Abstract
This chapter is a case study of Chinese adaptations of Brecht’s Life of Galileo (1979), The Caucasian Chalk Circle (1985), and The Threepenny Opera (1998), all mounted by Chen Yong (1929–2004), a female director and one of the most prolific and noteworthy contemporary Chinese theatre artists at China Youth Art Theatre (one of the predecessors of the National Theatre of China today). This chapter examines Chen Yong’s directorial approaches in adapting Brecht’s plays in the three specific political and social environments since the end of the Cultural Revolution. Chen’s reinterpretations of these plays were not only conditioned by the changes in the socio-historical and cultural life of China, but they also reflected a unique perspective that paid particular attention to the portrayal of female characters. This directorial perspective was filtered as much by her revolutionary idealism as by a traditional Chinese “idealization” of the virtues of womanhood; hence, it would fall short of the ideals of feminism as understood in the West.
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Notes
- 1.
For this chapter I used Brecht’s scripts of Life of Galileo, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, and The Threepenny Opera and the video recordings of the three huaju adaptations performed by China Youth Art Theatre as the main textual basis for analysis. Since I do not have the Chinese performance scripts for these three adaptations, I referred to the existent Chinese translation of Brecht’s plays, titled The Collection of Brecht’s Plays (Bulaixite xiju ji, edited by Zhang Li and Cai Hongjun, published by Anhui Art and Literature Publishing House in 2000) for the purpose of comparative analysis. The video recording of the huaju adaptation of Life of Galileo was not issued by the China Youth Art Theatre for the public. I appreciate the translator of this adaptation, Ding Yangzhong, for providing me the precious copy of his own videotape for my research.
- 2.
Chen Yong initiated the production in 1978 and invited Huang Zuolin to come to Beijing to co-direct the production. It premiered in spring 1979 in Beijing at the Capital Theatre (Shoudu Juchang) (Yong Chen 26). As Chen Yong indicated in her book My Artistic Stage, it was the first foreign play chosen to stage after the Cultural Revolution (Yong Chen 26).
- 3.
In a 1975 article titled “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” feminist critic Laura Mulvey coined the term “the male gaze” to discuss how, in the era of classical Hollywood cinema, women characters were positioned to be looked at by the male viewer voyeuristically and/or fetishistically. She posits that the only way to remedy the gender bias against women in filmmaking is to challenge it with an alternative feminist perspective (Mulvey 14–28). By alluding to the concept of the “male gaze” here, I do not mean that Brecht, in his dramatic works, is particularly gender-biased in his portrayal of female characters (e.g., sexually objectifying them for the pleasure of male theatergoers). Instead, I want to keep that feminist criticism in mind when I study the unique perspective of a Chinese female director in her productions of Brecht’s plays in a span of almost 20 years since the end of the Cultural Revolution.
- 4.
“Three obediences”: A woman was supposed to obey her father as a daughter, her husband as a wife, her son(s) in widowhood. “Four virtues”: wifely virtue, wifely speech, wifely manner/appearance, and wifely work. For more, see chap. 17, “Women’s Virtues and Vices,” in Chinese Civilization: A Sourcebook, edited by Patricia Buckley Ebrey, 72–76.
- 5.
See Rey Chow for a study of female images presented in modern Chinese literary and cinematic texts.
- 6.
See Lisa Rofel for a study of female factory workers in China during the decades after the Cultural Revolution.
- 7.
This discussion is based on Bertolt Brecht’s Life of Galileo and performance video of Life of Galileo by the China Youth Art Theatre.
- 8.
This description is based on the performance video recording of the huaju adaptation Life of Galileo performed by the China Youth Art Theatre.
- 9.
I felt that the music of huaju adaptation Life of Galileo is recorded music. When the Ballad-Singer and his wife appear on the stage, their lyrics are meant to introduce the (next) scene. The Ballad-Singer’s mandolin is a stage prop for decorative purposes, especially in the first scene to augment the joyful festive mood.
- 10.
I have quoted from English translations of Brecht’s plays because the dialogue in the 1979 Chinese adaptation Life of Galileo was mostly faithful to Brecht’s script, with only minor changes.
- 11.
In Scene 14 in Brecht’s script of Life of Galileo, Galileo is “old now and half blind” (99); Virginia is “now about forty years old” (99). However, Brecht’s script does not indicate Virginia is wearing a nun’s robe in this scene.
- 12.
The “new spring of science” was the title of a lecture given by Guo Moruo (1892–1978) in 1978. The theme of the talk was that now that the ten-year ordeal of the Cultural Revolution was over, a new spring for science (as well as arts, literature, and everything else) began. It reflected the general spirit of reform and opening up after the third plenary session of the 11th central committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in 1978.
- 13.
According to Chen Yong’s book, this article “Happy Exploration and Experimentation: The Director’s Thoughts on Huaju The Caucasian Chalk Circle” was first published in Guangming Daily, May 16, 1985.
- 14.
This segment of the discussion is based on Bertolt Brecht, The Caucasian Chalk Circle. (New York: Arcade Publishing, Inc, 1994).
- 15.
This discussion of Chen Yong’s 1985 adaptation of The Caucasian Chalk Circle is based on a performance video of The Caucasian Chalk Circle by the China Youth Art Theatre.
- 16.
I have quoted from English translations of Brecht’s plays because the dialogue in Chen Yong’s adaptation The Caucasian Chalk Circle was mostly faithful to Brecht’s script, with only minor changes (which possibly resulted from translation and/or out of concern for stage performance for Chinese audiences).
- 17.
Regarding the quoted phrase, see Du Gao and Gang Chen’s article in People’s Daily on 23 June 1982.
- 18.
In the performance video of the huaju adaptation of Brecht’s Caucasian Chalk Circle directed by Chen Yong, when Grusha (performed by Ding Jiali) leaves the child on the threshold of the peasant family, she dances joyfully. Although the dance movement is very short, it presents Grusha’s lively personality. The production video shows Grusha’s (Ding’s) feet movement (hitting with the floor) as the main dynamic of the body, accompanied with a finger snap. Based on my knowledge of traditional Chinese dance and European folk dance (again both in a broad sense), I deem the dance moment European style. When I asked Ding Jiali during an interview in March 2018 about the style of the dance, she couldn’t say for sure what specific European style it exactly was.
- 19.
As far as I know, taihuajiao (抬花轿) is a kind of dance steps often seen in xiqu and yangge (秧歌).
- 20.
See the citation of stage photo in Peter Wigglesworth Ferran’s article “The Threepenny Songs: Cabaret and the Lyrical Gestus” Theater, vol. 30, no. 3, Fall 2000.
- 21.
This segment of the discussion is based on the performance videos of The Threepenny Opera by the China Youth Art Theatre.
- 22.
According to Chen Yong, the huaju adaptation deleted the eighth scene in the original script where Polly and Lucy fight over Mac “so that the plot development would be more compact and focused” (Yong Chen 67). It is also possible (although Chen herself did not explicitly say so) that as a female theatre artist Chen Yong did not particularly like this demeaning scene of two women engaged in a “catfight” for the same man.
- 23.
Here I compare the singing in the opening scene in the huaju adaptation The Threepenny Opera based on the video recordings of the performance and Brecht’s script. For lyrics, I quote from the English translation of Brecht’s play for stylistic consistency because Chen Yong’s adaptation is mostly faithful to Brecht’s script. For Chen Yong’s changes, I provide the translation based on the performance video.
- 24.
For the lyrics for this song I quote from the English translation of Brecht’s play because the Chinese version of the lyrics used in Chen Yong’s production was mostly faithful to the original with only minor changes here and there.
- 25.
This dialogue between father and daughter is quoted from English translations of Brecht’s play because its Chinese version in Chen Yong’s adaptation was mostly faithful to Brecht’s script.
- 26.
For Jenny and Mac’s singing, I compared the lyrics in the huaju adaptation The Threepenny Opera based on the video recordings of the performance and the English translation of Brecht’s original script. Whenever Chen Yong’s production is faithful to Brecht’s script, I quote from English translation of Brecht’s play. Whenever and wherever Chen Yong “deviates” from the original script, I provide an English translation based on the performance video. In this instance, the line with the strikethrough is from Brecht whereas the underlined line is from Chen Yong.
Works Cited
Ding, Jiali. 2016. Personal Interview, Beijing, May 23.
Ding, Yangzhong. 2016. Personal Interview, Beijing, April 12.
Du, Gao, and Gang Chen, 1982. “Huaju chuangzuo yu jingshen wenming” [Spoken Drama Creative Work and Spiritual Civilization Construction]. Renmin ribao [People’s Daily]. June 23: Section 5.
Li, Jianming. 2016. Personal Interview. Beijing, March 23.
Mao, Tse-tung. 1942. “On Literature and Art”. Ed. Berel Lang and Forrest Williams. Marxism and Art: Writings in Aesthetics and Criticism. New York: Longman Inc., 1972, 108–125.
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Zhang, W. (2020). One Director, Three Takes: Chen Yong’s Reinterpretations of Life of Galileo, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, and The Threepenny Opera. In: Chinese Adaptations of Brecht. Chinese Literature and Culture in the World. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37778-6_2
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