| Tibet will soon have its first professionally trained modern drama troupe. Sent just over two years ago to study in the Shanghai Institute of Dramatic Art, twenty-nine Tibetan students have completed their courses in acting, staging and other aspects of modern theatrical art and are now on their way home. Only two weeks ago they showed their paces at a graduation performance of the full-length historical play Princess Wen Cheng acted in Tibetan.
Tien Han's drama was an apt choice for the occasion. It tells about the Tang princess of the 7th century who was married to Tibet's capable King Sron-tsan Gampo and became a symbol of the fraternal relations between the Tibetan and Han nationalities. The success of the young Tibetan actors in this production gave a good measure of the hard and fruitful work put in by both teachers and students. The general opinion was that it was an exceptionally good performance for a class which had had only two years and four months of training, and all the more remarkable in view of the background of these young students. Most of them are children of former serfs, peasants and herdsmen. Some are orphans. All, until a short time ago, were illiterate. The youngest of the class, 14-year-old Yangdzom, is an orphan who knows intimately what is poverty and oppression. She began to earn her living at the age of five by taking care of her young master whom she carried on her back. The oldest of the class, 29-year-old Wangdii, was a serf. When he first arrived in Shanghai in the latter part of 1959, a few months after the quelling of the rebellion engineered by a handful of the upper-strata reactionaries in Tibet, his teachers found that hard labour, whipping and other forms of torture had deformed his limbs. It is not surprising that these students had little education, and still less artistic training.
When the Performing Department of the Shanghai Institute of Dramatic Art took over the training of these young Tibetans it knew full well the difficulties involved, but also saw the favourable factors. Stirred by their new emancipation, the students were brimming with enthusiasm and keen to make good at their studies. At the same time, faculty members of the department were especially eager to help, regarding it an honour to be entrusted with the training of Tibet's first professional modern drama group. To overcome language difficulties and get acquainted quickly with their students, the two young teachers specially assigned full-time to the class went, on their own initiative, to live in their students' dormitory. A special curriculum was worked out for the class: including language courses in Tibetan and Han, political education, history, theoretical studies in drama, art and literature and the performing arts as well as vocational training in acting, dancing, singing, make-up and other related subjects. The students were also given ample opportunities to see stage and film shows, visit the museums and get to know life at first hand on visits to factories and the rural people's communes near by.
In giving their students their professional training, the teachers worked on the principle of going "from what is near to what is far, from the simple to the complex, from the personal experience of the actor to the creation of the role." In the first year, the students, with the help of their teachers, wrote and rehearsed more than 70 short sketches such as Two Shepherdesses and Father and Son Reunited. These were all drawn from the students' own experience of life; the acting was spirited and the images true to life. After further polishing,12 of these sketches have been joined together to form a play entitled The Story of a Serf As Told by Himself. It tells the life story of an old serf before and after liberation. The serf owner forces the old man to part with his wife and son. He loses his sight. But these sorrows end with the quelling of the rebellion; he is happily reunited with his son and his sight is restored after treatment at a hospital. Staged by these young Tibetans at the school and in several people's communes and acted with the authenticity of real knowledge, it has invariably made a deep impression on audiences.
By the time they finally came to rehearse Princess Wen Cheng, the Tibetan class had already gained a considerable stage experience playing excerpts from various dramas on a wide range of themes and in many styles. This intensive stage practice combined with well-planned classroom study has given them a solid grounding for further study and stage work.
As they make their way home the Tibetan class will stop off in Peking, Sian, Lanchow and other cities to present their version of Princess Wen Cheng.
(This article appears on page 5, No. 18, 1962) |
