Taiwanese opera actress Chen Ya-lan (陳亞蘭) has launched a crowdfunding campaign for the sequel to the television series for which she won Best Leading Actor in a Television Series at the 57th Golden Bell Awards this month.
Chen is the first woman to win the “actor” award, having played the male role of the Qing-era Jiaqing Emperor (嘉慶帝) in the drama Lord Jiaqing and the Journey to Taiwan. Her campaign is also the first of its kind for a Taiwanese opera television series.
“I am willing to dedicate myself to the only type of drama that originated in Taiwan,” she said at the awards ceremony, referring to traditional Taiwanese opera troupes known as gezaixi (歌仔戲), adding that she hopes that efforts are made to help the traditional drama form survive.
Photo: Chen Yi-kuan, Taipei Times
Chen is reported to have sold three homes to raise funds for the drama’s first season.
By working with crowdfunding consultants, Chen hopes to appeal to a young generation of Internet users who might not be familiar with traditional Taiwanese opera, she said.
“Taiwanese opera is the essence of Taiwanese traditional culture, which could be difficult to pass to new generations without a concerted effort being made,” she said.
Apart from advertising expenses, Chen plans to put the funds raised into a trust account, reports said.
Separately, 78-year-old Taiwanese opera star Yang Li-hua (楊麗花) on Saturday won a special performance award at the 33rd Golden Melody Awards for Traditional Arts and Music, which was held at the Taiwan Traditional Theatre Center in Taipei.
Yang began her career at the age of 13 and has performed Taiwanese opera on radio and television, starred in Taiwanese movies and produced theater works.
Winning the award “is the best encouragement to me,” she said. “Taiwanese opera gave me my reputation and I will always work hard for it.”
“She dedicated her entire youth to Taiwanese opera and raised its status,” Chen said as she introduced Yang at the ceremony.
Yang is also an educator who teaches people the central values of the opera — loyalty, filial piety, chastity and righteousness, she added.
“It is because of Yang’s example that I have achieved what I have today,” Chen said.
Additional reporting by CNA
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
RSS