Shanghai Dramatic Arts Centre’s White Snake. Image via QPAC.
The classic famous Chinese legend White Snake staged at The Playhouse in QPAC is an enchanting, delightful tale of love, loss and redemption. The debut production comes from the Shanghai Dramatic Arts Centre (SDAC) Shanghai’s only national theatre company. This exceptional rendition of one of China’s greatest four legends, blends tradition and contemporary methods to make this work a unique treasure.
This intriguing storyline of a forbidden love between an immortal and a mortal, the spiritual journey and dichotomies of moral and ethical values is fascinatingly entertaining.
The calligrapher was undoubtedly a highlight for me as narrator (Yuan Ye). The story was scribed live at times, and clever backdrops of translucent screens enhanced the calligrapher’s images with lighting techniques. These screens were present throughout the performance as clever visual props which were paramount to enhance with precision the changing scenes successfully. A testament to Xu Xiangen. Throughout the show the multimedia content held the visual nature of changing acts extremely well. Undoubtedly though, the exceptional lighting design (Chen Lu) enhanced every scene seamlessly with grace and sensitivity. This became more evident as the play went on. Furthermore the accompanying music (Composer Jerome Baur) was impressive as song and sound landscapes effects were deeply moving, surreal and idyllic. The sense of the mystical on this earthly world was really brought forth with these components.
The vocal talent of Zhang Zhongo as the Songbird is beautiful, her ethereal voice filled the theatre. All the actors were of high standard, holding the space on the stage with power and dexterity. Yang Ziyi as the beautiful White Snake (Bai Suhzen) offered a mesmerising performance and Gu Tongtong as Greenie, the quirky companion of white snake made her mark as a cheeky companion. The young Liu Xubin (Xu Xian) the handsome mortal made a believable inspiring performance. I really enjoyed Ren Shan as Fa Hai too, his role surprised me as his character evolved from being a Buddhist monk renowned for demon slaying to a power hungry nemesis. A dramatic crescendo to the story which held awe and surprise.
Costume design was classic and elegant mostly in colours of pastel that worked beautifully with the lighting and movement of the actors. The visual feast when dance and movements was highlighted was stunning, I would have liked the dance sequences to have been longer as I found myself holding on to some incredible visual moments.
The play was sung and spoken in Mandarin and was supported by English subtitles above the stage. This worked well, although there was a skip in a sentence or two, perhaps the timing could have been better also. No great loss to the overall enjoyment of the piece.
Members of the audience were obviously excited throughout performance, with little laughs at quirky moments in the show, however, it would have been better if some patrons didn’t take photographs inside during the performance as per signage in the foyer!
All in all a great production and insight to this famous myth. I recommend White Snake for all ages to enjoy.
Rating: 4 stars out of 5
White Snake
THE PLAYHOUSE QPAC
31 MARCH – 1 APRIL 2017
TOUR DIRECTOR GUO HONBO
LIGHTING DESIGNER CHEN LU
SETTINGS AND PROP MANAGER XU XIANGEN
COSTUME AND MAKEUP ARTIST DONG GUIYING
STAGE MANAGER LIU LEI
