Beijing Daily Client | Reporter Wang Run
Three "Xiangzi", old, middle-aged and young, have a conversation across time and space. The "reverse tiger girl" laughs and curses are amazing. The 15-person "all-male class" lineup shows the appearance of all living beings in Lao She's works, "freehand brushwork" "The stage presents a different "Beiping City"... As the first commissioned work launched by the 7th Lao She Theater Festival and also the closing drama, it is jointly produced by Beijing Performance Co., Ltd. and Tianjin People's Art Theater, with Fang Xu as the screenwriter After three months of careful polishing, "Camel Xiangzi", directed by and starring , made its New Year's Eve premiere at Beijing Tianqiao Art Center. With its imaginative contemporary aesthetics and unique interpretation, this classic masterpiece shines with the glory of the times.
Fang Xu, known as the "professional adaptor of Lao She", has been committed to innovating classics and breaking through himself. This is the seventh time he has put Lao She's works on the stage. From a one-man show with "one person playing multiple roles" to two actors "I am in you and you are in me", to leading a group of male actors with their own unique skills and characteristics to perform Lao She with an "all-male" cast He writes about all kinds of characters, men, women, old and young... Fang Xu, who has more and more stage experience and more and more skillful directing skills, chose three actors to interpret Xiangzi at different stages for "Camel Xiangzi" this time, and let them perform on the stage. The dialogue across time and space allowed Xiangzi, who was "taciturn" and somewhat "boring" in the original literary work, to freely and fully reveal his heart on the stage of the drama, and also made the tragic "history of struggle" of the foreign rickshaw driver in the old society more vivid. Sublimated into a "history of the soul" struggling between ideals and reality.
The young and tall actor Xu Xingbo pulled a car and ran wildly on the stage, interpreting the young Xiangzi's persistence and dreams for life; Liu Xinran, who performed delicately, portrayed the helplessness of the middle-aged Xiangzi facing various life tests including weddings, funerals, birth, old age, illness and death. , grievance and pain, performed vividly; the elderly Xiangzi played by Fang Xu sat alone on one side of the stage for most of the scene. At first, he only appeared as a bystander making joking comments or making cold-eyed remarks, until the audience When he finally realized that this "bad old man" who was in huge contrast to the young and middle-aged Xiangzi was actually an old Xiangzi, a sense of tragedy enveloped the entire stage. Director Fang Xu also cleverly transformed the common chorus form in Western dramas into the image of "carriers", which not only presents the changing times of all living beings, but also uses their perspectives and viewpoints to allow the audience to experience a more novel and diverse way. Understand the world-awakening significance of classic works from a deeper perspective.
Various female characters in the drama are also played by male actors in different forms, among which the most important ones are undoubtedly "Hu Niu" and "Xiao Fuzi". Actor Zhao Zhen, who became popular for his role as "Cow Mom" in "Niu Tianci", relied on his years of opera skills and performance experience, as well as the unique comedy effect of a man pretending to be a woman, to transform the "Tiger Girl" The highly individual characters are surprisingly well created, and the laughter, anger and curses are all very interesting. The young actor Ren Yuebin portrayed the kind-hearted character and tragic fate of "Xiao Fuzi", a poor woman in the old society, with a calm and measured sense that made people feel heartbroken, making people forget that it was actually a male character.
The stage design of "Camel Xiangzi" continues Fang Xu's consistent freehand drama style; Zheng Jinqi, Liu Zhao, A Kuan, Lu Liang, Liu Lian, Liu Xingcen and other top artists joined in to jointly create a simple, elegant, smart and multi-faceted drama. A changing and imaginative aesthetic space. One of the highlights is the "transformation" of the characters in the play, which is like magic. The "reversible" costumes cleverly designed by the costume designer A Kuan, the actors do not need to take off their clothes and change clothes on and off the stage. They only need to gently tear, turn and shake the clothes, and the gray coachman's coat will immediately change under the gaze of the audience. Cheng Huniu’s pastel cheongsam, Mr. Liu’s brocade silk gown, Detective Sun’s black uniform, Mr. Cao’s long blue shirt...the actors’ roles, genders, and temperaments also changed instantly. It's amazing.
The most important thing is that, just as Fang Xu has always demonstrated the attitude of "both respecting the spirit of the original work and giving it contemporary interpretation" in adapting Lao She's works for many years, he presented it to the audience on the stage in a unique "dramatic" way. , is not only an accurately refined classic character and story, but also a wonderful product of the spiritual dialogue between contemporary people and Lao She. Therefore, it has practical significance that transcends the times and arouses resonance among contemporary people. It's no wonder that many viewers couldn't help but sigh after watching the play: "I didn't understand the truth when I read novels when I was in school. Thank you for this play telling me: It turns out that you and I are not Xiangzi." Photography by Zhang Bonan
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