danceview
a quarterly review of dance

Writers' Archive

Alexandra Tomalonis
Reviews

The White Haired Girl

Shanghai Ballet
by Alexandra Tomalonis
Special to The Washington Post
September 30 2002

Art and politics usually make uneasy bedfellows. During China’s Cultural Revolution, when universities were closed and longstanding cultural ideas and institutions were rather forcefully re-examined, ballets from China’s new, Soviet-imported classical ballet tradition, such as “Swan Lake,” were expunged from the repertory.

Although classical ballet itself was not banned, it could no longer be used to tell tales of princes and enchanted maidens. Only stories that portrayed the life of the People and reflected Communist ideology were permitted.

During the 1960s, Eight Model Plays (the term included plays, operas and ballets) were created that met the state’s criteria, and these were the only theatrical works allowed to be performed on Chinese stages. “The White Haired Girl,” which the Shanghai ballet brought to rousing life Saturday night at George Mason University’s Center for the Arts, was one of them.

Under these circumstances, one expects to see a simple world peopled by cartoon characters that reinforces political dogma with sledgehammer force, but that’s not the case at all. The story of a peasant girl (Xi’er) who avenges the death of her father and her own enslavement by an evil Japanese landlord (described in the program as “the local despot”) is told clearly, with bold strokes, but also with a great deal of charm.

The characters are three dimensional and well developed, and although the choreography itself lacks complexity or variety, it is pleasant enough and serves the story well. In the opening scenes, before tragedy strikes, Xi’er’s dances are designed to show her delicacy, but a sudden, boldly taken arabesque or quick jump shows that there’s steel in her nature. There’s a martial quality to the soldier’s dances, and one exciting fight scene uses martial arts moves as dance.

In many ways, although it is set in northern China during the Anti-Japanese War (1937-1945), the ballet is quite traditional, faithfully following the 19th century models that mixes classical and folk dancing with pantomime. Western choreographers have shied away from using ballet to tell contemporary stories. Audiences are uncomfortable seeing contemporary characters dancing classical steps, and choreographers grope to find a dance language that can express complex emotions.

The Chinese (four choreographers are credited) have no such self-imposed restrictions. “The White Haired Girl” depicts murder, psychological abuse, physical torture, an individual’s rebellion and spiritual growth, and a society’s revenge, yet the peasant girls are in pointe shoes and traditional Chinese dress, and the soldiers show their power by exploding into jetés. The music, as expressive as a film score, propels the story and includes songs which help explain the action. For example, while Xi’er is being whipped in the wings (one hears the whips crackle), Auntie Zhang (Du Hongling) reacts, blow by blow, in an onstage dance -- one of the few dance/pantomime roles for a middle-aged woman in any ballet company’s repertory.

The Shanghai Ballet is a young company, formed in 1979, and so it’s surprising that they have so many senior mimes -- in addition to Auntie Zhang, Xi’er’s father (Yang Xiaoming), the evil Japanese landlord (Zhong Min), his henchmen and household -- all of whom were superb.

The title role is divided among four ballerinas: Ji Pingping, her dancing clear as water, and with beautifully expressive hands, danced Xi’er, the peasant girl, in the early scenes. After Xi’er escapes the landlord’s clutches, she undergoes a transformation, shown by changing hair color -- the Black Haired girl, the Gray Haired Girl, each of whom have a solo expressing Xi’er’s growing determination and wildness as she becomes one with nature and finally, the White Haired Girl (Zhang Weiying), who completes the ballet.

What the ballet lacks, to Western eyes, is a crowning pas de deux, when Xi’er is reunited with her fiancé Wang (Chen Zhenrong), now a soldier, who finds her in the mountains. They dance a very chaste duet, but they could be two strangers -- perhaps a romantic pas de deux is too sentimental for Chinese taste. The moment that tugs at the heart is when the White Haired Girl and Auntie Zhang recognize each other and perform a gentle ballet of the hands as they greet. That moment encapsulates the ballet’s humanity, transcending ideology and time.