Drama on olympic scale

Beijing turns into a stage as a world-class theater festival unfolds to enchant audiences, reports Raymond Zhou.

Theater lovers are rushing from one venue to another as the 6th Theatre Olympics shifts into high gear in Beijing. While thunderous applause is filling the houses, people are emerging scratching their heads and raising sharp questions in conversations after the shows. A festive mood permeates the Chinese capital, a metropolis so mammoth as to threaten to drown out any such activities.

The festival started earlier this month with a revival of a Peking Opera production titled You and Me. If this sounds vaguely familiar, it was also the title of the theme song for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Another similarity is the director, the renowned filmmaker Zhang Yimou, a reminder of that other event with the word "Olympics" in it. The opening show may not be a typical theater piece in your imagination, but the festival calendar has such an eclectic mix of programs that it includes operas, musicals, dance dramas - almost everything except a rock concert.

The theme "Dream" does not appear to tie up neatly the 47 productions in the lineup, which is as sprawling as the city itself and its venues. Most of the Chinese pieces are revivals, including Meng Jinghui's Amber at the Poly Theater. Two more of Meng's plays, also revivals, follow in its footsteps, yet are not found on the festival menu. Overall, the Chinese selections are so varied they seem a bit haphazard and spoken plays occupy only a minority position.

The first production to take the audience by storm is Folding by Shen Wei Dance Arts, a piece inspired by Tao Te Ching, a classic treatise on Chinese philosophy. Shen, a Chinese choreographer who made his name and now resides in New York, has been astonishing his home country with ultramodern treatments of age-old themes every time he brings back his work.

About half of the festival lineup is imported productions and Shakespeare jumps out as a main attraction. Three Hamlet productions, from Lithuania, Georgia and the United Kingdom, a King Lear from Japan, a Macbeth and an As You Like It from Georgia, plus A Midnight Summer's Dream from the Bard's own Globe Theatre, combine to form a mini-festival of its own. But then, if there is one language shared by theater professionals the world over, it must be Shakespeare's immortal lines and tales.

However, it is not the stories per se, but rather, the presentation of them - albeit in different languages - that fascinates Chinese theatergoers. The spoken play, when performed to a foreign audience who do not understand the language, cannot rely on the power of the word alone. It needs help from stage designs and directorial flourishes, which are in abundance at this festival.

The Hamlet from Lithuania's OKT Theatre places the tragedy in a David Lynch-like world, with nine dressing tables and mirrors that accentuate the pale faces of the actors. "It is a gothic hell stinking with death and decay," writes Tian Huiqun, a professor of Beijing Normal University. "The audience were thrown into the thick of the plot by the mirrors and, figuratively, in that hell."

Tadashi Suzuki's Tale of Lear incorporates actors from Japan, China and South Korea and has them speak their own languages, but all in a Kabuki or Noh style. The two elder daughters emerge as powerful players in this almost operatic version of betrayal, but Cordelia, the youngest daughter, and the thunderstorm scene, a centerpiece in most productions, seem to diminish in impact.

The familiar stories with unfamiliar treatments have shocked quite a few spectators. A student who watched Suzuki's version of Cyrano de Bergerac asked the Japanese master whether what he did to the classic amounted to "blasphemy". The female lead does not have the kind of qualities - in appearance or voice - that many associate with romance, and the two male leads deliver their lines with a harshness that shook many in the audience from what was otherwise an ambience of love. On top of that, Suzuki requested that only a few lines be translated into Chinese titles, an approach he intended to divert audience attention back to visual elements.

This goes against the conventional wisdom that was developed in China over the past six decades. Despite mavericks like Lin Zhaohua, Chinese theater, especially the play, has been under the Russian influence of Stanislavski, who emphasized naturalism and realism. "The world has blossomed into a rich variety of styles while we are still clinging to one flower. This festival opened our eyes," says Li Longyin, an expert on theater who was involved in the selection of festival programs.

"Technically, our productions do not lag behind others," says Guo Xiaonan, a theater director whose The Scholar and the Executioner is showcased in the festival, "but we are behind in conception. And this event has jolted us out of our complacency."

The heavily stylized productions have shifted audience focus from playwrights to stage directors. Some people are so impressed after watching works by Suzuki and others that they have concluded that only mediocre productions care about stories and lines.

Fortunately, the festival has programmed diversity into its genres and styles, some of which are dependent on dialogue. A Midsummer Night's Dream from the Globe Theater has no change in lighting or set but, as a throwback to theatrical practices of Shakespeare's days, it certainly illuminates what makes a play into a classic. TNT Theatre Britain's Hamlet is so sparse, with only seven actors taking on all roles, that visually it would have been lost in a sea of student productions. Productions go through stylistic cycles, but the Bard's lines and tales are forever enchanting.

Overall, as the pendulum swings from realism to stylization, innovation in presentation is the strongest message sent from the Beijing edition of the Theater Olympics, which will end with The Sound of Music, a piece clearly designed to appeal to the broadest cross-section possible and with inbuilt resistance to any conceivable theatrical revolution.

Contact the writer atraymondzhou@chinadaily.com.cn

If you go

Jonny Berouette's Little Cart

Les Matapestes of France

7:30 pm; Dec 5, 6. Experimental Theater of Beijing People's Art Theater, 22 Wangfujing Dajie (Street), Dongcheng district, Beijing. 400-610-3721.

The Little Mermaid

The National Ballet of China

7:30 pm; Dec 6, 7. National Centre for the Performing Arts, 2 Xichang'an Jie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 400-620-6006.

Krapp's Last Tape

Change Performing Arts of USA

7:30 pm; Dec 6, 7. National Theatre Company of China (NTCC), 277 Guanganmenwai Dajie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 400-610-3721.

Ren

Fria Teatern of Sweden

7:30 pm, Dec 6, 7. Oriental Pioneer Theater, 8-2 Dongdan Santiao, Dongcheng district, Beijing. 010-6527-6911.

Countryside Memories

China's Central Academy of Drama

7:30 pm; Dec 10, 11. National Centre for the Performing Arts, 2 Xichang'an Jie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 400-610-3721.

Macbeth

Vaso Abashidze Music and Drama Theatre of Georgia

7:30 pm; Dec 12, 13. Chang'an Grand Theatre, 2 Jianguomennei Dajie (Street), Dongcheng district, Beijing. 400-610-3721.

Yunzhihe (Grand Canal)

Jiangsu Performing Arts Group

7:30 pm; Dec 13, 14. National Centre for the Performing Arts, 2 Xichang'an Jie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 010-6655-0000.

Trilogy of Oresteia

National Theatre of Ping Opera, China

7:30 pm; Dec 15, 16. China Pingju Opera Theatre, 19 Xiluoyuan Xiqu, Fengtai district, Beijing. 400-818-3333.

As You Like It

Kote Marjanishvili State Drama Theatre of Georgia

7:30 pm; Dec 17, 18. Small Theater of National Theater of China, 277 Guanganmenwai Dajie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 400-610-3721.

Cesarean Session

Teatr ZAR/Inst. Grotowski of Poland

7:30 pm; Dec 17-19. Experiment Theater of Beijing People's Art Theater, 22 Wangfujing Dajie (Street), Dongcheng district, Beijing. 400-610-3721.

Demons

Eugeny Vahtangov State Academic Theatre of Russia

7:30 pm; Dec 19, 20. Tianqiao Theater, 30 Beiwei Lu (Road), Xicheng district, Beijing. 400-811-8510.

My Hamlet

Kote Marjanishvili State Drama Theatre and Fingers Theatre of Georgia

7:30 pm; Dec 20, 21. Small Theater of National Theater of China, 277 Guanganmenwai Dajie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 400-610-3721.

The Sound of Music

Andrew Lloyd Webber

7:30 pm; Dec 10-21. Beijing Exhibition Theater, 135 Xizhimenwai Dajie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 400-610-3721.

Yongle

Lin Zhaohua Drama Studio, China

7:30 pm; Dec 22, 23. Tianjin Grand Theatre, 58 Pingjiang Dao (Avenue), Hexi district, Tianjin. 022-8388-2000.

Visitors on the Snow Mountain

National Center for the Performing Arts, China

7:30 pm, Dec 24, 25, 26, 28. National Centre for the Performing Arts, 2 Xichang'an Jie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 010-6655-0000.

Riverdance

Riverdance Irish Dance Troupe

7:30 pm, Dec 26, 27. Beijing Exhibition Theater, 135 Xizhimenwai Dajie (Street), Xicheng district, Beijing. 400-600-8012.