This weekend the Koo Foundation’s (辜公亮文教基金會) new program, Good Old Operas (好老戲), which opened at Novel Hall last night, presents a number of classic operas performed by its talented cast of regulars led, and directed by Li Baochun (李寶春).
Li, who reached the top of his profession performing the acrobatically demanding martial males roles of Beijing opera, has achieved further success in recent years with ventures into the writing and performing of new-style Beijing operas, most notably his adaptation of Verdi’s opera Rigoletto under the title of The Jester (弄臣) in December last year.
With Good Old Operas, Li has returned to some of the most traditional of Beijing opera’s repertoire. He presented Si Lang Seeks His Mother (四郎探母) last night and will stage Zhao Jun Departs for Barbarian Lands (昭君出塞) and The Search for the Orphan (搜孤救孤) tonight and highlights from The Battle of Wits Between Zhou Yu and Zhuge Liang (瑜亮鬥智) tomorrow.
All these operas deal with “generals, prime ministers, kings and nobles” (將相王侯), and provide plenty of opportunities to show of the elaborate costumes and heroic poses much loved of Beijing opera audiences.
The operagoing public will be familiar with these operas, but Li has brought in a strong cast of performers from both China and Taiwan to give the imposing presence that these stories of high diplomacy, grand strategy and courtly intrigue demand. There will be a chance to see Taiwan’s Huang Yu-lin (黃宇琳), whose performance in the National Guoguang Opera Company’s (國光劇團) Ghostly Stunts (鬼。瘋) show earlier this month was curtailed as a result of injuries she suffered in a car accident.
Li is a master performer and has proved himself able to give opera a contemporary vibrancy without tampering with fundamentals. With Good Old Opera he is going back to Beijing opera roots, picking stories that deal with the survival of empires and the ambitions of powerful men. Patriotism; loyalty and morality; emperor, race and family: These are the core themes of Beijing opera, and these can easily seem dated or irrelevant to a modern theater audience. It can be hoped that Li, with his towering stage presence, will shake the dust off these pieces and make them live again. Performances take place at Novel Hall today at 7:30pm and tomorrow at 2:30pm. Tickets are NT$500 to NT$1,500 and are available through ERA ticketing or online at www.ticket.com.tw.
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