surprised, because she used to sing Hua Dan, and Grandma Li was the character of Lao Dan. But director A Jia thought that Gao Yuqian would definitely be able to act, and asked her to go back and read the script again and understand that the characters were ready to go into rehearsals. In this way, Gao Yuqian accepted the task of playing Grandma Li, she read the script again and again, and was moved by the revolutionary feelings of Li Yu and the three generations of the family, especially Grandma Li, again and again, and soon really entered the play, and began to think about how to act and how to act like Grandma Li.
Generally, when an actor takes over the role of a new play, he first finds the "pretty head" in the performance, but Gao Yuqian is not like this, but adopts the "stupid" method of not letting go of a word and working hard bit by bit. She first started from Grandma Li's form and demeanor, on the way to and from work, she learned the gait of the old lady walking, and her usual gestures and eyes also deliberately imitated the appearance of the old man; when she returned home, she also thought about doing what she felt according to the old man's self-feeling... In this way, he slowly moved closer to the character and entered the role of Grandma Li.
For Gao Yuqian, the bigger problem and challenge is the voice. Because she originally sang DanJiao, she had never learned Lao Dan, but Grandma Li had to use a big voice to sing according to the line, so what to do? She only had to find another way to change her voice to a big voice, to speculate and practice with her heart, and to carry the people in the group to do private work. She followed the magic all day, and she was stunned to practice her big voice. At that time, she still had concerns, worried that after performing "Red Lantern", Xiao Voice could not find it back, but what she did not expect was that "Red Lantern" was performed for so many years, and her artistic life and Grandma Li were closely linked and never separated.
File photo Photo By Liu Ping, a reporter of this newspaper