Life

Shows that shone

By Raymond Zhou and Chen Jie (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-12-28 08:04

The Village

This 3.5-hour Taiwan play toured the mainland twice during the year, and wherever it was presented it elicited tears and laughter from the audience. A panorama of three generations and 60 years, about a Kuomintang military settlement in Taiwan, is boiled down to bittersweet moments and historical richness, touching the heartstrings of mainland audiences.

The episodes about the first generation of settlers, those who retreated from the mainland in the aftermath of the Kuomintang's defeat in 1949, is particularly inspired, making it the best Chinese-language play in at least 20 years. It crosses not only the Taiwan Straits but also political and linguistic boundaries.

Taiwan theater impresario Stan Lai has staged other productions on the Chinese mainland, all gaining rave reviews, including Watch TV With Me, a more commercial play about the past three decades of reform here. Lai, sometimes aided by Taiwan TV honcho Wang Wei-chung, has firmly established himself as a force to be reckoned with in Chinese theater with his long string of critical and box-office triumphs over the years.