After studying traditional Taiwanese and Peking opera for several years at Taiwan's premier performing arts institute, Peng Yi-chi wants to be a stewardess, or maybe a tourism official.
Despite hundreds of mornings where Li Ya-chun rose at 5:30am to do three hours of physical training, followed by a full day of academic classes, then more training until 8pm, she is thinking about finding work in a restaurant.
Huang Chih-ling may follow her.
"I think Taiwanese opera is going to fade away," says Huang, a student at the National Taiwan Dramatic Arts School. "Very few of my friends are interested in it because the stories don't reach the young generations."
As the three girls break from a rigorous practice session, they explain their decision to drop the performing art as a career: their audience is dying, literally. The mostly mainlander audience for traditional opera, especially Peking Opera, is ageing, while the theatrical tastes of the new generation tend more toward a Taiwanese soap opera on TVBS than an esoteric production of "Chung Kwei Marries Off His Sister" at the National Theater.
There is little doubt that over the past decade in Taiwan the popularity of Peking Opera, and to a lesser extent Taiwanese Opera, has been steadily diluted by the emergence of competing entertainment, from high culture symphony orchestras to the pop culture of karaoke parlors and A-mei.
"We were A-Mei 15 years ago," jokes Tracey Zong, director of Peking Opera at the school. And therein lies a plot twist that certainly qualifies as theatrical tragedy -- an art form more than 300 years old is falling to the likes of a pop singer less than 30 years old. It is a problem, arts observers say, that will continue to plague traditional opera on Taiwan and in China.
"It's very difficult for Peking Opera to become more popular again because it is too fixed now," says Ou Shu-chiung, a Peking Opera teacher. "It cannot absorb new things like Taiwanese Opera where you can use new props or other tools. If you do these things in Peking Opera there is a lot of criticism.
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"It's very difficult for Peking Opera to become more popular again because it is too fixed now," says Ou Shu-chiung, a Peking Opera teacher. "It cannot absorb new things like Taiwanese Opera where you can use new props or other tools. If you do these things in Peking Opera there is a lot of criticism.
"It is also a more high-class art, so it cannot become a popular art. And it is too abstract, not like our daily life, so the young generation cannot appreciate it."
This depreciating interest has led to a quiet downsizing in the theater over the past three years, starting with the merger of Taiwan's four main Peking Opera troupes -- Ta Peng, Hai Kuang, Lu Kuang and Yunnan -- into the Kuo Kuang Chinese Opera Company. In July, the National Taiwan school, formerly known as National Fu Hsing Dramatic Arts School, merged with the company's drama academy. By 2001, National Taiwan will lose its professional Peking Opera and acrobatic troupes to the Kuo Kuang company.
The mergers were intended to cut costs, and on that front the plan has been successful. But side-effects have emerged, including fewer slots for graduating performing arts students. Additionally, before the mergers, it was possible to see traditional Peking Opera performances almost every night in Taipei; now, once a week is more likely.
"I know we have a lot of problems," says Zong, "but I don't think that [mergers] is right. If there is only one troupe, the audience can only see one style -- and I don't like that."
In her office at Fu Hsing, Zong sits at the forefront of the battle to ensure that Peking Opera survives in Taiwan. She admits that it is a task that often leaves her hoping for the best while living through the worst. With lingering dread, she recounts one of her worst experiences in theater, which happened a few years ago during a performance in Keelung.
"There were only seven people in the audience," she recalls, "including two men who worked in the theater. And on the stage were 46 actors and actresses. It was terrible. I was so shocked. I thought, `How could it be this bad?'"
Zong is one of the influential forces in Taiwan's theater that is helping traditional opera adapt. She tries to create new stories while using traditional Peking Opera devices. She may, for instance, take a 14th century story that is male-oriented and perform it from a woman's point of view. She has adapted Snow White into a Peking Opera for children, which garnered her a full house in the National Theater, and she plans to do a Christmas production of the Biblical story Exodus, again at the National Theater.
"At first we used to imitate," Zong explains, "but now we have to create so that we can attract new, younger audiences."
However, her efforts to liberalize Peking Opera have drawn criticism from some corners of the theater world. Because Peking Opera is fairly static, with a limited repertoire of plays and with precise movements to convey specific meanings, there has not been much tugging at the seams to loosen its approach.
Those who have pushed the boundaries, such as the Ya Yin Ensemble, led by Kuo Hsiao-chuang, have met with fleeting success. Ya Yin once won accolades for its ability to graft Western theatrical concepts and stories to Peking Opera, using experimental performance techniques. Of this experiment, one critic noted, "The true degree of Ya Yin's success can be measured in how the group has succeeded in attracting young intellectuals to Peking Opera performances."
Another foray into metamorphosing Peking Opera was made by director Wu Hsing-kuo, who produced a successful adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth, a move that was seen as an intermediary step toward making traditional opera more accessible to modern audiences. (However, lack of financing and interest led Wu to indefinitely suspend his troupe's touring schedule.)
"Traditional is so wonderful and so beautiful," says Zong, "but the performing arts needs to find a new path in the future."
If it doesn't, says Su Zheng-lao, an academics teacher at Fu Hsing who is a tireless advocate of opera, then Peking and Taiwanese opera may end up like other once popular performing arts in Taiwan, such as beiguan, a musical performing style.
"Can you imagine that 100 years ago this drama was very popular in Taiwan," Su says, leafing through a historical text. "But there are no such performances around Taiwan anymore. They just keep these books and tapes so people will remember.
"Maybe if we work harder, there will still be Peking and Taiwanese performances."
The National Taiwan Dramatic Arts School hosts performances of Peking and Taiwanese opera every Tuesday and Thursday at 11am. Call 2796-2666 ext. 601 for more information.
On Nov. 13, the school will perform "Peak of the Spring/Autumn Period"; on Nov. 27 A Feast of Peking Opera will be presented. The school is located at 177 Neihu Road, Sec. 2, Neihu, Taipei.
From Dec. 24-26, the school's professional Peking Opera troupe will perform "Exodus" at the National Theater."
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