CHINA DAILY | HONG KONG EDITION Wednesday, March 24, 2021 | 17 YOUTH he vicissitudes of a social ethnic culture, the crew made an structure from a bygone effort to research how to truthfully era, a bildungsroman represent Tibetan culture while tell­ about an individual caught ing the story. Tbetween being either an idiot or a The movements for the perform­ prophet, love writ in water versus ers were conceived by dance direct­ blood and feuds spanning genera­ Power play or and choreographer Yu Chenxi, tions — a new play, titled Red Pop­ who says he integrated ethnic char­ pies, presents all these facets in acteristics into the body movements three hours. A production depicting the seen onstage, including gestures Produced by Joyway production from the jingangwu, a dance per­ company and performed by Sich­ era of Tibetan clans in formed during festive occasions. uan People’s Art Theater, the play Sichuan is set to make “I felt that it was serendipitous for will make its Beijing debut on Satur­ me to join the play. I started learning day, with a second performance on its Beijing debut, folk dance at the age of 12 from a Sunday, before touring Shanghai, teacher of Tibetan ethnicity, so I Zhejiang province, Jiangsu province Cheng Yuezhu reports. have learned a lot of regional dance and Guangdong province. styles,” Yu says. The play is adapted from the 1998 “When I joined the crew, I went to eponymous novel written by Alai, a Chengdu and visited the streets Sichuan­based writer from the where Tibetan people gather and Tibetan ethnic group. The book won dance together every night. I stayed the Mao Dun Literature Prize in there for seven days and observed 2000, making Alai, then 41, the them. From their postures and our youngest winner of the prize. conversations, I extracted the fea­ Having grown up in the Tibetan­ tures of their mannerisms and inte­ inhabited area in Sichuan, Alai grated them into my choreography.” zooms in on the former clan struc­ The play’s musical director, Shi ture of the ethnic group before the Yicen, also visited Tibetan­inhabit­ founding of New China. ed areas to conduct field study. The The story focuses on a chieftain’s production includes indigenous son who is widely considered to be Tibetan music and folk instru­ an idiot that is out of step with the ments, and a singer of the Tibetan real world. However, he is gifted ethnic group was invited to record a with a vision that allows him to few sequences to provide transi­ make wise decisions at crucial tions for the play. moments. “Many details in my music are In one such example, when other inspired by the monologue of ‘the chieftains are all growing poppies, idiot’ from the original novel, which the protagonist suggests growing is expressed in an acutely sensitive food crops instead. way. For instance, a series of varia­ Later when a widespread famine tions are designed for him to set off hits the area, grains become more his complicated emotions when valuable than opium. The clan interacting with the female charac­ therefore takes the opportunity to ters,” Shi says. expand its wealth, population and According to Alai, the story should territory. not be seen as being about a single The story also addresses family ethnic group, but as one that deals feuds between clans, the relation­ with the issues relevant to all, such ship between power and desire, and as power, money and happiness. the ups and downs of clan structure. “This play shows that the crew “Seeing the book adapted into the has a good grasp of the spiritual core play, I felt a sense of refreshment,” of the original book. It highlights the says Alai, who serves as the literary individual and the group in that consultant for the play. particular era, presenting the ups “It’s been almost 30 years since I Red Poppies, a play adapted from Alai’s award­winning eponymous novel, will be staged in Beijing this weekend. Tibetan ethnic culture is and downs of their fate and emo­ finished the book. Hearing some of a major feature of the production. PHOTOS BY WEN LU AND WANG XUFENG / FOR CHINA DAILY tions in the progress of history. I the lines onstage, I recalled that I think it’s a soul­stirring production,” wrote them.” restricted by both time and space, words. It’s reinvigorating to see how According to the play’s script­ the “idiot” protagonist, but also Alai says. He says that, compared to novel­ hence presenting an interesting the play condenses and represents writer, Cao Lusheng, it preserves a making adaptations with regard to writing, which does not necessarily challenge. the story. It seems like a novel, but lot of the book’s original features, female characters. Contact the writer at have a length limit, a play is “The novel is almost 300,000 somehow different.” such as following the narrative of As the story is based on Tibetan [email protected] Chinese views on global news CHINA DAILY Global Edition.