Sixty Years on and the Cycle Continues

HU YUE

LAST September saw the opening of Jiazi Garden, a hotly anticipated new play that features some of Chinas oldest living drama heavyweights. Written by award-winning playwright He Jiping, the plays maiden production was presented by the Beijing Peoples Art Theater in celebration of its 60th anniversary.

The story takes place in a century-old house named Jiazi Garden whose inhabitants are all elders. This title holds heavy symbolism, as “jiazi” means a cycle of 60 years. This symbolism is all the more meaningful as the play progresses and the late owners daughter returns home after spending years overseas and decides to sell the property. Conflicts between the young heiress and the elderly tenants arise and lay bare the intricate relationship between the aged and the young in China, who often have disparate values and interests. Eventually an understanding is forged, and both sides gain deeper insights on life.

Senior Stars Stand Tall

Eighty-five-year-old Lan Tianye has devoted most of his life to the stage, beginning his career in 1944 and later becoming one of the first actors of the Beijing Peoples Art Theater. But he still feels like he has something more to give.“For my whole life what Ive been most afraid of is to owe someone emotionally,”he said at the establishment of the Jiazi Garden production team. “To pay back my emotional debt to the art theater, I have to go back on the stage.” With Jiazi Garden he now has that opportunity. He has not only taken on the main role of the play, but is also its art director, two tasks that are a challenge for somebody of his advanced years.

But Lan isnt the oldest cast member in the play. Ninety-year-old Zhu Lin has five years on him. “Most of my life was spent on the stage and in the rehearsal halls of the art theater,” she said. Her lifes passion is acting and bringing characters to life on stage. One of her most notable early roles was Lu Shiping in the Beijing Peoples Art Theaters first stage version of Cao Yus seminal 1933 work, Thunderstorm, which tells the tale of the physical and psychological deterioration of a family at the hands of its hypocritical and despotic patriarch. Since then she has shaped more than 50 characters on the theaters stage.

Today Zhu Lin has to attend most social events in her wheelchair and her opportunities to act are few. When she heard about the play last year she had to make sure she was on the cast and went straight to the theaters management to let them know she was interested. The playwright eventually added a character tailor-made for her, and she was soon attending rehearsals. “Im so happy to have the chance to present the play with so many of my old friends,” she said at a press conference, where she insisted on standing to give her speech.

The star-studded cast of Jiazi Garden spans several generations, the biggest age gap more than 60 years. But in the rehearsal hall, young and seasoned actors all work together to produce something they can all be proud of. “In our theater, there are no small parts, only small actors,” Lan explained, quoting the celebrated Russian actor and director Constantin Stanislavski.

The current leader of the performance section of the Beijing Peoples Art Theater is Yang Lixin, who first rose to fame through the popular sitcom I Love My Home in the early 1990s. Yet despite his television reputation, Yang has remained loyal to the Art Theater and grown into one of the companys most essential actors.

Part of Yangs loyalty stems from fear– fear of not being able to work with the experimental and avant-garde stage plays produced by younger theater groups. But it also stems from appreciation and a sense of value for the traditions that the Beijing Peoples Art Theater has formed and sustained over the last 60 years.

Six Decades in the Limelight

“In China, the stage of the Peoples Art Theater is the most prestigious venue for plays,” Yang remarked proudly. This status put pressure on Yang never to slacken in his efforts during his 40 years at the theater.

When Yang played Zhou Puyuan, the surly father, in the theaters third production of Thunderstorm, he added extra depth and complexity to the character by speculating about Zhous experiences in youth and how it shaped his attitude toward life, which are not touched upon in the script.

Cao Yu was the first president of Beijing Peoples Art Theater, which was founded on June 12, 1952. At the founding ceremony then vice mayor of Beijing Wu Han, who was also a renowned historian, announced its birth in front of an audience that included some of the most illustrious figures of Chinas literature and art circles. Among them were writer Lao She, drama theoretician Zhang Geng, writer Liao Mosha, actor, playwright and director Ouyang Yuqian, and playwright and writer Li Bozhao, wife of late PRC President Yang Shangkun.

Lao Shes masterpiece The Dragon Whiskers Ditch was the theaters inaugural production, which was followed by a succession of Cao Yus plays including Thunderstorm, The Sunrise and Beijingers, and Guo Moruos Tiger Tally. The theaters early productions laid foundations for its realistic style. The theater also employed the Stanislavski system in its teaching activities and stage plays. Since the very beginning, in order to better present characters, experiencing the lives of people from all walks of life has been one of major tasks of the theaters directors and performers.

In 1959, when the unique style of the theater had already taken shape, the theater put on eight productions in one year. They included Lao Shes Teahouse and Rickshaw Boy and Guo Moruos interpretation of legendary heroine Cai Wenjis tale, to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the founding of new China. An extravaganza of such size and content had never been seen in the capital.

As the decades passed, the theater and its performers gained increasing national attention. The 1980s saw the beginning of a new age of greatness. In the last 20 years, it has staged 12 classic plays plus more than 80 new productions, many of which have enjoyed longstanding popularity.

The company has taken these plays all across China during their 60-yearlong history, including Hong Kong and Taiwan. Well received at home, they have also garnered the appreciation of international audiences during overseas tours of such masterpieces as Teahouse, The Worlds Best Restaurant, Uncle Doggies Nirvana and The Death of a Salesman, making appearances in more than 20 cities abroad. Its international presentation is Chinas requital to an imported art form.

Embarking on a New Cycle

According to Zhang Heping, president of Beijing Peoples Art Theater, the decision to invite so many prestigious elderly artists to act in Jiazi Garden was to create a chance for the young-generation actors to learn from their predecessorsmeticulousness and devotion to the theater, as well as from their attitudes and approach to the stage, rehearsals and life in general.

This experienced generation of actors has not let their years of accumulated skills and knowledge go to their heads and cloud their vision, and they still diligently research their roles. Zhu Xu had barely recovered from a condition that gripped him for six months when he joined the cast. But the moment he got the part, a maven of The Book of Changes, the octogenarian began to bone up on the classic of divination, cosmology and philosophy that daunts the brightest mind.

Pu Cunxin, who has starred in a slew of popular films, TV series and stage dramas and is active in charity projects, also delved deep into the real life examples of his supporting character in a nursing home in Beijing. The multi-award winner has humbly taken the position of understudy in the play, the first time he has done so since he first gained national acclaim some 20 years ago.

Like Pu and Zhu, the Beijing Peoples Art Theater is well aware that it cannot rely simply on the prestige its 60 years of operation has earned, and with a history that has followed the twists and turns of Chinese society, it has learned to adapt.

Nowadays, the theater is also facing some grave challenges. For example, the predominance of television and film and the dwindling interest of audiences have meant that actors and writers alike are moving away from the stage as a form of expression. In recent times there has been sharp drop of new, good-quality scripts, and it is essential for theatrical artists to stick to the form and develop it. There is also contradiction between a theaters development, which involves the passing down of valuable traditions and conventions, and social development, which calls for innovation.

Zhang Heping is clear about the future of the Beijing Peoples Art Theater. He believes that, as a national theater, it should remain dedicated to the more mainstream concept of realism, but at the same time it should present productions of other genres.

He is aware that bringing this into fruition will be an arduous task, but the theater has ample resources and talent with which to try and achieve the goal. On the heels of Jiazi Garden, the theater also presented Аnton Chekhovs Swan Song and The Dangers of Tobacco, which, directed by experimental pioneering director Lin Zhaohua, are both the first Chinese renditions of the two works. In doing so, the theater hopes to integrate its respect for tradition with dedication to reality, advocacy of innovation and tolerance of diverse art schools, and bring about a new cycle in its journey.