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English plays get cold shoulder on campus
Only two English language plays were performed during the three-week 2005 College Theater Festival of China, but they failed to evoke most Chinese audience's favor.
Broadway's Joseph Graves, current art commissioner for the Institute of World Theater and Film of Beijing University, acted in the monodrama "Revel's World of Shakespeare" in Beijing on Tuesday and Thursday nights. His play only attracted about 20 people for either performance, no more than half of the seats. "Language is the biggest problem for me to enjoy it," said Zhao Yuning, a student of Tianjin Foreign Language School after the performance. "I almost understood the everyday expressions, but I had to depend on the titles screened of the ancient expressions and poem lines." Based on Graves' childhood, "Revel's World of Shakespeare" describes the friendship between the playwright and his drama teacher Revel. A similar thing occurred in "Workout," by another US playwright Wendy Wassertein. The seven-minute monodrama, which featured a middle-aged woman talking to herself during her workout at home was shown by a student who majors in English in University of International Business and Economics on Aug. 13 and 14. Some audience said it was hard for them to understand the play after the first night, even though everyone got a Chinese version of script before the play began. As requested by audience, Chinese titles were screened on the second night. "Language could challenge some Chinese audience, but many meanings can be understood through body language," Graves said. In fact, actors in the two plays paid more attention to their body language to try to get their performances across to the Chinese audience. Huang Fang, who acted in "Workout," made imitations when she expressed voting, writing and putting a gun down. Graves came continually up and down a chair, and made the simple properties' signification always changes on the stage. However, the two plays gave unique offerings to the audience. "Graves must have a good basic training of stage lines, and he is very good at the switch between excitement and calm. Besides, the lighting was also great. All of these made me experience the unique taste of the combination of drama and English," Chai Jinlong, a student at the Beijing Film Academy, said after watching "Revel's World of Shakespeare." "Language is not a problem at all, and the point is the performance - since pantomime can make it understood, can't it?" he said. It is not the first time English plays were shown at the festival. Incorporating English plays into the festival aimed to make the plays more colorful and make college students enjoy foreign plays more, said Yuan Hong, an organizer of the festival. A total of 30 plays from 15 universities across the country were expected to be performed at the annual festival, which opened in Beijing on Aug. 6.
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