What are the experiences of Fan Zuiting, the founding father of Yu opera

Fan Zuiting (1905～1966), formerly known as Fan Yu. He was a native of Suiping, Henan Province. He was a writer of Chinese Yu opera. Called the "Father of Modern Yu Opera", he graduated from Henan University in 1929. In 1929, he graduated from Henan University. During his student days, he often went in and out of theaters and box offices, interacted with artists and appeared on stage. 1934, he founded the Yu Sound Theatre, and served as the head of the troupe, scriptwriter and director, reforming the performances, music, costumes and make-up of the Yu Opera. 1935, he began to write plays, and in the past 20 years, he has written and rewritten 58 plays, most of which are relatively healthy and progressive in ideological content, and are of some practical significance. Most of his plays are relatively healthy and progressive in ideology and have certain practical significance. His plays are well structured, with twists and turns in the plot and novel techniques. His masterpieces include Ye Hanyan, Cleansing the Blood of Shame, and Red Pearl Woman. He was also a diligent theater director, rehearsing more than 60 plays in his lifetime, and was known for his meticulousness and profundity.

Early Activities

When he left home in 1919 to study at the European and American Preparatory School for International Students in Kaifeng, he defied his father's reprimand and his teacher's discouragement, and set up a Peking Opera (Beijing Opera) team with a few of his classmates who were fond of literature and art, and he was the captain of the team. He organized rehearsals with his classmates after school and performed on stage during holidays. He played the roles of Cheng Ying in Orphan Zhao and Chong Gong Dao in Female Rising. During this period, he also taught drama classes part-time for more than a year at the Art Unit of the Henan Rural Training Division established by Feng Yuxiang. After graduating from Henan University in 1929 with a master's degree in liberal arts, he was invited to be a drama teacher at Henan People's Teachers' College. In the following year, he was also the director of the Social Education Promotion Department of the Henan Provincial Department of Education.

Before and after the war

In 1934, the Henan Provincial Department of Education accepted Fan's suggestion to "break the stereotypes and improve Yu opera" and established the Yu Sound Theater, appointing Fan as its director. From then on, he devoted himself to the cause of Yu Opera, recruiting famous actors and actresses from all over the world, abolishing all kinds of stereotypes and old customs, and formulating new stage disciplines, which made the troupe undergo great changes. He paid attention to learning the advanced management and creative experience of the brother troupes, and when he learned that the Shaanxi Yichang Society ranked the top in the country from the management system to the script writing, he went to Xi'an to watch the performance, and transplanted dozens of Qin Opera plays, such as "The Three Turns Back" and "The Edge of the Cabinet" into Yu Opera performances, which stirred up the whole Kaifeng. In order to improve the quality of Yu opera performances, create a Yu opera style, he spent a lot of effort, from 1935 to the eve of the outbreak of the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, has created "Liu Luyun", "Lingyunzhi", "Three Sleeves", "Cleansing Shame Blood", "Hate on the Soil", "Women's Virginity" and so on dozens of anti-feudal, anti-wicked, anti-traitorous as the theme of the big book of the play. At that time caused a sensation "clean shame blood", is a father to be a traitor, the daughter resolutely opposed to the plot, the propaganda patriotism ideology of a good play. Cheng Yanqiu, a famous Peking Opera master, saw the performance in Kaifeng and was so excited that he visited Fan at his door, called him "teacher" as soon as he entered the house, and brought the script back to Peking. Later, due to the turmoil, Fan changed the name of Yu Sheng Theater to Lion's Roar Traveling Theater Troupe (taking the meaning of "waking up to the roar of the lion"), and was forced to start a wandering life. After the fall of Kaifeng, the Lion's Roar Traveling Troupe stopped performing, and most of the actors and actresses scattered to make a living. In order to preserve the artistic backbone of the team, Fan took the famous actress Chen Suzhen and Zhao Yiting and other ten actors fled to Nanyang Mashankou, where he lived in a broken temple, gathered the old troops, and continued to make up, rehearsal and mobile performance. At this time, he was full of anti-Japanese passion and created patriotic plays reflecting the theme of the anti-Japanese war, such as "Returning to the Enemy in Honor", "The Good Wife" and "The Woman Warrior". In July 1939, he led the cast and crew to Xi'an, the ancient city of Xi'an, as the Japanese army invaded every step of the way and Nanyang found it difficult to gain a foothold. The Lion's Roar Traveling Troupe arrived in Xi'an, relying on a complete lineup of actors with solid skills, excellent repertoire that grasped the pulse of the times and had progressive and healthy content, as well as the care and support of the Qinqiang troupes such as the Yichang Society and the Three-Ideas Society, the troupe was finally able to gain a foothold, and was supported by the masses, especially the masses of the Yu nationality, but it was difficult to continue the troupe's work because the lyrics of its plays touched on the dark side of the powers-that-be and aroused discontent among the authorities, causing them to suffer difficulties. Difficult to sustain; coupled with soaring prices, the actors have left the troupe to make a living, so that the Lion's Roar Troupe in a state of paralysis or closure. On the eve of the victory of the war, Fan's father and a powerful ally advised him to "turn back", but he vowed never to turn back. During the war of liberation, Fan, under the difficult situation of famous actors going their separate ways, recruited more than 50 children from the children of refugees fleeing from Henan and living in Xi'an, set up the Lion's Roar Children's Troupe, and hired famous Peking Opera masters to intensify their training. At the same time, the troupe wrote and adapted more than 30 excellent plays for children, such as "Dreaming Fragrant Screen", "Annihilation of Poison" and "Leifeng Pagoda". On the eve of the liberation of Xi'an, the Lion's Roar Children's Troupe under Fan's leadership had become a renowned literary group in Xi'an and Northwest China. However, at this time, Fan was imprisoned by the Kuomintang reactionaries in the underground prison of Zhonglou for "attacking the government" in his plays. After the rescue of Chen Zijing, an underground worker in China, he was released from prison.

After the founding of the country

After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Fan, with a sense of responsibility as the master of the country, created "A Catty of Grain Stamps", "Regenerating Iron", "It's Difficult to Escape from the Law", "Lv Sinniang", "Yangliu Village", and "Milk Turtle Mountain" to reflect the suppression of the counter-revolutionary, the "Three Againsts" and "Five Againsts" campaigns and the land reform movement. "and the land reform movement. In 1955, after he went to the Beijing Screenwriting Workshop for further study, he wrote excellent plays such as Wang Zuo Breaks His Arm, Yang Mantang, Lei Zhenhai Conquers the North, and Zheng Guo the Plumber. The play "Wang Zuo Broken Arm" won the first prize for script adaptation, performance and direction in the first Shaanxi Provincial Opera Observatory Performance in 1956. During this period, he also served as a delegate to the first sessions of the Xi'an People's Congress, a member of the standing committee of the second session of the Xi'an Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the vice-chairman of the Shaanxi branch of the Chinese Dramatists Association, and the vice-chairman of the Xi'an Federation of Literature and Artists. On the eve of the "Cultural Revolution", the traditional theater was forced to stop performing, and Fan was reprimanded as "right-leaning and backward" and "serious in purely business point of view", and was forced to leave the troupe to stay at home. On January 1, 1966, he died of a coronary heart attack. He created and wrote the play was published as "Fan theater collection".

Edited Chronology of Activities

1934, Year of the First Hundred Days of the Lunar Calendar: Formation of Yu Sound Theater Fan Zuiting founded the Yu Sound Theater in Henan Province. February 1935, Lunar Year B Hai: Opening of Yu Sound Theatre At the beginning of the year, Mr. Fan Zuiting invited a group of actors such as Chen Suzhen, Liu Chaofu, Zhang Zilin as well as Zhao Yiting, Huang Ruxiu, etc., and converted the original Kaifeng Yongle Theatre into the Yu Sound Theatre, which was formally opened at the beginning of February. He drew on some of the successful experiences of Beijing opera and drama, reformed many aspects of theater management, troupe management and performance rehearsals of plays, abolished some of the stereotypes in the troupe, and personally compiled and dedicated himself to the reform of the Yu opera, which soon made the Yu opera, which had been regarded as a vulgar art for a long time, have a good reputation, especially some intellectuals began to pay attention to the Yu opera. In order to further enrich the performance skills of Yu opera, he invited Jia Yintang, a Peking opera amateur with real talent, to teach martial arts to the actors of the theater, and at the same time, he also continued to absorb some young actors with real talent and promising career into the theater, which soon brought together a large number of influential artists in Yu Sound Theater. In 1938, the year of wuyin in the lunar calendar: Yu Sheng Theater was renamed Lion's Roar Troupe Fan Zuiting took the meaning of "waking up to the roar of the lion" and changed Yu Sheng Theater to Lion's Roar Troupe to publicize the anti-war in the form of traveling performances, to stimulate patriotic fervor of the masses and to absorb young people with the troupe to learn the opera, and the troupe bounced around Xi'an and was on the verge of stopping for a few times. In 1942, the year of the Imnu in the lunar calendar, the Lion's Roar Children's Troupe was founded. Fan Zuiting recruited a number of hard-to-reach children of Yu origin and hired Peking Opera actor Han Shengxiu as a coach to run the troupe in the form of an academy, where they insisted on training in slums and resumed performances. In the following years, training and performances went hand in hand. Most of the plays were written and directed by Fan Zuiting, and the troupe continued to improve and innovate in the areas of performance, music, costumes, and make-up. The performances were serious, and the theater was famous for its martial arts plays, forming a strict and vigorous stage style and unique artistic style.

Editorial Artistic Characteristics

Fan Zuiting's repertoire is characterized by the fact that women accounted for the vast majority of his nearly 60 works, which was due to the fact that on the one hand, he was well aware of the development of Yu opera to the point that "eating buns and eating stuffing, listening to the opera and listening to Dan'er," which was the reason that Dan'er lines dominated the stage, and on the other hand, the reason that Yu opera was the center of the stage. On the other hand, as an intellectual with democratic thinking, he felt the oppression of Chinese women in feudal society, and at the same time, he y sympathized with the low status of women in Chinese society. Because of this, he portrayed a series of his ideal women in his plays, including Liu Fang in "Cleansing the Blood of Shame", Tong Yushan in "The Wind of Righteousness", Qiu Liyu in "Female Chaste Flower", Hua Huijuan in "Returning to the Enemy in Glory", and Yang Mantang in "Yang Mantang", and many other female figures. In these dramas, he never simply expressed the inferiority of women's status or portrayed the image of a submissive woman, but focused on expressing the compassion and great wisdom and courage of female characters. They either killed the enemy to avenge the shame and martyred the country (Liu Fang in "Cleansing the Shame and Blood"), or were chivalrous and righteous to redress the injustice (Tong Yushan in "The Wind of Righteousness"), or sent their husbands to the army and refused to be humiliated (Hua Huijuan in "Returning to the Enemy in Honor"), or were beautiful in heart and sacrificed their own lives to save others (Qiu Liyu in "The Chaste Lady's Flower") or were open and unafraid to lose out to the men (Yang Mantang in "Yang Mantang"). It can be said that the images of women in his works are characters that have inherited and developed the democratic essence of Chinese opera, but at the same time are very much characterized by the new women of today. The reason why he was able to create such characters is inseparable from the people's nature of his works, and this people's nature of his works is that he always stood in the position of the people to sing praises of the diligence and bravery of the Chinese people, and to praise the role of Chinese women in the progress and development of China's society. Fan Zuiting's works inherited the characteristics of traditional Chinese opera art in the method of creation, which is easy to understand, and to see the truth in the vulgarity. 30's he created the "Righteous Wind", "Cleansing the Blood of Shame" and other dramas in Kaifeng was a big popularity, one of the important reasons is that the lyrics of the songs are easy to understand. He was an intellectual, but he never showed his learning by using difficult words and phrases; instead, he took listening, memorizing, and easy-to-understand as the highest principle. If his compositions in the 1930s were still a bit vulgar in their vulgarity, then with the passage of time, after the 1940s his compositions completely entered a realm of vulgarity but not coarseness, easy to understand but literate. In addition, another characteristic of his creations is that they attach great importance to emotion. It can be said that to a certain extent, his plays are won by emotions. He emphasized emotion in his writing, but never abused it, and he never used the strings and sets of traditional plays because he thought they were impersonal and could not properly express the emotions of the characters in his plays and the objective environment they required.

Editing the Outstanding Achievements

Mr. Fan Zuiting's achievements were manifold and all-encompassing. As a playwright, he wrote 37 plays and adapted 20 plays in his life***, of which the most famous are the four major tragedies: "Cleansing the Shame Blood", "Three Whisks of the Sleeve", "Hatred in the Sky", "The Wind of Righteousness"; four major comedies: "The Luoyang Bridge", "Lingyun Zhi", "The Maiden Flower", and "The Green Cloud of Willow"; four major historical dramas: "The Broken Arms of Wang Zuo", "The Water Worker Zheng Guoguo", "The Sung Jingshi and the Wu-tun", and "Regenerating Iron"; and four major mythological dramas: "The Red Pearl Lady", and "The Red Iron". Mythological Dramas: Red Pearl Woman, Saving Mother by Splitting the Mountain, Golden Mountain Temple, and Leifeng Pagoda. As a director and artist, he is the first professional director of Yu opera, both scholarly and expert, daring to learn from and innovate, pursuing the great popularity and the beauty of literature and martial arts. The style of "Fan Opera" and the beauty of "Fan Opera", which can also be said to be the characteristics of the "Fan School" of Yu Opera, are clearly and fully expressed in the hundreds of plays directed by him. As a theater educator and troupe manager, he was also fruitful and accomplished. From the Kaifeng Yu Sound Theater in 1934, to the Xi'an Lion's Roar Children's Theater in 1941, to the newborn department of the Lion's Roar Theater at the beginning of the liberation period, he successively held eight training classes and cultivated hundreds of outstanding talents. Especially, Mr. Fan spared no expense in hiring high-level celebrities to teach, which was very difficult to do in the general troupes at that time. From Mr. Fan's theatrical ideas and a series of theatrical practices, it is obvious to see that one of his general goals is to reform the Yu opera, and his most significant contribution to the cultural history of opera lies in the reform of the Yu opera. It is because of the reform, so that the Yu Opera from the artists Yu Opera to the literati artists combined aspects of the conversion, for the Yu Opera created a new cultural model; because of the reform, so that the Yu Opera ended the era of only performances without scripts; because of the reform, so that the traditional Yu Opera to the conversion of the modern Yu Opera for the Yu Opera to create the second tradition; because of the reform, so that the Yu Opera in the 1930s in the Chinese local theater lion roar and rise, a unique. Without Mr. Fan's reform of Yu opera, I do not know how many years Yu opera would have lagged behind other local operas. In short, Fan Zuiting, "Fan theater", the Lion's Roar troupe, to the Yu opera has left a valuable treasure, but also to Henan and Shaanxi has left a valuable cultural resources of opera, can also be said to be a valuable "Fan Theater".