(The author of this article is Wang Jiaxi)
Peking Opera Hua Dan is an important industry with a high degree of development and very fruitful artistic achievements. Especially since the 1930s, through the efforts of the art master Xun Huisheng and many Xunmen disciples, the Peking Opera stage has presented a splendid World of Huadan. Tong Zhiling is one of the most eye-catching.
Her stage career of more than 60 years is very typical among a generation of Danjiao actresses. In January this year, the Xiqu School affiliated to the Shanghai Theater Academy held a seminar on Tong Zhiling's performing arts to explore her successful experience, which is a very meaningful thing. Needless to say, in today's sluggish environment of Peking Opera, Hua Dan seems to be lagging behind compared to other industries. Therefore, when we talk about Tong Zhiling today, there are more topics to discuss. This article would like to make some recollections of my own experiences.
Break your own way
Tong Zhiling,"Shilang Visits Mother"
Tong Zhiling learned to play and appeared on stage in the early 1930s. On May 3, 1939, she was only 17 years old when she was a teacher in Tianjin. By the mid-1940s, she was already popular all over the country. In 1947, she again studied under Mr. Mei Lanfang. She is the main worker of the Xun School, and is also good at acting in the Mei, Cheng, and Shang School plays, with a wide range of plays, versatile, and especially spirited on the stage. When I was a child, I saw her plays such as "Embroidery", "Wang Baojun", "Mu Guiying", "Miss Fan" and so on at the Tianjin Beiyang Theater. I remember that the audience was very welcoming to the big star at that time, and in various newspapers and periodicals, she was often a news figure who occupied important pages. I also kept reading the texts that commented on her in various ways, leaving a deep memory.
In the mid-1940s, Peking Opera Danxing was very prosperous, with a large number of young actresses emerging, and "Ten Dan Nine Xun"; Peking Opera groups around the world, Hua Dan picked classes accounted for a large proportion. In the very fierce competition for art, Tong Zhiling broke out of her own way based on learning Xun, enjoying fame and prosperity, which is really not a simple thing. After the 1950s, her performing arts gradually developed to a higher level, and her personal style became more and more mature, she maintained the earlier free, open, bright, but more intrinsic, deep. As a result, she successfully created a series of ancient and modern women's artistic images such as Jin Yunu, You Sanjie, Wu Zetian, Zhao Yiman, etc., these role identities and temperaments are very different, but they are vivid when she plays them.
Rearrangement of "Golden Jade Slave"
In the second half of 1960, when I was studying at the university, I interned at the Shanghai Peking Opera House. At that time, Tong Zhiling was preparing to rehearse Mr. Xun Huisheng's newly revised "Reunion" "Jin Yunu" in June 1959, and when she knew that I had been obsessed with Peking Opera since I was a child, and that I loved and was familiar with the art of Xun Pai, she asked me to assist her in making some modifications to the script, and watch her rehearse and give her opinions. In the environment and atmosphere at that time, we were all called "comrades" between us, and I was only 19 years old at that time, and I also called her "Comrade Zhiling". At that time, she was very modest, dressed very plainly, spoke quite directly, and did not have any horn racks. She proposed that a large part of the "stick fight" is best changed to a large singing voice, and the lyrics can be more lifelike, "to sing the audience cry!" This large section of [Erhuangyuan Plate] plus stacked sentence singing ("It is not my stubbornness and refusal to obey"), later became one of the characteristics of the child's "Jin Yunu", although the lyrics have been revised and processed several times, and the first draft, she let go and let me write it as an intern. This old play was all new at the time. During the rehearsal, Comrade Zhiling, Huang Zhengqin, who played Mo Ji, and Sun Zhengyang, who played Jin Song, pondered and repeatedly deliberated on all the details one by one on the basis of studying Mr. Xun Huisheng's performance achievements and characteristics. I participated in the whole rehearsal process and also made some suggestions. Comrade Zhiling is very good at listening to opinions and striving for excellence in art, all of which I feel very deeply.
Created "Wu Zetian"
After graduating from university, I was assigned to work at the Peking Opera House in Shanghai. Since August 1963, the Shangjing Second Troupe led by Tong Zhiling has toured Anqing, Tongling, Jiujiang, Nanchang, Changsha, Wuhan and other places, and I went out with the group for the first time, mainly responsible for various publicity work. In other places, I often shared a room with Xu Jun, the head of the regiment, and Comrade Zhiling often came over to chat about drama. Her manuscripts published in various newspapers and periodicals, including those sent to Wen Wei Po (published on October 25, 1963), were dictated by her and compiled by me. At that time, more articles were written about Wu Zetian. Tong Ben "Wu Zetian" was rehearsed for the first time on January 14, 1961 at the Shanghai Tiantou Stage, and performed in Jinjing in December of the same year, which was highly acclaimed, and was performed in various places in 1963, which produced a warm response, and was welcomed by both old connoisseurs and new audiences. I have watched this play with comrades from peking opera troupes around the world many times and exchanged views with them, and they are really satisfied with Tong Zhiling's performance.
Tong Zhiling "Wu Zetian"
The child's book "Wu Zetian" is based on Guo Moruo's drama of the same name. Although Guo Lao's general Wu Zetian was overly idealized, in terms of drama, the "Wu" drama was after all a big stroke, and its cleverness lay in the fact that it got rid of the "palace drama" and only took some historical materials from Wu Zetian's 56 to 61 years old, focusing on the image of the empress in Guo Lao's own mind. Guo Lao's Wu Zetian is a figure with profound insight, monarchy, thinker demeanor and rich feelings, which is difficult to find an image as a basis in the traditional repertoire of Peking Opera. In the face of this difficult new topic, Tong Zhiling fully demonstrated her artistic talent and innovative ability. One of the most prominent is the treatment of Jingbai in the play.
Peking Opera has retained a large number of lines written by Guo Lao unchanged, which makes it difficult to avoid the problem of "drama and singing" in some scenes, and Tong Zhiling has made great efforts to "peking opera" these philosophical words and phrases. She mobilized her artistic accumulation and absorbed the essence from the excellent achievements of the major Danjiao genres, she extracted the fortitude and steadiness of Wang Yaoqing and Furong Cao Nianfa, combined with the natural freedom in Xun Huisheng's recitation, and also integrated Mei Lanfang's solemnity, and made all this unified in the "tone of Wu Zetian". In the fourth scene of the play, Wu Zetian is called emperor, Pei Yan instigates Xu Jingye to send troops to fight, the enemy is current, but Wu Zetian is very calm to sit and listen to Guan Wan'er read Luo Binwang's "Passing on the Heavens on Behalf of Xu Jingye", while listening and adding comments. In a play like this, it's not easy to win theatrical effect! And Tong Zhiling's wonderful recitation of talking and laughing freely actually made the whole stage shine. She is sometimes slightly angry, sometimes not satisfied, sometimes admiring his literary style, sometimes scorning his "lack of insight", all kinds of tones are accurate, fresh, and emotional, which not only portrays the unusual political demeanor of the characters, but also has a touching and exciting sense of Peking Opera rhythm. Before the curtain fell, Wu Zetian paced and recited his five-word poem: "... The moon shines on the nine clouds, and the time comes from all over the world...", Tong Zhiling uses Kunqu opera tunes to express the profound thoughts and inner poetry of the characters, whether it is singing or expression, it is a stroke of God. From the pace of the chanting poems, it is also necessary to talk about the steps, Tong Zhiling integrated the steps of Empress Xiao of "Yanmen Pass" and Li Yanfei of "The Great Protector", and also learned from the lao sheng wang hat play, plus her own creation made it "Wu Zetianhua", there are opera programs and "transformations" as if there is no program at all, that weight is heavy, singing to "Golden Wheel Luck is not endless", the stage is like a stormy imperial weather!
When I helped her sort out and record her performance experience, she talked about the wonderful creations of many predecessors and contemporaries of artists, and she had seen many plays and heard records. She has incisive evaluations of Wang Yaoqing, Mei Lanfang, Xun Huisheng, Hibiscus Grass, and Mao Shilai's Jingbai. Especially Wang and Xun, the most attractive recitations, she learned to paint a lot of color. Which sentence is pronounced white, there can be a full hall of color or laughter in the audience, and she will never fail to achieve the expected effect when she reads it. Listen to her talk about how to refer to, how to learn, and know that her new is not a source of water. Her expressiveness and appeal on stage are not easy to come by.
Hopefully, there will be more repertoire
Zhou Xinfang and Tong Zhiling, "Fishing and Killing Families"
On that outing in 1963, Comrade Zhiling, who was in his early forties, was flourishing, and his unique personal style had been quite clearly revealed. But in the cheers along the way, she often sighed, always saying "too little drama". In fact, if you look at today's Peking Opera stage, her reserved repertoire at that time is not small. According to my observation notes, since January 1959, there have been 54 plays that I have seen and officially performed, and there are all kinds of literary and martial arts. Moreover, the new repertoire she created, in terms of survival rate and impact, is second to none among several famous Peking Opera Danjiao artists in Shanghai. But when she talked to Colonel Xu and me for a long time, she always said that she was in a hurry. On the one hand, "bone dramas" such as "Meilong Town", "Rainbow Pass", "Proud Edge", "Bow Yan Edge", and "Zhan Wancheng" have been criticized and inconvenient to stage. Xun Pai's famous drama "Kan Yujun" was also criticized, resulting in her not acting for many years. In 1961, although her glittering and highly box office value of "Eighteen Pulls" was once "open", the clarion call of "Peking Opera Must Revolution" in 1963 had been sounded, the situation was tense, and this play obviously could not be performed again. There are so many less plays, how she wants to add a fair amount of drama! On the other hand, she often measured herself in terms of the four famous Dans, and compared with Zhang Junqiu, Zhao Yanxia, and Du Jinfang at that time. How ambitious Tong Zhiling, who has always been ambitious, hopes that her unique new contributions will be more!
Another new height
After the "Cultural Revolution", Tong Zhiling, who has endured 10 years of hardships, has worked particularly hard to study art in order to regain the good years that were sacrificed. After returning to the stage in 1977, she pushed her performance and singing to a new height in the repertoire of "Kan Yujun", "Meilong Town" and "Wang Xifeng's Great Trouble in Ningguo Mansion". Li Fengjie, a restaurant girl in "Meilong Town", was reinterpreted by her, pure, innocent and intelligent and witty. In the recitation of this play, she adopted mr. Xun Huisheng's "Xun Pai Rhyme White" that integrated Jingbai, Yunbai, and Kunbai Shenyun into one, and reprocessed it. Many of the recitations are unique and humorous, expressing the subtle psychological changes of young girls, and the accuracy is very moving. Her singing skills are more exquisite and more delicate. For example, in her 1989 recording of "Kan YuJun" by China Records Shanghai Company [Erhuang Yuanban], "How close are you to me", "Four Flat Tones" "Zhang Lang Painstakingly Wraps People Up", which is her best masterpiece in the later period, obviously better than the "Red Lady" recorded in 1980.
Since the 1980s, after I went to Beijing to participate in some large-scale seminars and performances related to Peking Opera, I almost always took a few days at the invitation of Teacher Zhang Weijun to take a nap at the former residence of Mr. Xun Huisheng, and Tong Zhiling also lived in Xun Mansion every time. During the meal together, Xun Linglai said to the Xunmen disciples present many times: "No matter what large-scale activities our Xun family has, everyone must first let Sister Zhiling pass." It can be seen that Tong Zhiling's status in the Xun family. And I have heard Comrade Zhiling at least three times talk about a "concession to the stage", and I think her views are very insightful and worthy of attention.
Concessions are not the way to go
Li Yuru and Tong Zhiling, "Fan Jiangguan"
At that time, some authoritative figures proposed that in order to cultivate young people, old actors and middle-aged actors should give way to them, and some competent departments also actively adopted this method. Tong Zhiling said: "As far as I can see, Yan Huizhu, Li Yuru, Wu Suqiu, Zhao Yanxia and I are not let go of the stage by the four famous Dan, and when we first appeared on the stage, Mei, Cheng, Xun, and Shang were in their prime years, like the sun in the sky." Huizhu and Yuru and I chased after them as soon as we had the opportunity, and worshipped them as teachers, trying to learn from them as much as possible. The performance of several of us was very competitive, and at the same time, there were four little celebrities Zhang Junqiu, Mao Shilai, Song Dezhu and Xu Hanying competing with us. After liberation, Huizhu and Yuru and I were all on the same stage at the Shanghai Peking Opera House, and the exchange was more, and we were all recognized by the audience in the competition between the four famous dans, such as transmission, help, belt and each other. So she said, "Giving way is not a solution." "I think probably because she was no longer in the troupe at that time, but was teaching at the Shanghai Opera School, so she considered the issue of education more than in the past, and then repeatedly discussed this issue, and even appealed." Unfortunately, it was not adopted at that time. Judging from today's current situation, Tong Zhiling's opinion at that time should be said to be a very valuable experience.
Since marching to Hong Kong in March 1982 to perform her series of famous plays, she has become a well-known outstanding representative of xun school art, and has been "out of xun into the child", she is known as the original Danjiao everyone is well deserved. She was so strong that she kept trying to set up a team and rehearse a few plays, but many of her ideas could not be realized in the end, so she repeatedly stopped her friends around her from saying: "Slowly call it 'children's pie'!" (This sentence has been published in several newspapers.) This is of course the self-knowledge of a knowledgeable artist, but it is not a great regret in her heart!
(This article is transferred from "Chinese Peking Opera", No. 4, 2007, by Wang Jiaxi, if there is an infringement link, delete)