A. Arbuzov's play "My Poor Marat" on the modern Chinese stage: the problem of reception

Xuejing Wu ORCID: 0000-0002-1564-1834 Post-graduate student, Department of History of Modern Russian Literature and Contemporary Literary Process, Lomonosov Moscow State University. 119991, Russia, Moscow, Leninskie Gory str., 1 wxj2020@mail.ru

Today, China is experiencing an increased interest in Russian drama of different historical periods: modern plays are being translated, published and staged, Soviet classics are being read anew. Among the popular playwrights is Alexey Arbuzov, whose plays, however, can also be found in the modern repertoire of many Russian theaters. The scenic and artistic organicity of his plays, the appeal to the universal, always relevant problems of human relations, growing up, choosing a life path, the charming characters of Arbuzov attract many theaters to his dramatic heritage and contribute to the success of the audience. On one of the most authoritative Chinese stages, the Beijing People's Theater, two resonant performances based on the playwright's plays were held one after the other: from March to April 2021, "My Poor Marat", from July to August 2021, "Old—Fashioned Comedy", and in the Shanghai Theater Academy in the past December, it was returned to the theater stage arbuzovskaya "Tanya". In this article, we sought to explore, first of all, the features of the modern Chinese artistic and critical reception of the play "My Poor Marat" in 2021, but we also turn to earlier productions in order to trace the dynamics of perception and adaptation of the text.

The production of "My Poor Marat" in April 2021 at the Beijing People's Theater is not the first version of the Arbuzov play that has been performed in China, but perhaps the most discussed. The capital's media concentrated on this cultural event, it received a wide response from theater critics and the audience. The performance was based on the translation of the text carried out by Professor Bai Sihun in 1983 to form and publish a collection of Arbuzov's plays — in general, the playwright's texts were published by the Soviet publishing house "Art" since 1954.  In an interview with RIA Novosti (2017) and in an interview with the Chinese News Service in January 2022, Professor Bai noted the demand for the play "My Poor Marat" in China: "The play, which tells the story of young people's love and finding their purpose in life, was well received by the Chinese audience. This inspired me ... humanity has many common concerns and aspirations, and this is a humanistic basis for finding a common language and building a community of a common destiny together" ^[12].

The resonant production of 2021 stirred up the interest of researchers in this 1964 play by Arbuzov, which, unlike "Tanya" and "Old-Fashioned Comedy", has not so far attracted the special attention of Chinese theater critics and philologists. And it turned out that "My poor Marat" had an unknown, but interesting stage story. So, on December 8, 2000, Zhang Yi, Yang Dapeng and Qi Huan from the Central Academy of Drama adapted and shortened the play, which interested them in the timeless aspects of the issues and the sublime tone, renaming it "The Years of Growing Up". At the same time, the original source was significantly changed in this experimental production: "in order to emphasize the difference in the age of the characters at the beginning and end of the action and thereby enhance the psychological effect, the 13-year gap, as it was with Arbuzov (1942, 1946 and 1959), was replaced by a 30-year (1942, 1946 and 1976) the dialogue between Marat and Lika, which took place in his youth, was transferred to the context of their meeting in the third part. The original ending was also rethought: in order to make the play more emotionally acceptable to the audience and complicate the intrigue, Leonidik does not let go at the end" ^[6].

The performance was warmly received by the audience, but at the same time received critical comments from teachers of the Central Academy of Drama and representatives of the People's Liberation Army of China who attended the premiere. It was noted, for example, that the play (and therefore the performance) lacks "Soviet—style features" — Arbuzov's closeness, one of the main advantages of his dramaturgy, was thus regarded as a disadvantage; chronological freedom in the play was also not approved - changing the age of the characters, according to the professional jury, distorted the perception of them personality and the whole story. The director of the play, director, and now famous actor in China Zhang Yi later wrote: "I love Soviet culture even more thanks to this play and I hope that through the efforts of the theater, thanks to our production, many will love this nation and its culture" ^[10].

In July 2013, the play was presented as an experimental performance at the Wuzhen Theater Festival in Jiaxing City, Zhejiang Province, which is the most famous arts festival in China. And in December of the same year, director Cha Wenyuan, a graduate of the Central Academy of Drama, was transferred to the stage of the Penghao Theater in Beijing. Cha Wenyuan admitted that her professional choice and creative activity were influenced by her uncle, the famous Chinese director Cha Mingzhe, who studied at the Lunacharsky State Institute of Theater Arts. She also noted that "My Poor Marat" is a great play in which actors and director expose their most vulnerable sides to each other during the rehearsal process and accept each other. This production aroused great interest and attracted full houses, five performances in a row took place at the Penghao Theater in the summer of 2013, so popular that "even the aisles in the theater were filled with people" ^[11].

  In 2016, another version of the Arbuzov play, "The Hero's Love", appeared in the Tianjin Bolshoi Theater and the Beijing Jiuyin Bolshoi Theater. The director of the play was Louis Danni. She set out, on the one hand, to bring the translation of the text closer to the modern Chinese viewer, simplifying some points that are difficult to perceive, and including replicas corresponding to the elements of the modern language. On the other hand, the director sought to deepen the stage image of Marat, to convey to the audience, immersed in routine life and busy business life, the romantic pathos of the hero — the master of his fate, not afraid to confront circumstances and be happy.

The director of the newest production of 2021 is Lin Tsung, known for his chamber situation comedies. He carefully preserves the text and strives to convey the atmosphere of the original source — only the stage language is being modernized (using the screen, musical accompaniment, building the stage space). The performers of the main roles are three young actors: Wang Jiajun as Marat and Chen Hongxu as Lika are graduates of the Central Academy of Drama of China and have been working on stage for a long time; Shi Yunpeng, acting as Leonidik, is more familiar to the audience from his film roles, as he starred in many famous Chinese TV series and films.

Director Lin Tsung used elements of chamber theater close to her as a stage master in the play. The chamber theater itself, with its small format and the possibility of a confidential dialogue with the audience, located near the stage, often on the same level with it, has a special magic that brings actors closer to the audience without special techniques for eliminating the "fourth wall". Considering this, the director of the theater changed the original U-shaped shape of the auditorium to a theatrical structure, where the stage is in the center, and the audience is on both sides of it. The stage disappears, and the whole hall turns out to be a space for performance and viewing, and the audience becomes part of the action. On one side of the auditorium, narrow walls are used as screens, allowing images to transport viewers to the era of the play's action. In the intervals between the two parts, the screen displays the year and hints for the next act of the play, accompanied by music.

Lighting plays an important role in the play: in the first act it is warm and subdued, the atmosphere of a small room where three young people are sheltering in the destroyed military Leningrad causes a shaky, but a sense of security. The lighting in the second act is still warm, but a little brighter than in the first. Since the war is over, three young people are full of hope for the future, and the fire of love burns three young hearts. The lighting changes significantly in the third act, as the director seeks to show the psychological transformation of the three characters: from the loss of fighting spirit to the revival of hope and will in the struggle for life. This generally optimistic sound of the performance corresponds to the motif of the increase of light.

The gap between the stage and the first row of spectators is densely covered with fallen leaves. Under the yellow light, the fallen leaves seem warm, and this sight evokes poetic sadness. Director Lin Tsung explains that to create an exotic plan, she chose furniture in gray and white tones as props, as they remind of the boundless birch forests of Russia ^[7]. Conceptually, a room in a Leningrad house is important — a closed place for all the acts of the play. At the same time, the visible changes taking place in it reflect both the internal evolution of the characters and the transformations of time and society. As I. Vishnevskaya wrote, "three years and one room... The same walls especially vividly, prominently emphasize changes in everyday life, changes in people. As if in a mirror, the faces of time are reflected in this room..." ^[3]. On the other hand, the Soviet period is so far from the modern viewer that such a design makes it easier to introduce him into the plot and convey the atmosphere of the action. The props in each scene have bright features of the era, while anachronisms can also be found — most likely not accidental. Russian Russian songs and musical pieces from different times, familiar to the Chinese public, such as "Get Up, the Country is Huge", "Russian Waltz" by D. Shostakovich (which chronologically correlate with the action of the play) sound between the acts. or "Call me softly by name" by the group "Lube" (artifact 2000)

By the way, examples of such musical anachronisms can be found in earlier stage versions of the Arbuzov play, which were discussed above. Thus, the director of the play "Hero's Love" Louis Danni specifically commented on her idea when creating the musical and sound score of the production: "For this play, I did not ask to select music in accordance with certain social phenomena or the cultural context of the Soviet Union at that time. If the music was in the right mood to create a mise en scene, we chose it. The choice of music was not particularly strict in terms of following each point in its chronological trajectory" ^[13]. Thus, the transmission of mood and, perhaps, the accentuation of the timeless nature of the problems raised in the play turned out to be primary for the creators of the performances. In the article "Historiography and Historiosophy" Hayden White defines historiosophy as "the representation of history and our thoughts about it in visual images and film discourse"^[5]. Human civilization has gone through a process of transition from seeing to reading and from reading to seeing. Despite the "mistakes" in the productions, the latter reflect the new creative view of the modern director, and such a work has historical value as a history of modern social thought. Drama must follow the laws of literary creativity and literary appreciation, and sometimes it needs to go beyond strictly historical thought.

Like the Russian people, Chinese memories of the Second World War are mixed with deep sorrow, and in dramatic works it has long been a tradition to link personal fate with the tragic and majestic history of the war. The content of the play "My Poor Marat" is closely connected with the spiritual growth of young people, the theme of growing up, choice and self-determination. Therefore, the play captivates not only the generation familiar with Arbuzov's work, but also the young Chinese audience. Arbuzov uses the private history of his main characters to once again ask the eternal question of humanity: "What is happiness?". This issue has overcome time and national differences and has been put to young people in China. Should we be satisfied with the existing situation, come to terms with the circumstances of life that do not satisfy, or follow our ideals, follow the dream?

"My Poor Marat" is a work that deserves repeated reading. Symbolic, ambiguous details and metaphors are hidden both in the characters' dialogues and in the author's remarks. So, in the lyrical remark of the third act, the question sounds: "But has this not too rich furniture found its final place? Probably not. Chairs, tables, an ottoman and bookshelves are still continuing their search"^[1]. The author's question in the remark is projected from the everyday plan onto the characters of the play themselves, who have not yet found their true place in life, have not achieved their goals. The image of the bridge, through in the play, acquires a symbolic meaning: this is not only a structure that was built by Marat, who became an engineer, but the hero himself becomes such a "bridge" for his friends, a link through which Lika and Leonidik seek and achieve changes in life. "Marat is endowed with an almost supernatural gift of premonition of future changes... to draw our attention to the divorced bridges of life" ^{[2, p.107]} It can even be argued that the play "My Poor Marat" serves as a bridge between the audience and their ideals, allows us to correlate the real, achieved with what is seen in dreams and aspirations. There are also metaphorical descriptions of the weather in the play, allusions to the society of that time — these details are difficult to show in the theater, and the director inevitably sacrifices some of them ^[8].

Arbuzov's play staged by the Beijing People's Theater provoked contradictory responses from critics and viewers. Many saw in this production a consistent reflection of the artistic principles of the theater and the director, a successful adaptation and modernization of the text created in a foreign language more than half a century ago. However, it was also suggested that the play is not suitable for the modern Chinese stage due to the complexity of the language. The fact is that in a melodrama (and Arbuzov's play has the features of this genre), the word, intonation, mood are very important, so the dialogues of the characters occupy a central place in it. The Chinese audience has managed to get used to the use of spoken language in performances, and the sublime, metaphorical, somewhat even theatrical speech of the characters of the translated text sounds unusual. Moreover, Professor Bai Sihong's careful translation preserves the original forms of individual speech characteristics - for example, Leonidik sometimes speaks of himself in the third person, which is strange for the Chinese audience and leads to misunderstanding. On the other hand, the Soviet era is already far from young people who have not experienced wars in their lives — this is also one of the reasons why not all viewers were able to get into the play.

The choice of Lika in the second part, when she decides to stay with Leonid, and not with Marat, caused confusion among some viewers who are not familiar with the text of the original source. One can understand that she chose him not for love, but because, as she thought, he would need her more than Marat. But is her self-sacrifice justified, followed by the rejection of her own dream of science? After all, Leonidik is a weak person, and she only helps him to be so. And only the return of Marat gives the heroes to understand themselves and try to change their lives. Chinese researchers have also offered another explanation for the difficult relationship of the heroes: since these three have long become an indivisible collective, united in difficult times, the departure of Marat and the union of Lika with Leonid is actually a collective decision, and the departure of Leonidik in the third act means the awakening of individual consciousness and its victory over the collective ^[9].

The same part of the Chinese audience, whose youth fell in the 1980s, understands poor Marat better (although probably in its own way): this timidity was the result of both material and spiritual poverty - the awareness of this inferiority made young people feel unworthy. For Marat, "timidity" is his duty to many of those who died, his sacrifice, which he must bring. Why did Arbuzov call Marat "poor"? According to Vasilinina, not only because the hero lost the integrity of his personality and could not regain himself in any way, but also because he cannot use the weakness and mistakes of another for his own good ^{[2, p.111]}. In the context of history, Marat's behavior is similar to the "survivor's syndrome". P. Rudnev writes: "When the enemy is visible, everything is clear, when life itself becomes the enemy, it is impossible to fight. The traumatism of the war has been transferred to everyday life, where there is no longer a poetic obsession, but a prosaic habit"^[4]. The psychological traumatization of people of the military generation, which causes symptoms of maladaptation, is conveyed in the play by artistic means. These include a deep sense of guilt. In the modern world, with its individualistic values, such noble deeds have become an exceptional phenomenon, therefore it is not surprising that the plot of the production is difficult to understand, especially for a young audience.

  The unique experience of the reception of Arbuzov's play was presented in September 2021 by the Chinese artist Shi Haitao, who held a major solo exhibition at the Baolong Art Museum in Shanghai. He participated in the production of "My Poor Marat" at the Beijing People's Theater, and it was according to his idea that the stage and the auditorium located on both sides of it were reconstructed. In his youth, which came in the 1980s, Shi Haitao studied theater skills under the guidance of director Lin Jaohua (the father of Lin Tsung, who staged "My Poor Marat" in 2021) and has extensive experience in the field of art, theater, design. The exhibition offers a new immersive theatrical experience for the viewer. By dividing the exhibition hall into three parts in accordance with the structure of the play, the artist engages the viewer and engages himself in the space of the performance. The exhibition presents oil paintings on canvas, as well as videos and installations – the whole array of the master's works is based on impressions of Arbuzov's play and reflections in connection with it, a view of the artist's world immersed in the atmosphere of scenic art is demonstrated. Many years of study and work in the theatrical sphere required Shi Haitao to read a large number of literary works, including dramaturgical classics, and this experience gave him not only a rich stock of literary knowledge for creativity, but also a unique worldview.

In the series "My poor Marat", the most important place is occupied by an oil painting, on which there is a gray stage and an empty auditorium. The only bright spot is the artist, who is sitting in the center of the hall, lost in thought. Shi Haitao wonders: is it possible for a person to distance himself from historical cataclysms and the passage of time in order to understand where he is and what he needs in life? This is coordinated with the main idea of the play "My Poor Marat", as well as with the principles of receptive aesthetics: the educational and entertainment functions of the work should be realized in the process of reading. The reader actively participates in this process and is the driving force behind the creation of literature; the reception of literature is regulated not only by the nature of the work, but also by the reader.

So, the stage history of Arbuzov's play "My Poor Marat" in China not only testifies to the persistent interest of the theatrical community and the viewer in the Soviet theatrical classics, but is also closely connected with the socio-political aspect of the country's life and national mentality, affects the official ideology and individual consciousness, reflects the dialogue of foreign cultural factors and traditional forms of national culture. 

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