Venue
Dates
Duration
Approximate 165 mins (Intermission Included)About
Synopsis
Artist
This drama is named after a line from the poem Staying at a Cottage of Mt. Hibiscus on a Night of Snow of the Tang Dynasty: 'When the mountains lurk dim in the pale dark, the cottage of shabby looks stands lone in twilight. By the wattle gate now I hear dogs loudly bark, the master has come home in the snow of night.' Wu Zuguang, the playwright, described the joys and sorrows of the famous actor named Wei Liansheng in the historical context where people were swaying in the midst of a raging storm. He has experienced both the prosperity of being popular in early years and hard times of despair; and the love story between him and Yuchun, a concubine of the bureaucrat named Su Hongji is just a sad melody that cost their lives.
The prosperity on the stage, the desolation of life, the variability of love and the changes of destiny.... With this sentimental love story, Wu Zuguang sought to explore the eternal essence of life, the awakening of nobodies and their inquiries towards the desolate destiny.
Credits
Playwright:Wu Zuguang
Director: Ren Ming
Stage Designer: Xue Dianjie
Lighting Designer:Xing Xin
Assistant Designer: Cong Lin
Constume Designer: Yan Ni
Make-up Designer: Xu Li
Acoustic Designer: Zheng Chen
Cast
Su Hongji: Zhang Qiuge
Wei Liansheng: Yu Shaoqun
Yuchun: Cheng Lisha
Wang Xingui: Li Lin
When did this story happen? A paragraph of the endless life.
The age may just pass away, may also not completely elapse, however, the story happened may repeat in the future, because old habits die hard.
Wu Zuguang, playwright
Return on a Snowy Night is a true classic and a great drama. It is my dream over the past thirty years, and today it finally comes true.
Although the dream comes true, there has never the dream. And I like living in the dream...
Ren Ming, director
In the late 1920s, on a cold night of snow, a man stumbles into the Su Hongji's garden from a gap of the collapsed wall, holding the withered cherry-apple tree as if searching for lost figures...
Twenty years ago, there appears a poor Peking Opera actor Wei Liansheng who fascinates dignitaries, young men and women, and even the general public. He has large social circles and often relieves poor neighbors, thus popular with the people. Chief justice Su Hongji getting rich by smuggling opium leads a happy-go-lucky life. His fourth concubine Yuchun is a prostitute, and then is redeemed as concubine by Su Hongji. With a free heart, Yuchun is not resigned to the caged material life. She learns the drama and meets with Wei Liansheng, confiding to him her miserable life; before Liansheng goes to Su Mansion for birthday celebration and performance, Yuchun invites Liansheng to her loft. Because of their similar background and fate, they fall in love and agree to elope toward the freedom. At this time, Liansheng picks a Chinese flowering apple and sends it to Yuchun.
Unexpectedly, all this is seen by Wang Xingui, a steward recommended to Sue Mansion by Liansheng, and the sycophantic steward tells the thing to Su Hongji. When Yuchun runs away as agreed, Wang Xingui leads several hatchet men to take Yuchun back, while Liansheng is deported. They are reluctant to part and live far apart from each other so far. Twenty years later, Liansheng stumbles into the homeland, but the things are still there but men are no more the same ones....
Wei Liansheng, a famous Peking Opera actor encounters Yuchun, the favorite concubine of Su Hongji, president of the court, and falls in love with her dearly. When Wei Liansheng realizes that he is just a toy of influential officials upon the instruction of Yuchun, he decides to run away with her. When their runaway fails, Liansheng is expelled from the country and Yuchun is sent to the commissioner of salt revenue as a cleaner in the border area. 20 years later, he and she are coming to the place where they fell in love with each other, but Liansheng dies in the snow and Yuchun disappears in the snow before they meet each other.
Famous scholar, playwright, calligrapher, most legendary culturati in contemporary China, praised for 'conscience' of Chinese intellectuals by public opinion at home and abroad, and the backbone of the Chinese traditional culture.
Mr. Wu has profound cultural background and is well known at eighteen years old. Since the 1930s, he has been very prestigious in the circles of drama, literature, and calligraphy, with more than 50 works covering drama, prose, political comment, and calligraphy, such as Return on a Snowy Night, Make a Living Wandering from Place to Place, Flower Is a Go-between, and Anthology of Wu Zuguang.
Ren Ming is a director and deputy dean of Beijing People's Art Theatre, Member of Art Committee of NCPA. He has directed more than sixty drama works, including Beijing Grandpa, South Street & North Yard, Family Album, Sunrise, Lotus, I Love Peaches Blossom, Desire under the Elms, Football Club, The First Intimate Contact, Caring Friends, etc.
Xue Dianjie, Liaoning of origin, ever went to DDR for study. After returning, he served as stage art designer of the Central Experimental Theatre and China Youth Art Theatre, and Vice President of the Central Experimental Theatre. He is the class-A stage art designer of National Theatre of China, member of China Artists Association and Chinese Theatre Association, ever served as President of the 2nd and 3rd sessions of China Association of Stage Arts, and Chairman of OISTAT, and is the honorary President of China Association of Stage Arts. In 1992, he obtained the government special allowance. In October 2003, he was appointed as visiting professor of the Central Academy of Drama. In 2007, he won the title of 'outstanding drama art worker of the Ministry of the Culture'. In 2010, he published Xue Dianjie Stage Art Works.
Representative works: Wrong Act in Commercial Circles, The True Story of Ah Q, Legend of Galileo, Season of Cherry, The Jade of the He Family, The Three-penny Opera, Die without a Burial Place, Battlefield of Life and Death, Cheng Ying Saves the Orphan, The Same Person, Journey to the West, Our Jingke, and Four Generations under One Roof. He ever won Wenhua Award of the Ministry of Culture, national stage art excellent project award, art festival stage art design prize, and the outstanding contribution prize for 2nd National Stage Art Exhibition in 2003.
Class-A lighting designer of National Theatre of China and outstanding expert of the Ministry of Culture. He is interested in different kinds of art, and has repeatedly received 'Wenhua Award', 'China Festival Award', 'China Art Festival Award', 'Golden Lion Award for Drama', 'Five-One Project Award', 'Chinese Opera Society Award', 'Chinese Stage Design Society Award' and other national awards.
Cong Lin is a performer of Beijing People's Art Theatre, who plays many roles in more than 60 works such as dramas Thunderstorm, Teahouse, Rickshaw Boy, The No. 1 Restaurant in China, Mutiny, Lotus, Bosom Friends and Sunrise. Cong Lin always follows the creation principle of realism in director's work.
Costume designer of Stage Design department of Beijing People's Art Theatre. Over the years, she served as costume designer in many plays, films and television plays. The main works include: drama Ruan Lingyu, Butterfly Dream, An Unusually Lucky Person, Antique, Waiting for Godot, I Love Peach Blossom, Desire under the Elms, Camel Xiangzi, Dragon Beard Ditch, Bosom Friend, Sunrise and so on; television play Han Xin, The Grand Mansion Gate, Thick Red Chamber, The Mou's Manor, Indanthrene, Eight Thousand Hunan Women Go up the Tianshan Mountain and so on. She has won the stage design prize of 'Golden Chrysanthemum Award' held by Beijing Municipal Government.
Make-up artist of Department of Stage Art of Beijing People's Art Theatre, and the main works include: Antique, Waiting for Godot, The Wonders of Natural Beauty Are Boundless, Nirvana of Gou Erye, Wuchang · Nv Diao, Courtyard South of North Street, Beijinger, Family Photo, Wotou Hall, Dinner, Relationship and so on.
Head of Sound Effect Team of Beijing People's Art Theatre. The main drama works include: First Intimate Contact,, Teahouse, There Is a Poison, Contract Marriage, Confessions of a Man, Wotou Hall, Desire under the Elms, Hamlet, Bosom Friend, Looking for Spring Willow Club and so on. Among them, effect design drama Confessions of a Man won the outstanding stage art prize for the 8th China Drama Festival.
Chinese Actor, a graduate of Wuhan Municipal Arts School, majored in Hanju Opera.
His honors include Best New Performer Award at the 3rd Asian Film Awards, Best New Performer at the 46th Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival, Best New Performer at the 13th Huabiao Film Awards, Best New Performer at the 12th Chinese Film Society Of Performing Art Award and Best Performer at the 16th Beijing College Student Film Festival,etc.
Films: Mei Lanfang, Kung Fu Wing Chun, New Shaolin Temple, A Chinese Fairy Tale, The Founding of a Party, The Revolution of 1911 and The Man Behind the Courtyard House, etc.
TV Series: The Firmament of the Pleiades, 100 Flowers Hidden Deep and The Magic, etc.
Cheng Lisha, an actor of Beijing People's Art Theatre, has ever starred in drama The First Intimate Contact, Affectionate Men & Women, and Hamlet, etc., films and TV series The Secret History of the Qing Emperor Nur Ha Chi, Big Dock, Change Son For Becoming a Dragon, The Last Princess and She Would Marry a Millionaire, and Love in a Fallen City, etc.
Li Lin, an actor of Beijing People's Art Theatre, graduating from The Central Academy Of Drama and once starring in the NCPA-produced drama Wangfujing.
Dramas: I Have A Date with Spring, Family Portrait, The Scarlet Letter, Looking for the Spring Willow Society, Lotus, Drama, Intimate Friend, Wangfujing, and Jing Ke.
TV series and films: The Days Without Wang Jie Change Your Lifestyle, Stellerae Flower, Life Rerouted, Special Competition, Father’s Odor (winner of China Lily Award), Phoenix Town, Digging Well, and All Loves, etc.
Box officeNorth Gate of NCPA, No. 2 West Chang'an Avenue, Xicheng District, Beijing, China
Tickets collection hours9:30-19:30 (CST) on performance day
9:30-18:00 (CST) for days without performance
Booking line+86 10 6655 0000
Booking hours9:30-18:00 (CST) Monday to Friday
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Dedicated to the staging of epic operas, ballets and dance dramas, the golden Opera House is considered the centerpiece of the NCPA. Its main tone is golden color, which looks glamorous and splendid. In the auditorium are the stalls and three higher levels of balconies, which can seat an audience of 2,207, including the venue of SRO. It is equipped with a modern stage that can be moved up/down/backward/forward or rotated, a ballet stage that can slant, and a rising orchestra pit for the triple winds orchestra. All the cutting-edge staging mechanism provides artists with enormous possibilities of creative performance.
Dedicated to the staging of epic operas, ballets and dance dramas, the golden Opera House is considered the centerpiece of the NCPA. Its main tone is golden color, which looks glamorous and splendid. In the auditorium are the stalls and three higher levels of balconies, which can seat an audience of 2,207, including the venue of SRO. It is equipped with a modern stage that can be moved up/down/backward/forward or rotated, a ballet stage that can slant, and a rising orchestra pit for the triple winds orchestra. All the cutting-edge staging mechanism provides artists with enormous possibilities of creative performance.