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• 1 2024-01-16T19:11:16+00:00 The Ink and Vermilion Edition of The Orphan of Zhao
  墨本丹青版赵氏孤儿 (2011) 22 plain 2025-01-28T14:55:58+00:00

  Staged Performance Made for Television

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  LINKS TO THE TELEVISION PROGRAM

  • A video of the recorded TV edition with Mandarin Chinese subtitles (simplified) on bilibili.

  INFORMATION

  • Title: The Ink and Vermilion Edition of The Orphan of Zhao (Moben danqing ban Zhao shi gu’er 墨本丹青版赵氏孤儿)
  • Year: 2011
  • Style: Beijing Opera performance
  • Cast: Wang Peiyu 王珮瑜  (as Cheng Ying 程婴); Tian Hui 田慧 (as Princess Zhuangji 庄姬); Dong Hongsong 董红松 (as Wei Jiang 魏绛); Chen Yu 陈宇 (as Tu’an Gu 屠岸贾); Lu Su 鲁肃 (as Gongsun Chujiu 公孙杵臼); Hao Shuai 郝帅 (as Zhao Wu 赵武)
  • Director: Ma Qian 马骞
  • Venue: Shanghai Grand Theater 上海大剧院
  • Language: Beijing Opera Style Mandarin
  • Duration: 133 minutes

  INTRODUCTION

  In terms of Peking Opera, two foundational renditions of The Orphan of Zhao stand out. One is the rendition entitled “Searching for the Orphan and Saving the Orphan” composed by Tan Xinpei 谭鑫培 (1847-1917), and was later performed by Yu Shuyan 余叔岩 (1890-1943) and Meng Xiaodong 孟小冬 (1908-1977) from the Yu school. Yu Shuyan recorded two arias from this play in 1925, namely “I have received the order in the Baihu Hall (白虎大堂奉了命)” and “My wife! No need to be so fierce (娘子不必太烈性).” Both are renowned as classics of “old male” (laosheng 老生) performance. Another prominent version is the one composed by Ma Lianliang 马连良 (1901-1966) in 1959, known as The Orphan of Zhao. Unlike the condensed four-scene play Search for the Orphan and Saving the Orphan, Ma Lianliang’s version narrates the whole story of The Orphan. In the “Ink and Vermilion” edition performed by Wang Peiyu 王珮瑜 (1978-), she combines the two aforementioned versions selectively, telling an intriguing story while maintaining the representative arias from both editions.
  
  Wang’s training in traditional Peking Opera laid the groundwork for her innovation. Born in 1978 in Suzhou, Wang Peiyu was admitted to the Shanghai Opera School (上海市戏曲学校 Shanghai shi xiqu xuexiao) in 1992. Before entering the school, she had already studied opera singing with the Yu school expert Master Fan Shiren 范石人 (1913-2012). She was able to perform thirty-seven arias and two complete plays, one of which was Searching for the Orphan and Saving the Orphan. Later in her life, she frequently chose to perform this play in various prestigious competitions and won multiple prizes and awards for her interpretation (Wang, 2019). In 1994, Wang Mengyun 王梦云 (1938-) assumed the role of the principal of the Shanghai Opera School, inviting Peking opera masters from across the country to teach there. She also encouraged students to learn from multiple teachers. In such an environment, Wang Peiyu had the opportunity to absorb the strengths of various operatic lineages. For instance, in her third year, she studied under the guidance of Zhu Bingqian 朱秉谦 (1933-2021), a disciple of Ma Lianliang, who had a keen understanding of the “old male” role type (Wang, 2019).
  
  In 2010, the director Ma Qian 马千 (1980-) and Wang Peiyu began to collaborate. First, they composed the opera The Black Basin (Wupen ji乌盆记) together. They wanted to restore the “original state of the ink shell” (moke yuantai 墨壳原态). The term “ink shell” is derived from traditional performing arts terminology, signifying authenticity and adherence to traditional practices. In Ma Qian's words, "We are neither transforming tradition into a new form nor preserving it in an old-fashioned manner. Instead, we aim to restore it to its original state, just as it was originally performed" (China News Network, 2009). This philosophy also characterized Ma Qian and Wang Peiyu's second collaboration, namely the "Ink and Vermilion" edition of The Orphan.
  
  Based on Ma Lianliang’s performance script, the “Ink and Vermilion” edition made few textual changes, but rearranged the order while removing some arias. The renowned traditional Chinese painter, Shen Shihui 申世辉 (1959-), was invited to paint a series of landscape paintings specifically for this edition. The name “Ink and Vermilion” stands for the original script by Ma Lianliang (ink) and Shen’s painting (vermilion) respectively. While the stage design retained the most traditional elements of Peking opera, featuring the classic “one table and two chairs” prop arrangement, some modern adaptations were made: in front of the background curtain, seven antique-style figure paintings, depicting the main characters in the Orphan, would be slowly raised or lowered from the ceiling of the stage in accordance with the storyline. These paintings provide a visual enhancement to the narration and the theatrical presentation.
  
  By utilizing the spatial dimensions of the stage, the “Ink and Vermilion” edition merged traditional Chinese painting with Peking opera performance. This approach, showcasing Chinese traditional culture through modern stage techniques (such as adjustable curtains and interchangeable background images on the screen) while integrating them with traditional Peking opera stage performances, reflects a prevalent trend in many recent opera adaptations. For instance, in Jade Hairpin (Yuzan ji 玉簪记)” composed by Pai Hsien-yung 白先勇 (1937-) and performed by Yu Jiulin 俞玖林 (1978-) and Shen Fengying 沈丰英 (1979-), calligraphic elements were introduced into the stage setting. Similarly, in the recent rendition of Top Graduate Zhang Xie, calligraphy scrolls were incorporated into the stage design as well.
  
  This module will show how traditional Chinese paintings, including the character images, affected the narration of Peking Opera as a stage play. The edition that is analyzed here is a recorded TV broadcast, which has undergone post-production editing. The transitions between scenes, for example, were all removed. However, in live performances, judging from audience feedback and news reports, Wang Peiyu may have incorporated some additional ideas. For instance, news reports suggest that Wang Peiyu intentionally presented the entire Peking Opera stage ecology to the audience by placing the orchestra directly on the stage and exposing the rearrangement of props to the audience (Dongfang News, 2012). Some audiences mentioned that the staff in charge of changing props were categorized as “performers” instead of “staff” on the playbill. However, further details of the live performance are beyond the scope of the present module.

  Plot Summary

  Tu’an Gu 屠岸贾 plotted to have the King of the Jin kingdom kill Zhao Dun 赵盾 and sought to eradicate the Zhao family. Zhao Dun's wife, Princess Zhuang Ji 庄姬, was pregnant and managed to escape death by hiding in the palace. She gave birth to a child and named him Zhao Wu 赵武. Tu’an Gu searched for the newborn baby in the whole country, vowing to find the baby of the Zhao family or else execute all infants of the same age.
  
  Cheng Ying 程婴 promised Princess Zhuangji to save Zhao Wu. Collaborating with Gongsun Chujiu 公孙杵臼, they developed a plan: Cheng Ying accused Gongsun Chujiu of hiding the baby Zhao Wu, which led Tu’an Gu to kill the baby and execute Gongsun Chujiu. However, the infant found in Gongsun’s place, who was supposed to be Zhao Wu, was secretly substituted by Ying’s own son, Jin Ge 金哥. The orphan of Zhao's family survived because of the sacrifice of Cheng Ying’s son and Gongsun Chujiu.
  
  Fifteen years later, General Wei Jiang 魏绛 returned to the court from the border. After hearing the story of the orphan, Wei Jiang sought revenge for the Zhao family. He whipped Cheng Ying, as Cheng Ying was believed to be the one who betrayed the Zhao family for money. However, Wei Jiang learned the truth from Cheng Ying. Cheng Ying informed Wei Jiang that Zhao Wu was still alive, with a red mark on his palm as an identifying mark. Wei Jiang decided to help Cheng Ying. Meanwhile, Zhao Wu, while hunting with Tu’an Gu, coincidentally encountered Princess Zhuang Ji. Zhuang Ji’s strange attitude towards Zhao Wu piqued Zhao Wu’s curiosity about the past. Cheng Ying prepared an album of drawings to reveal the past to Zhao Wu. With the assistance of Wei Jiang and Cheng Ying, Zhao Wu killed Tu’an Gu, avenging his father at last.

  THEME: Stage as a Narrator

  Example 1: Providing Additional Information [1:28:25 - 1:33:55]

  In the scene “Encounter with Mother” (Act 11 in Ma’s edition, Act 8 in Wang Peiyu’s edition), Zhao Wu and Tu’an Gu go hunting near the imperial tomb. Zhao Wu successfully shoots two large wild geese, but they fall into the tomb area. While searching for the prey, Zhao Wu coincidentally encounters his birth mother Princess Zhuangji, who has come to the tomb to pay her respects to her deceased husband.
  
  The aria sung by Princess Zhuangji in this scene was originally included in Act 10 of Ma’s edition of The Orphan. In Ma’s edition, Princess Zhuangji visits General Wei Jiang after 15 years, recounting the events of the past. Consequently, Wei Jiang visits Cheng Ying, criticizing him for shamefully sacrificing the orphan Zhao Wu for his personal benefits and beating with a whip. This aria signifies the return of Princess Zhuangji and a new possibility in the storyline, while presenting the experience and thoughts of Zhuangji over the past decade. In Wang Peiyu's edition, the function and role of the aria closely align with the original version.
  
  The background image in this scene features Shen Shihui's landscape painting titled “The East Wind Dyed a Myriad Trees the Color of Spring (东风染得万木春)” (Fig. 3). From the recording, the atmosphere of the painting appears to be desolate and lonely, creating a sense of sorrow that corresponds to Princess Zhuangji's emotion.
  
  Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes

  Chinese Subtitles	CTC Translation
  庄姬（唱）：宫廷静寂影凄凉	Princess Zhuangji (sings): The palace is quiet; my shadow is desolate.
  不堪回首暗神伤	I cannot bear to recall the past, but I am secretly full of grief.
  为报冤仇熬岁月	To avenge the feud, I endured these painful years.
  要学松柏耐冰霜	From pines and cypress trees, I learned how to survive ice and frost.

  
  Interestingly, Shen Shihui's original painting intended to convey a more positive mood. This can be deduced from the title he gave to this artwork, “The East Wind Dyed a Myriad Trees the Color of Spring.” The color of spring is the color of green, indicating the vitality of spring (Fig. 3) However, possibly due to the stage lighting and the limitation of recording equipment and technique, when this artwork is presented on the LED stage backdrop (Fig. 4), the saturation of the green color significantly decreases, almost blending with the bare trees. It therefore conveys a desolate atmosphere, capturing the characters' emotions.
  
  
  

  Example 2: The Painting on Stage and the Painting in the Plot [1:40:04-1:47:04]

  In the "Revelation (说破)" scene, Zhao Wu, puzzled by Princess Zhuangji's strange attitude, expresses his curiosity to Cheng Ying. As a result, Cheng Ying hand-paints an album of ink paintings, narrating the story of how several righteous individuals saved the orphan of the Zhao family from Tu’an Gu’s machinations. Cheng Ying does not disclose the names of those characters. At first, when Zhao Wu looks at the paintings in the album, he thinks it was merely a story. However, he soon learns from Cheng Ying that he himself is the orphan saved in the painted story.
  
  In this scene, seven pieces of portraits with images of the characters were unfurled from the top of the stage (Video 1). Most likely, the one in the center is Cheng Ying holding the baby, on the far left it is Gongsun Chujiu, and on the far right is presumably General Wei Jiang. Due to a lack of detailed information, it's challenging to identify all the characters. However, in Wang’s adaptation, seven main characters were involved in searching for and saving the orphan: Cheng Ying, who saved and raised the orphan Zhao Wu; Zhao Wu’s biological mother Princess Zhuangji;  Gongsun Chujiu, who sacrificed himself for the orphan; General Han Jue 韩厥, who let Cheng Ying escape from the palace; General Wei Jiang, who sought justice for the Zhao family; the maid Bu Feng 卜凤, who protected Princess Zhuangji, and Tu’an Gu, the villain. These seven canvases allow the story painted by Cheng Ying to be visible to the audience, while underlining the plot of the performed story. As Zhao Wu realizes he is the character in Cheng Ying's painted book, the audience simultaneously figures out that Zhao Wu, surrounded by these painted canvases, completes the story told by the stage settings.
  
  
  Click to expand/collapse Translation Notes

  Chinese Subtitles	CTC Translation
  Cheng Ying takes a seat. He opens an album and prepares to paint with brush and ink.
  老程婴提笔泪难忍，千头万绪涌在心！	I, old Cheng Ying, start painting, unable to stop myself from crying; A myriad thoughts surging in my heart!
  十五年屈辱俱受尽，佯装笑脸对奸臣。	I have suffered all sorts of humiliation over the past fifteen years; I was forced to put on a smiling face for the treacherous official.
  晋国中上下的人谈论	People throughout the kingdom of Jin, no matter their station in life, all said that
  都道我老程婴贪图那富贵与赏金;	I, old Cheng Ying, coveted rank and rewards,
  卖友求荣，害死了孤儿，	Betrayed my friends for glory, and caused the death of the orphan
  是一个不义之人！	I am considered a person without any integrity!
  谁知我舍却了亲儿性命!	Who knows that I sacrificed the life of my own son!
  亲儿性命!	The life of my own son!
  我的儿呀！	My dear son!
  Cheng Ying sits back, continuing to paint with the brush.
  程婴：抚养了赵家后代根。	I raised the sprout of the future descendants of the Zhao family.
  为孤儿我已然把心血用尽，	I have already exhausted my heartsblood for the orphan.
  说往事全靠这水墨丹青。	Only through these ink paintings can I recount the events of the past.
  画就了雪冤图以为凭证，以为凭证!	I have drawn this painting to clear my name from those unjust charges--as evidence, as evidence!

  Example 3: Depicting the Passage of Time [1:27:44-1:28:05]

          This scene transition occurs in the act "Encountering Mother." (Act 11 in Ma’s version, Act 8 in Wang’s version). Previously, Tu’an Gu and Zhao Wu had gone hunting. After this transitional scene, Princess Zhuangji appears to pay her respects at her deceased husband's grave.
          By zooming in on a withered tree and thus filling the entire frame with the background image, the camera then pans from left to right, and finally incorporates a gradual fade to Zhuangji's entrance. The video thus features a highly impactful transitional shot which is achieved through post-production techniques. The existence of post-production, coupled with the inherent characteristics of television programs as an imitation of live experience, makes such transitional shots more interesting. This approach contradicts the aim of restoring the watching experience of a live performance. Instead, it further emphasizes the recorded nature of the presentation, underscoring how the medium of TV technology changes the audience experience.
  

  Example 4: Deviation Between Traditional Chinese Painting and The Orphan of Zhao

  The Orphan is a play closely related to palace life, with intense and sometimes fierce emotional expressions. For example, Cheng Ying endures humiliation for over a decade before his final fight; at the beginning of the story, Cheng Ying escapes the palace with a baby in his medicine kit, facing numerous challenges and an obscure future. These are all highly charged scenes.
  
  Interestingly, the producers of the “Ink and Vermilion” rendition commissioned Shen Shihui, the famous Chinese painter, to create three ink-wash paintings to serve as background images for the performance. Shen Shihui is known for landscape paintings; hence, all three paintings unsurprisingly depicted nature and took landscape as their main subject.
  We have previously discussed the “withered tree” painting named spring color (Fig. 3). As for the other two, one depicts mountains and rivers, while the other one portrays trees (Fig. 6 and 7). These three images appear sequentially throughout the performance, starting with the mountain and river painting, followed by the aforementioned “withered tree” painting, and ending with another tree painting (Fig. 7), which is partially obscured by a character’s portrait.
  
  In contrast to the charged nature of many episodes in the play, the imagery of these three landscape paintings conveys a sense of tranquility. Furthermore, these three paintings predominantly feature outdoor scenes of mountains, rivers, and trees. This deviation in venues could be potentially confusing. In the image below (Fig. 6), for instance, Cheng Ying runs into General Han Jue at the palace gate, raising a question for the audiences new to the story: Does this conversation take place in the mountains or at the palace?
  
  
  In the above-mentioned cases, there is a conflict between the narrative conveyed by the stage setting and the narrative of the stage performance. The stage setting is no longer just a passive backdrop but has become another narrative agent, telling a new story.
  
  The landscape paintings that Wang used on the stage depicts complete and meaningful scenes. Interestingly, these scenes have no direct connection to the story of The Orphan of Zhao. To some extent, they exist independently on the stage as representatives of "Chinese traditional culture."
  
  As a result, these landscape paintings used as stage settings generate a parallel narrative alongside the opera performance. A narrative revolves around the design of modern Peking opera stages and the intersection and revival of Chinese cultural traditions in the modern era, which was told to the audience above and beyond the performance itself.
  
  In examples 1 to 3, we have already seen how this narrative can create intriguing intersections with the narrative of the performance, and how it enriches the dimensions of the stage. For instance, the depiction of withered trees in the artwork resonates emotionally with the graveyard scene; and the pun word "丹青" (danqing) —it can refer to both the stage backdrop and the important prop in the performance. It can be understood as Cheng Ying using the danqing to tell Zhao Wu's life story in the form of an album, it can also be interpreted as Wang Peiyu and her team used the danqing paintings and scrolls as tools to tell the story of The Orphan of Zhao to the audience. The actors stand in front of the background, as if they were blending into the backdrop, just like how Cheng Ying paints all the characters in the album to narrate the story of the orphan.

  WORKS CONSULTED CLICK TO EXPAND

  Wang Peiyu 王佩瑜. Taishang jian : Wang Peiyu Jingju xueyan ji 台上見：王珮瑜京劇學演記 (See You On Stage: Wang Peiyu’s Account of Learning How to Perform Beijing Opera). Beijing: Zhongxin chubanshe, 2019. 

  Xiaodonghuang Wang Peiyu mobendanqing ban Zhaoshiguer zaijing shangyan 小冬皇王珮瑜墨本丹青版《赵氏孤儿》在京上演 (The Ink and Vermilion Edition of The Orphan of Zhao, adapted by "Senior Queen Dong" Wang Peiyu, is on air in Beijing). CCTV, April 7, 2012. https://news.cntv.cn/20120407/119031.shtml

  Moke yuantai wutaiju Wupenji: xiangsheng pingshu jingju hunda 墨壳原态舞台剧《乌盆记》:相声评书京剧混搭 (Ink-shelled Stage Play "The Black Basin": A Fusion of Cross-Talk, Pingshu Storytelling, and Peking Opera." Sohu News, December 24, 2009. https://news.sohu.com/20091224/n269186276.shtml

  AUTHOR

  Li Zhao