China Youth Daily Client News (Guo Qianmei, China Youth Daily·China Youth Daily reporter Lin Jie) Recently, a meeting with the main creators of the dance drama "Eastern Grand Port" was held at the Foshan Grand Theater in Guangdong. Director of Ningbo Song and Dance Theater Liu Wei and leading actors Xia Xia, Wang Yihan, Wang Zheng, and Liu Siyu shared the wonderful stories behind the scenes of "Eastern Port" with the audience. This is the first stop in Guangdong of the show’s 2024 national tour.
Stills from the dance drama "Eastern Port". Photo courtesy of Foshan Grand Theater
The dance drama "Eastern Port" is co-directed by emerging post-80s choreographers Wang Sisi and Qian Xin, who have co-created the "Lotus Award"-winning dance drama "Awakening Lion" and many other out-of-the-circle works. Following the two performances of "Awakening Lion" at the Foshan Grand Theater, "Eastern Port" starring powerful dancers from the Ningbo Song and Dance Theater will be staged at the Foshan Grand Theater from April 4th to 5th.
Stills from the dance drama "Eastern Port". Photo courtesy of Foshan Grand Theater
"Oriental Grand Port" was created and performed by Ningbo Performing Arts Group. The dance drama takes hard-core industry as the theme and the construction and development of Ningbo Zhoushan Port as the background. It is a close and vivid combination of "port, city and people". In the narrative, the struggle history of small people is integrated into the development history of the big era, and the passionate youth and touching past events of several generations of great port builders are told, thereby depicting a new blueprint for Ningbo, a "modern coastal metropolis" in the new era, to "connect the port to the world".
Stills from the dance drama "Eastern Port". Photo courtesy of Foshan Grand Theater
On the stage, more than 50 dancers transformed into the builders of the port and told their struggles in dance vocabulary. The whole play uses the core element of the container, which is mobilized through high-tech stage means, showing a rare "spectacular and light industrial aesthetics". The combination of simple and advanced scene design with a large number of lights and special effects not only vividly displays the busy and fiery daily work of the port, but also brings a visual shock of industrial art to the audience.
Stills from the dance drama "Eastern Port". Photo courtesy of Foshan Grand Theater
In May 2023, the dance drama "Eastern Port" premiered at the National Center for the Performing Arts. In July, it was selected for the 14th National Dance Show and won the "Excellent Play" award. In October of the same year, it was shortlisted for the 22nd China National Dance Show Shanghai International Arts Festival. Feng Shuangbai, chairman of the Chinese Dancers Association, said that "Eastern Port" combines and displays the grand theme with specific harbor people, as well as the harbor spirit that they inherit from their fathers and pass down from generation to generation.
Source: China Youth Daily client
