Phoenix City Wen Ruo: The Chinese Spirit and National Soul—Watching the "Mulan" Kung Fu Stage Play

Phoenix City Wen Ruo: The Chinese Spirit and National Soul—Watching the "Mulan" Kung Fu Stage Play Phoenix City Wen Ruo More than ten years ago, the United States...

Phoenix City Wenruo: The Chinese Spirit and National Soul - Watch the "Mulan" Kung Fu Stage Play Phoenix City Wenruo More than ten years ago, Disney released a cartoon "Mulan" in the United States. The thrilling scenes were dizzying and the style was free and unrestrained. It promoted a personal hero to save the world and created an American-style character yearning for freedom. There was also a plot of Mulan performing love in the military. Of course, the film had many beautiful soundtracks and American laugh-out-loud humor. At that time, I said at home, what a pity, what a pity! Such a famous story in Chinese history has been used by Americans; the problem is that the inner content is out of shape, and the "soul" of heroic stories passed down through the ages is completely gone. What a pity! If a classic story like "Mulan" is expressed in a good artistic form by an artist who understands Chinese history and the Chinese spirit inherent in Mulan, it will go global. Last year, when I learned that a Chinese-run martial arts academy in Phoenix was going to perform a Kung Fu stage play called "Mulan," the tickets had already been sold out. Maybe they didn't advertise enough, I regret not knowing this news earlier. A friend of mine has two daughters who are attending this year's revival of "Mulan" in Phoenix. She knew my regrets and prepared two tickets for me early. I finally watched a very enjoyable performance on the night of February 2nd. The performance was unique at the beginning: young actors of different ages took turns to appear on both sides of the stage. The left side showed Mulan practicing martial arts from childhood to adulthood; the right side showed Mulan's soft and beautiful side while learning dance and dressing up. The most exciting thing about this performance is that they cleverly integrated various martial arts moves throughout, coupled with the traditional Chinese dance to show Mulan's soft and beautiful side; there is strength in softness, and softness in hardness. As the plot develops, eighteen martial arts skills such as swords, spears, clubs, and chains, as well as Chinese dance talents are fully demonstrated on the stage; the whole performance is very smooth, and the emotions are expressed vividly. Because the story of Mulan is well-known to every household, there is no need to introduce the plot specifically in this article; as for martial arts, choreography, music, costumes, scenery, lighting, projection, etc., they should be analyzed by professionals, so I will not go into details here. Let’s talk about some of the places that impressed me the most. This school that teaches Chinese martial arts chose "Mulan" as its repertoire, using martial arts movements as the main performance vocabulary. From what I have seen, it may be their first, and it is a very appropriate and clever choice. The source of students in this school is "talented locally", ranging from children aged 5 or 6 to adults, male and female students of different ages, and even non-Chinese students. The director arranged all the students into appropriate roles according to Mulan's different age stages of growth and Mulan's disguise as a boy; the non-Chinese students acted as the invading "foreign enemies"; the director was very thoughtful. Elements of Chinese folk culture are also cleverly interspersed in the performance. When Mulan was a child, her father taught her to play shadow play. What appeared on the screen was a huge male rabbit and a slender female rabbit, which immediately reminded people of the very vivid metaphor in "The Song of Mulan": "The male rabbit's feet are fluttering, and the female rabbit's eyes are blurred. Two rabbits are walking next to each other. How can they tell whether I am a male or a female?" There is a scene in which Mulan is in the army, sitting alone by a campfire in the dark night under the cold moon, with cold water and dry food; Mulan touches a string of beads necklace given by her mother, and can't help but recall the scene when she was young at home. At this time, a father and daughter appeared on the left stage playing a hand shadow game. How heartwarming and touching. The entire performance is interspersed with Chinese narration and English commentary of "The Song of Mulan". The Chinese narration is a recording by Zhu Jie, a Chinese lecturer at State University. Her tone of voice is tight and tight, relaxed and relaxed, and her voice is full of emotion, which perfectly sets off the plot. When the narrator reads: "The fresh air spreads to the golden watch, and the cold light shines on the iron clothes. A general dies in a hundred battles, and a strong man returns after ten years." It really makes people tear up! Because the performance uses martial arts movements and dance vocabulary, and is narrated in English, non-Chinese audiences also enjoy watching it. The famous story "Mulan" in Chinese history has also found resonance among other ethnic groups. It is also worth mentioning that based on my past experience, chaotic scenes of shouting and responding and walking around are common phenomena in performance venues with mainly Chinese audiences. But during this performance, the audience was silent and the narration could be heard clearly. We Chinese have become obedient to theater rules not only because this performance is closely linked, completed in one go, and smooth. This Kung Fu stage play has core content and soul. The whole performance runs through a main theme, showing the Chinese virtues and national soul: caring for the elders and caring for the younger brothers; resisting foreign enemies and defending the homeland; after achieving military exploits, not caring about official position and money, asking to return home to honor parents. This is the soul of the entire plot. Watching the entire performance is like watching a painting. You need to look at the overall connotation and style of the painting, and then look at whether there are any flaws in each stroke. There are still some small areas that need improvement in this performance, such as how to make martial arts shoes and some costumes more historical, and the selection of dance background music. Of course, the shortcomings do not hide the good points. This drama will become more and more refined after being refined step by step. This is a novel stage play created by a group of professionals who have knowledge of Chinese history, artistic and cultural heritage, understand the characteristics of Eastern and Western cultures, and skillfully borrow various artistic techniques and high-tech means. It is said that the director of the play is a professional with a Hong Kong performing arts background; I remember many years ago in Beijing I saw Hong Kong artists put "Along the River During the Qingming Festival" on the stage. Perhaps artists with a background of blending Eastern and Western cultures are good at expressing classical content with modern techniques. Thanks to this group of artists and students from the martial arts academy for bringing us a spiritual "Mulan" Kung Fu stage play; I also want to thank my friends for donating tickets, which made me make up for my regrets. (Written on February 3, 2013)