Resident performances are in full swing during the summer
2024-08-07
한어Русский языкEnglishFrançaisIndonesianSanskrit日本語DeutschPortuguêsΕλληνικάespañolItalianoSuomalainenLatina
Our reporter Gao Qian
During the summer vacation when cultural and tourism consumption continues to rise, resident performances continue to create a wave of popularity in Beijing: from the winding and majestic Badaling Great Wall to the crowded Happy Valley, from the revitalized century-old guild hall to the young and vibrant new space, performing arts resources with flexible forms and diverse categories have taken root and opened up another scene for the "Performing Arts Capital" in addition to the gathering of big drama masters.
Chongli Circus. Photo courtesy of Beijing Performing Arts Group
Beijing's first large-scale situational drama with the Great Wall as its theme, "Dream of China: The Great Wall", was officially performed in the Expo Park. Photo by our reporter Pan Zhiwang
Showcasing Beijing’s image through culture and tourism
The lights gradually come on, and another night, the Badaling Great Wall is brightly lit up in the night. At the foot of the Great Wall, a long scroll of human fireworks unfolds one after another: dance, folk music, acrobatics, folk art, magic and other performances change scenery, non-legacy snack stalls and cultural and creative stores are open all night, and business is booming... Songs and dances interweave light and shadow, "revitalizing" the glorious history and national spirit of the Great Wall. This summer, the immersive night situational performance "Dream Back to the Great Wall·Cranes from All Directions" launched by Beijing Performing Arts Group and Badaling Cultural Tourism Group will once again be stationed at the Badaling Great Wall. Last year, "Dream Back to the Great Wall·Cranes from All Directions" was performed 169 times in about half a year, opening a window for 118,300 viewers to explore the mysterious charm of the "Night Great Wall".
Including "Dream Back to the Great Wall·Cranes from All Directions", the strong momentum of resident performances is continuously driving cultural tourism consumption, showing Beijing's openness, confidence, and coexistence of ancient and modern times: "Night Painting of the Guihe River" blends natural scenery with myths and legends, such as the cruise ship wandering in the painting is about to set sail; the large-scale situational drama "Dream of China·The Great Wall" focusing on the "Great Wall Cultural Belt" entered the Beijing Expo Park this year, and plans to perform more than 200 times within a year, covering 500,000 audiences; at the Aoya Guanchen Art Center adjacent to the Bird's Nest, many acrobatic programs with extremely high "gold" content have merged into "Dragon Soaring Olympics", which is full of memories of Beijing's "Double Olympic City". Last summer, "Dragon Soaring Olympics" earned 4.84 million yuan from 258 performances; in May this year, "Dragon Soaring Olympics" will be on stage again, and the number of performances is expected to exceed 200.
Such a huge performance layout relies on Beijing's deep, mature and top-quality resource accumulation. Take the Beijing Performing Arts Group, which has created large-scale resident performance projects such as "Dream Back to the Great Wall·Cranes from All Directions", "Night Painting of Guihe River", "Dream of Hua·The Great Wall" and "Dragon Soaring Olympics" as an example. As an important force in the construction of the "Performing Arts Capital", Beijing Performing Arts Group has a total of 9 municipal state-owned art troupes, covering 13 art categories. Furthermore, "The group has signed strategic agreements with Yanqing, Miyun, Mentougou and Zhangjiakou, Hebei, and has a good foundation for multi-point efforts to promote more resident performances to take root and blossom." Zhao Jiachen, Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of Beijing Performing Arts Group, said.
The cultural golden name card of "Seeing big plays in Beijing" has already derived the radiation effect of "big plays out of Beijing". In Zhangjiakou, the "Beijing-Zhangjiakou Sports, Culture and Tourism Belt" is converting the traffic of the Winter Olympics into more cultural and tourism growth. In the past two years, Beijing Performing Arts Group has combined the strength of its Chinese Acrobatic Troupe and Beijing Children's Art Theater to jointly launch the "Chongli Circus" and the "2024 Beijing-Zhangjiakou Snow Ruyi 'Children's Voice' Art Festival". The former is a combination of Chinese and Western, and it received a good response for 96 consecutive performances last year, and it is expected to perform 40 more this year; the latter has introduced well-received children's dramas such as "Where is Chang'an" and "I Love You Forever" to the National Ski Jumping Center "Snow Ruyi", as well as about 20 rich experiences such as carnival parades and art exhibitions. By mid-to-late September, nearly 100 performances, games and other activities will be carried out intensively.
Activate space and stimulate urban vitality
Large-scale tourist resident performances that showcase Beijing's image to the outside world complement each other, and high-quality literary and artistic resident performances that nourish the city's civilization internally have a silent influence, injecting new vitality into many urban spaces.
At the Fanxing Theatre Village, "Love at All Costs", which has been officially performed since December 2013, has set a record for the most performances in a single cycle in a domestic small theater with 192 performances and the longest resident performance record of 7 consecutive months.
The Starry Theater Village is not an isolated case. In recent years, the accelerated emergence and continuous upgrading of new performing arts spaces in Beijing have given resident performances great potential. In November 2022, the new space of Damai, located in the Longfu Temple Cultural District, was unveiled and put into operation. The opening drama, the immersive interactive drama "Now Opening", will be on stage until the end of August 2023, with more than 200 performances; during the Spring Festival of 2023, the Time Theater located in the Beijing 22nd Courtyard Street Art District in Baiziwan officially opened for business, and the environmental musical "The Merchant of Venice" continued to be on stage; the Beijing 77·Zhuama X new space in the 77 Cultural and Creative Park is the "birthplace" of the panoramic immersive interactive theater "Zhao Gan'e" series. "The Great Detective Zhao Gan'e" and "The Great Detective Zhao Gan'e 2" have been on stage here for two consecutive years. At the end of July, the more than three-month performance of "The Great Detective Zhao Gan'e 2" came to an end, with an average attendance rate of over 90%.
Focusing on developing new performing arts spaces with diversified formats is a test field for connecting young audiences and practicing cutting-edge concepts. Compared with traditional theater performances that only perform a few shows and then end, resident performances and new performing arts spaces complement each other and "are more likely to produce a brand effect." Pan Pengfei, operations director of 77 Cultural and Creative Park, said that according to his observation, the popular "Zhao Gan'e" successfully made more audiences aware of this unique park hidden in the back street of the art museum. Catering consumption was significantly driven by the performances, and the old factory building of the former Beijing Offset Printing Factory was revitalized by the injection of performing arts resources.
A number of ancient buildings that have been sleeping in the depths of time are also awakening. The scattered guild halls are precious treasures left to Beijing by history. With the in-depth promotion of "Guild Halls with Operas", the old spaces have gained new vitality. In the Pigment Guild Hall, nine troupes under the Beijing Performing Arts Group have performed long-term works such as the immersive Beijing opera "Teahouse" and the opera "Memories of South City - "Old Door Gods"", bringing more than 200 performances in three years.
Cultivate talents to drive industry development
Today, the ever-expanding resident performances are continuing to bring more industry exploration and thinking.
"In terms of the content of building a 'performing arts capital', resident performances are very important and can drive the development of the entire chain of the performing arts industry." said Zhang Haijun, president of the Beijing Performance Industry Association. Li Chi, head and general manager of the China National Acrobatic Troupe, feels the same way. Taking the construction of the actor echelon as an example, at present, China National Acrobatic Troupe is deeply involved in the production and presentation of many resident performances such as "Dragon Olympics" and "Chongli Circus". "Many new generation actors have emerged and stepped onto the stage to take charge of their own affairs." Improving the ability to integrate resources is another topic raised by the market. In June this year, "New Amazing Skills - International Circus Gold Medal Show" was performed at the Happy Valley OCT Grand Theater, bringing together excellent works from nearly 10 countries. In this show, the task of China National Acrobatic Troupe is not only to "perform", but also to "gather". It should be like a link to build a bridge for artists from various countries to gather in Beijing to perform on the same stage.
Beijing is the national cultural center. As an art group rooted in Beijing, "our goal is to create high-quality works that are truly up to standard and can match the level of development of the city of Beijing. In the long run, we are operating the entire Chinese acrobatics industry," said Li Chi.
"The international position has opened up our horizons and forced us to keep moving forward and surpass ourselves," said Zhao Jiachen. In her opinion, for resident performances to upgrade and develop, they must overcome the key challenge of talent shortage. "Resident performances rely on long-term and stable passenger flow, which requires us to reserve a high-quality creative team." Taking "Dream Back to the Great Wall·Cranes from All Directions" as an example, the content of the performance changes every year, and the actors are constantly replaced. The creative team must "have the thinking of market operations and the ability to refine creation, so that the performance reflects the characteristics and level of Beijing and is always new." At the same time, in terms of venues, funds, publicity and other aspects, high-level resident performances call for the implementation of relevant supporting policies as soon as possible to fully help Beijing build an influential resident performance brand in the country and even the world.
(Source: Beijing Daily)
