The Chinese theater

by A. E. Zucker

But religion does not mean to the actors merely the burning of incense or the making of an annual pilgrimage to Miao Feng Shan, two days’ journey from Peking. There is a definite tradition that an actor must show filial piety. Whenever he undertakes something out of the ordinary, such as perhaps accepting a contract to act in Shanghai, he must first ask his mother’s permission. I asked repeatedly about this custom, and learned not a reason for it, but simply the fact that if an actor did not ask his mother’s permission he would be laughed at. Often it is the mother who makes the contract and receives most of the money. Of a certain rising actor it is said that his mother never allows him to act unless he is to receive twenty dollars for each performance.

In the fairly democratic China of the imperial times the son of the poorest man could rise to the position of viceroy of a province by virtue of passing a brilliant literary examination—and if we are to believe Chinese playwrights he often did. However, the actor, together with the son of the prostitute, and one or two other despised classes, was debarred from these examinations. Of course, with the discontinuance of the examinations in 1907 and the establishment of the republic in 1912, these disqualifications dropped away. Socially the position of the actor is improving rapidly nowadays. For example, in July, 1922, the son of a high official of Shantung Province married the actress Li Feng-yün. Far from being ashamed of her profession, she acted several plays on her wedding day as part of the festivities of the occasion. However, she abandoned her professional career on becoming the wife of this wealthy man. The fact that she was the first wife was the remarkable thing to the Chinese who spoke to me of the event; for that an actress becomes the concubine of a rich official is almost an everyday occurrence in Peking. Progress along such lines is not a unique or surprising thing in China; to mention but one example, coeducation has come into being since 1919, almost overnight, so to speak, with surprisingly little opposition. Actresses were forbidden on Chinese stages during the days of the Manchu Dynasty, but since 1912 their number has increased rapidly so that they are appearing now on eleven stages in Peking. Only in the foreign concessions of such treaty ports as Tientsin and Shanghai do men and women appear together on the stage, however; in Peking, Chinese prudery still forbids this.

There is a current notion that Chinese plays last a week or a lunar month, but as a matter of fact about a dozen plays, or separate acts taken from different plays, are given in one performance. Toward the end of the afternoon’s or evening’s entertainment the spectator may observe that some long strips of red paper covered with Chinese characters in black ink are removed from the two side railings of the balcony and others substituted in their place. In this manner the program of the following day is announced. The performances generally last from noon to about six and from seven in the evening until midnight. The best plays with the stars are reserved until the last, while dull, long plays with inferior actors generally begin the program. These poor actors are often retained merely for charity’s sake; often, too, famous actors give benefits for their less fortunate colleagues. In Shanghai actors get monthly contracts; but in Peking the minor actors are hired by the day, and some of them must play in several theaters in one afternoon in order to eke out a meager living at about twenty coppers a day.

Men of this type, of course, are hardly more than “supers.” Regular actors on the average earn about one dollar a day, while some of a higher grade receive five dollars to ten dollars. To receive twenty-five dollars for a regular performance a man must be quite prominent in the theatrical world. A few stars, like Mei Lan-fang and Yang Hsiao-lo, receive one hundred dollars for each regular performance, and considerably more when they act at banquets or on other special occasions.

The charges in the theaters depend on the type of theater and even more on the actors. Theaters where women or boys appear as actors are lower in price. There is no ticket or money demanded as one enters the theater, but the price is collected by the usher when he seats the spectator. In the ordinary theater one can sit at a comfortable table for forty cents or in a box for a dollar and a half. There are two large theaters in Peking built in Occidental style with receding stages, in which the prices are somewhat higher: eighty cents for a first-class seat and nine dollars for a box seating eight persons. When a star is playing, these prices are augmented somewhat. The poorer classes can enjoy theatrical performances for five coppers by going to the mat-shed theaters. The average seating capacity of a Peking theater is about a thousand, and the average attendance is very near this figure, if not above it.

The course of an actor’s training is an extremely hard one. For seven years he is instructed in singing and acrobatics, and then he begins to play in some of the boys’ theaters, institutions connected with the training schools for actors. During the longest part of his apprenticeship he receives no wages, he has long hours, menial tasks, and severe taskmasters. Actresses are trained by special private teachers and their courses have not yet become so uniform as have those for the men. The police have very strict regulations to prevent actresses from becoming prostitutes, but according to Mr. Gamble, in some theaters women from the licensed quarter appear, make engagements after giving their acts, and do some other soliciting. The connection between the lower-grade theaters and the segregated district is rather close.

In order to give an idea of the different kinds of theaters one encounters in Peking, I can do no better than to describe several typical entertainments from my notes stretching over five years. There is in the Southern City, for example, the Tung Lo Yuan, a fine specimen of the old-style Chinese theater. No women are allowed to visit this theater—not because of immoralities, but simply because the place is conservative. The seats run at right angles to the stage, along tables, showing that people come to hear the music rather than to observe the action on the stage. I paid twenty-four coppers for my seat in the balcony; the usual price in this theater is eighteen coppers, but because Han Hsi-ch’ang was going to act, the price was raised on that particular day. After a series of plays dealing with murders and robberies, in the course of which the audience gloated over the shuddering and weeping of the victims, there came the chief play of the day—a Yuan Dynasty drama revived in this theater.

The play deals with a poor woodcutter and his wife. The hero takes no interest in his humble calling; in fact, he neglects it for the study of literature. Since he does not support his wife, she deserts him for a smith. Finally the husband goes to Peking for the literary examination and passes with honors. When the wife learns that her first husband is to become a mandarin she is filled with joy; she sits down at a table, falls asleep, and has a wonderful dream. The dream is portrayed just as it would be in our moving pictures; a conventional symbol, a short pause in the action and the tapping of the drum, indicates to the audience that there is going to be a dream, and then the dream action continues in the same way in which the rest of the play had gone on. A number of men—recalling the Wise Men of the East—enter, bringing all manner of silk robes, headdresses, and other rich gifts for the lady. In her dream the faithless wife sees all this; she tries on her robes, shows them off to the neighbors, and glories in her riches. Then she returns to her sleeping position at the table and awakens to find that all had been a dream. In the fourth act the husband returns, dressed in embroidered robes, a prosperous mandarin. He pours a cup of water on the ground, saying that he will take his wife back provided she can gather up the water again. From this play comes the proverbial expression, “Water once spilled cannot be gathered up again”, which means, of course, that a wife who has been unfaithful cannot be taken back by the husband.

According to the custom of Chinese theaters only one act was presented; it was the third act, the dream, that I saw. The too-severe strain on the chief actor who must sing very long arias is generally given as the reason why plays are not presented in their entirety. Sometimes when an entire play is presented—this is frequently done at guildhalls and other private theatricals—three or four actors in turn play the leading rôle. The actor portrayed exceedingly well the wife’s emotions of joy, surprise, and pride. He wore a black dress, because this is the conventional color for the poor, although it was made of fine silk instead of the cotton which is actually worn by the masses. In the old-style Chinese music (called kuan-ch’ang) the flute is the leading instrument and the strains are melodious and sweet, not at all offensive to the foreigner’s ear as is a great deal of the modern music.

One evening I was the guest of Mr. Chang Ziang-ling, the present Chinese Consul-General in New York, at a performance by Mei Lan-fang in the so-called First Theater, a large playhouse built in European style. The usher took us to two good seats near the stage occupied by two ragamuffins, and asked the latter to give up their seats to us. Mr. Chang then paid him two dollars for two seventy-cent seats and explained that it is a little graft on the part of the ushers to place vagabonds in good seats until people who they know will tip them come to the theater.