Rise Traditionally,
Chinese theatre has placed great emphasis on sung performances, with highly stylized acting prominent in the
Peking and
Cantonese operas. Western-style spoken-word dramas were introduced in the early 1900s, with the Tokyo-based
Spring Willow Society performing ''
Black Slave's Cry to Heaven'' considered one of China's first Western-style theatrical performances in 1907. Upon their returns to China, alumni from this troupe established the civilized drama genre, which blended spoken-word dialogue with operatic performances while incorporating realistic set design. Towards the 1920s, interest in the civilized drama began to wane, and critics began decrying the genre as
overacting. Amateur troupes, meanwhile, sought to move away from the highly commercialized civilized drama genre. Subscribing to the realist philosophy taught by Ibsen and following the
New Culture Movement's call for reform, these troupes put greater emphasis on naturalistic performances. Many of these early works were direct translations of works by Western playwrights. Audiences for these performances, which occurred mostly in urban cultural centres such as Shanghai, were limited. introduced the word
huaju in 1927. The word
huaju was introduced in 1927 by the dramatist
Tian Han, at which time it was used to describe works that relied exclusively on realistic spoken-word dialogue. Although most troupes embraced high levels of realism, some such as the national theatre movement under
Yu Shangyuan sought to maintain hybridity in stage performances and thereby retain elements of traditional Chinese culture. Critics of this movement, most of whom were students, decried it as capitulating to feudal norms, and it was quashed by the end of the decade. The 1930s saw the expansion of
huaju through further Westernization, as well as access to broader audiences. Through the 1930s and 1940s, a variety of playwrights penned new works to be performed as spoken-word dramas. These included
Ouyang Yuqian,
Hong Shen, Tian Han, and
Cao Yu; the
Encyclopaedia Britannica describes Cao's
Thunderstorm (1933), a tragedy in four acts, as a high point in performance and story. During the
Second Sino-Japanese War,
huaju troupes travelled to rural areas to promote resistance to Japanese forces; some of these were supported by the government, with the
Guo Moruo–headed Third Section providing support to ten Anti-Japanese Drama Companies.
After the Chinese Civil War In China Following the establishment of the
People's Republic of China in 1949, the
Chinese Communist Party (CCP) initiated efforts to reform drama, sponsoring a series of "revolutionary and politically correct"
huaju performances as well as the development of a ballet-inspired dance drama genre known as
wuju. Genres prominent in this period included the
slice of life, as represented by
Lao She's
Teahouse (1957), and the
historical drama. Efforts by civilized drama writers such as Xu Banmei to again reintegrate traditional operatic forms into
huaju, under the name
tongsu huaju (popular spoken drama), gained some traction in the late 1950s, but were ultimately futile. Performances of
huaju continued through the 1960s, with Tian defining the genre in 1957 as "a new dramatic form imported from Europe together with capitalist civilization half a century ago, or created with strong foreign influences". By this point, close
relations between China and the United Soviet Socialist Republic had allowed the introduction of
Stanislavski's system of acting into Chinese drama, albeit with some modifications; other influences came from the dramaturgy of Chekhov and Gorky. Such emphasis on realism was not universally accepted, with the film director and dramatist
Huang Zuolin calling for a return to traditional conventions as well as the theatrical ideals of Brecht. in Beijing, established in 1951 During the
Cultural Revolution that began in 1966,
huaju was branded a "poisonous weed" and banned. In the subsequent decade, most dramatic performances were Peking operas made into "model dramas" that advanced the CCP's propagandic interests. Although some
huaju were performed by the mid-1970s, they were constrained by the government-mandated models.
Huaju returned after the revolution, with many early performances condemning the political persecution that had been experienced. Zong Fuxian's
In a Land of Silence (1978), for instance, explored the last months of the revolution. Several dramatists, such as Xie Min through his
Why Did I Die?, used the post-Revolution reforms to advance
avant-garde theatre. Others, such Sun Huizhu and Fei Chunfang, incorporated elements of Chinese opera into their performances.
Huaju has remained a dominant dramatic form in Chinese theatre. Since the 1990s, it has expanded to become a "total performance event". At the same time, younger audiences exposed to Western thought have allowed the genre to increase in prominence. Influences from foreign forms of theatre have accelerated, a situation that may be attributed in part due to direct exposure to foreign playwrights; for instance,
Arthur Miller directed a Chinese-language production of his
Death of a Salesman (1949) in 1983.
In Taiwan The conclusion of the
Chinese Civil War and establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949 was followed by the exodus of some million and a half refugees across the
Taiwan Strait. This brought significant changes to
Taiwan, where modern drama introduced by the Japanese during
their rule in the 1910s had not found much of a following. The
Kuomintang government initially used
huaju for propaganda, though it had diversified by the 1960s under the guidance of dramatists such as
Li Man-kuei and her Committee on Spoken Drama Appreciation. Practices expanded through the 1980s, with
Chin Shih-chieh advancing a model that integrated traditional opera.
In Hong Kong Although under
British influence English-language drama had long been performed in Hong Kong, as with Taiwan, the most popular form of theatre among Chinese audiences through the early 20th century was traditional.
Huaju gained some traction in the 1930s, with the years before the
Japanese occupation seeing several patriotic works. The influx of refugees following the Chinese Civil War, again as in Taiwan, brought several playwrights. Through the 1950s, playwrights such as Hu Chun-bin,
Hsiung Shih-I, and Lai Kok-bun produced
huaju in
Cantonese. Since the 1960s, students of universities such as the
Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts (established 1985) have been primary drivers of
huaju production. ==Themes==