East Meets West - Wang Keran: What "Fruit" Will Theatrical Collaboration Between China and the West Bear?
As one of the oldest forms of artistic expression in human civilisation, theatre has a long tradition in both China and the West. When Western directors come to China, what artistic effects will they produce with Chinese actors, theatres, and audiences? What new interpretations and watching habits will they bring to the world theatre stage?
In recent years, Chinese theatre producers, represented by Wang Keran, the founder, artistic director, and production director of Yanghua Theatre, have produced a number of theatre productions, including New Wilderness, Ghetto, Ponzi Scheme, Thunderstorm and Thunderstorm II, through the collaboration of top Chinese and Western directors, scripts, and actors. These works have achieved both breakthroughs in artistic approach and commercial success.
In an exclusive interview with East Meets West of the China News Service, Wang Keran explained the path and impact of the theatrical collaboration between China and the West from the perspective of a theatre producer and creator.
CNS: In the early 20th century, modern Chinese theatre began and developed through the translation of Western theatre works and theories. Compared to that time, why is it important for Chinese theatre today to work with European directors?
Wang Keran: Chinese theatre has developed for over a century, but that doesn't mean it is the best in this field. Isn't it a good thing to bring in the best artisans from all over the world to make our own work?
National confidence also lies in acknowledging each other's strengths. At the moment, European theatre is world-class, and European directors' artistic and technical approaches are generally superior. This is rooted in the overall environment of the European theatre market - in developed European countries, theatre is a particularly important object of government support, and local audiences are keen to go to the theatre, so governments step up their efforts to support it. There is much to learn from Europe in terms of mechanisms to protect the development of artists and support them to connect with the market.
On the other hand, China has many classic plays, and what is classic must have vitality in its blood. Let's take Thunderstorm as an example: The Beijing People's Art Theatre already has a version of Thunderstorm, and there are inevitably different ways of presenting the classics, so Yanghua can be a practitioner of different ways of presenting them, and we invited the famous French theatre director Eric Lacascade to produce the multi-act plays in sequence Thunderstorm and Thunderstorm II in 2020.
In fact, theatre vitality lies not in the technique but in the text, and the most important thing is to express the destiny of the Chinese people. If one is stuck on whether the technique is traditional or not, one is bound to go the wrong way. "Making foreign things serve China and traditional things serve the present" and using the best techniques to express Chinese culture is cultural confidence. Using the most advanced techniques to express one's soul is the best way of thinking about theatre creation.
Thunderstorm at Beijing People's Art Theatre.
Photo by Shi Chunyang
CNS: Thunderstorm is a classic masterpiece of modern Chinese theatre, and were you not worried that a Western director wouldn't be able to present it accurately? Or did you want such an external, modern perspective?
Wang Keran: When I choose a director, one of my premises is that the director should come with the desire to create, i.e. can they get a better artistic breakthrough in China? This desire determines whether they can fully motivate their passion, creative talent, and the perspective in working with the Chinese creative team.
In the creative practice, we have not given a free hand to foreign directors. For example, at the beginning of the creation of Thunderstorm and Thunderstorm II, I told director Eric that several aspects had to be decided by the Chinese team, such as the costumes. Director Eric did not know much about the Chinese dressing habits in the period when Thunderstorm was written, and even if he was trying to get close, it would not look vivid to us.
As long as the script story is ours and the costumes are ours, it is still an expression of the Chinese story, no matter how it is changed. On this basis, we agree with Eric's bold artistic innovations for Thunderstorm. For example, the Zhou family's living room is no longer an antique Chinese living room. It is designed in a modern minimalist style, with the entire stage made of white marble and no superfluous decorations except for a few tables and sofas, thus underlining the repression of patriarchal power and the coldness towards kinship in the Zhou family.
Eric has a great reputation in Europe and has directed many plays at the Palais des Papes in Avignon, France. Of course, such a big-name director is extremely controlling in his creativity, but as long as we carefully communicate with him from the director's perspective, he will accept it. Because what we are doing is not to suppress him but to express the needs of Chinese theatre and help him become more successful.
Stage photo of the multi-act plays in sequence Thunderstorm and Thunderstorm II. Credit: the interviewee
CNS: In addition to top directors from Europe, in recent years, Yanghua has also introduced foreign plays such as Same Time, Next Year, Ghetto, Saigon, The Ponzi Scheme, and Les Miserables. And what characteristics have you seen in these plays?
Wang Keran: The most crucial point in choosing a play is that its core is what Chinese audiences want.
Let's take the famous Broadway romantic comedy Same Time, Next Year as an example. 2017 saw the production of a Chinese version of Same Time, Next Year by Yanghua. The play, which premiered in 1975 and won the highest award in American drama and musical theatre, explores love in its text and the relationship between people and society as they grow up, which is precisely what Chinese audiences can now understand and find intriguing. I chose it because the script is deep enough to portray the Vietnam War, loyalty in relationships, responsibility, and human frailty.
At the same time, while attending theatre festivals abroad, I have seen some excellent theatre productions, such as Saigon, the "king of plays" at the Avignon Theatre Festival in France in 2017. Set in a Vietnamese restaurant called Saigon, the play spans from 1956 to 1996 and tells the story of many Vietnamese people who fled to France and returned to their homeland 40 years later. Although far from Chinese audiences, the play essentially asks the question "who am I", a theme full of the zeitgeist, and expresses the common emotions of humanity, such as separation for ever and the impact of the times on fate, which, with the help of advanced expressions, are sufficient to move Chinese audiences.
Director Eric in rehearsal. Credit: the interviewee
CNS: The Yanghua productions such as The Dream Like a Dream, Thunderstorm, and Thunderstorm II have been well received in China, and have you ever thought of taking these plays abroad? What impact does Chinese theatre have on the world theatre stage today?
Wang Keran: In fact, in recent years, I have been receiving invitations from foreign theatre festivals that want us to participate in the theatre festivals. New Wilderness, Thunderstorm, and Thunderstorm II were invited many times, but we could not attend because of the pandemic. Not long ago, the Israeli Embassy also kept contacting us for new collaborations. This year, Yanghua also invested in launching the Chinese version of Les Miserables with the Actors' Spring Theatre Festival in Montpellier, France.
Wilderness by Beijing People's Art Theatre. Photo by Shi Chunyang
New Wilderness by Yanghua Theatre. Credit: the interviewee
When I first met Director Eric, he asked me rhetorically, "Why would I, Eric, go to China to direct a play like this?" Now, he keeps telling me that he is willing to come back to China to direct a new play. I think this is out of the concern of Western theatre people for Chinese society and out of their trust in Yanghua, who can help them connect with Chinese audiences and Chinese theatre.
If we look at theatre as a worldwide industry like other industries, Chinese theatre has to be an equal participant and contributor in the industry. To achieve this, I believe that we must first build on our Chinese roots, and then offer our contribution to the world in terms of techniques, values and other aspects. I have never deliberately wanted foreign audiences to watch our plays because I am making them for Chinese audiences. However, as long as Chinese theatre productions are first-class and have the creative ability to keep pace with first-rate foreign theatre expression, they can participate in the world theatre industry, which is a process of constant integration.
Wang Keran, having been in the theatre industry for nearly twenty years, is the founder, artistic director, and production director of Beijing Yanghua Times Culture Development Company Limited. He was a delegate to the 11th National Congress of the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, was honoured by Children of China as a "leader in expanding the world of Chinese theatre", and was awarded the Chevalier Order of Arts and Letters by the French Republic in 2021.
He has produced, supervised, produced, and scripted more than 50 works, including Watch TV with Me, A Village in Taiwan, The Dream Like a Dream, Let Me Hold Your Hand, The Seagull, Winter Journey, The Village, and New Wilderness, reaching an audience of more than 4 million people.
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