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Time: From 1964 to 1976. Location: Mainland China. Principal subject: Ma Yongan (1942–2007). Role type: Jing. Main issues: The impact of Jiang Qing’s “jingju revolution” on actors and on the genre. How jingju’s fundamental aesthetics were altered and how certain conventions of singing/speaking/movement and the colour and pattern of the jing role’s facial make-up were eliminated when contemporary costumes, Western musical instruments and composition, lighting and scenery entered the revolutionary contemporary model theatre. This chapter focuses on the revolutionary contemporary model jingju, perhaps the most peculiar cultural phenomenon produced by the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966–76). During this period, the entire traditional repertoire and the newly written historical plays (like Tang Sai’er) were abolished, while model theatre and a small number of its adherents, directly guided by Mao’s wife Jiang Qing (1914–91), dominated the stage, broadcasting and screen. A sense of mass culture was produced, although strictly controlled by the authorities, because the whole population of one billion people could sing or recite lines of these jingju productions. Phrases from the above works also entered daily life — some are still used today. Ma Yongan (1942–2007), the central figure in this chapter, studied the jing (painted-face) role at the Beijing Municipal Theatre School from 1952 to 1959 and learned plays from the principal, Hao Shouchen (1886–1961), the founder of the Hao school of jing. The specific coding of this role’s facial colour and pattern epitomizes the expressiveness and symbolism of jingju. However, the distinctive feature was 5 Ma Yongan— A Painted-Face Role Type and a Non-Painted-Face Character 156 The Soul of Beijing Opera removed from the stage during the mid-1960s because the role categories and their stylized conventions were the enemy of the “revolutionary realism” pursued by revolutionary contemporary jingju. Ironically, throughout Ma’s career in the painted-face role, the most famous character he played was Lei Gang — a peasant rebel/Marxist fighter in The Azalea Mountain, premiering in 1973 — wearing a contemporary outfit and without painted-face make-up. Ten years later, Ma staged his jingju Othello, in respect of which I approached him for my Shakespeare project in 2001. He had retired from the theatre in 1998 and had become a Buddhist and a voluntary spiritual healer,1 and although I stayed in touch with him our conversation was more on Buddhism and people’s diseases than on jingju. For this book, I went to interview him on 30 January 2007.2 Ma had warned me that his home was not an ordinary residence, but I was still surprised that the smell of burning incense was detectable even outside the building’s gate. The sitting room of his flat had been converted into a hall for worship and an enormous Buddha was placed against one wall. I surmised that regular gatherings took place here. A few young people in the flat, all shaven-headed, addressed Ma as “Master” and were apparently followers of his Buddhism practice rather than jingju. While Buddhist chanting ran continuously on a DVD player, we talked about theatre, training, Stanislavski (a Chinese way of referring to modern non-formalized theatre rather than the original system), Aosailuo (transliteration of Othello) and Lei Gang. During the three hours of this interview, I often felt dizzy, partly due to the smoulderingjosssticksandpartlybecauseofthediversityofsubjectsthatwecovered. I found it difficult to make the “mental jump” from jingju acting conventions, such as cloud-hands and somersaults, to Marx’s Communist Manifesto and peasant rebels in the late 1920s; from Shakespeare to the characteristics of a painted-face role; to specific facial patterns and to the two characters Ma played that did not use any facial pattern; from Stanislavski’s psychological approach for building a character to Ma’s belief in Buddhism and spiritual healing; and to various problems caused by the economic reforms. However, looking through my interview notes, remembering my feelings at the time, studying the two play scripts and the recordings of the performances, and reading the literature on the painted-face role and revolutionary contemporary model jingju, I came to understand that the interlocking relationship of these contrasting and contradictory issues forms the core of the discourse of this chapter. This chapter will proceed from the painted-face role to revolutionary jingju productions, and finally to Lei Gang (Ma’s most famous stage image), bringing in the relevant cross-currents of the time, society and Ma Yongan’s performance. 1 My...

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