Peking Opera Today: Some Views of Performers

PEKING OPERA TODAY: SOME VIEWS OF PERFORMERS Pamela C. White Harvard University The purpose of this paper is to report on the current state of the art of Peking Opera performance in selected geographical centers in China and the United States. At present, there is a large number of both professional and amateur Peking Opera troupes in the United States and in Asian countr~es with large Chinese p~pulations including Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Viet Nam.1 The largest professional troupes are the Military Peking Opera of Taipei, Taiwan, and the Peking Opera of Peking. A third' troupe which is rapidly growing is the Shanghai Peking Opera. The largest troupes in the United States, all amateur clubs, are centered in New York and Los Angeles. This paper presents information gathered from an interview with the Peking Opera of Peking during their North American tour in 1980, an interview with the Shanghai Peking Opera dtiring their Alice Tully Hall season in New York City in 1981', and interviews with the major amateur troupes in New York. The study has been focused on the ways in which the traditions associated with Peking Opera as it had evolved by the time of the Cultural Revolution in Mainland China have been preserved or changed in the training and performa'nce prac,tices of the various troupes interviewed . 1Johannes, Schaaf. "The Ageless Art of Chinese Opera. n .G.eQ, Vol. II (Dec. 1980), pp. 90-106. 96 ' PEKINGOPERATODAY: SOME VIEWSOF PERFORMERS Pamela C. White Harvard University The purpose of this paper is to report on the current state of the art of Peking Opera performance in selected geographical centers in China and the United States. At present, there is a large number of both professional and amateur Peking Opera troupes in the United States and in Asian countries with large Chinese populations including Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, and Viet Nam. 1 The largest professional troupes are the Military Peking Opera of Taipei, Taiwan, and the Peking Opera of Peking. A third troupe which is rapidly growing is the Shanghai Peking Opera. The largest troupes in the United States, all amateur clubs, are centered in New York and Los Angeles. This paper presents information gathered from an interview with the Peking Opera of Peking during their North American tour in 1980, an interview with the Shanghai Peking Opera during their Alice Tully Hall season in New York City in 1981, and interviews with the major amateur troupes in New York. The study has been focused on the ways in which the traditions associated with Peking Opera as it had evolved by the time of the Cultural Revolution in Mainland China have been preserved or changed in the training and performance practices of the various troupes interviewed . 1Johannes Schaaf, "The Ageless Art of Chinese Opera," ..G..e.Q, Vol. II (Dec. 1980), pp. 90-106. 96 97 THE PEKING OPERA TROUPE OF PEKING On October 23, 1980, with the help of Professor Rulan C. Pian, I spent ·two hours interviewing Mr~ Liu YU-ch'Uan, (Liu ~1Jj "1: "" lin' s father Chow Hsin-fang, ( Zhou Xinfang rr:1J lb ii ), (18951975 ), who founded the Shanghai opera troupe in 1949. The troupe ~ :;(~ calls its style "the Ch'i Style," based on a stage name for Chow Hsin-fang, meaning "Unicorn Boy," which was coined during _his performances as a six-year-old acting prodigy shortly after the turn of the century. It is this so-called "Ch'i style" which Chow Shao-lin compares to Stanislavsky "method acting," and was developed by Chow Hsin-fang throughout his career. The style consists of consciously seeking, beyond the strict formalized movements and vocal techniques of the Peking Opera as its tradition had evolved by 1900, for the "inner motivation" of the character , and striving for a more realistic emotional portrayal. A writer associated with the Shanghai troupe, rsai Chin, quoted a critic of Chow Hsin-fang as writing in 1915, "Even his back is 9see Richard Yang, op. cit., pp. 105, 110. 112 expressive.,,10 Tsai Chin also wrote, "Because he chose the most difficul~ and dangerous solutions for interpreting his role, his performances...