Curtain up as East meets West on the stage in Wuzhen
Much of the plot in the Chinese folktale about a white snake spirit falling in love with a human takes place in water, including the trans-species encounter in drizzle and a torrential flood being whipped up to rescue the human husband.
As if to complement the outdoors re-enactment of this age-old story, the god of rain bestowed non-stop drops for exactly the length of the performance of Green Snake, which is the opening piece at the Second Wuzhen Theater Festival in Zhejiang province.
In case you're confused, Green Snake is the younger sister of White Snake. She is usually portrayed as more quicksilver and tempestuous and in Tian Qinxin's retelling she is the one who embodies the basic human instinct of sexual desire, or should it be animal instinct?
