Preserving Tradition: How Peking Opera Thrives in Today’s Digital Age

BEIJING – Clad in a striking red-and-white warrior ensemble, Peking opera performer Zhang Wanting expertly balances on a chair’s narrow rosewood handle. With grace, she leans forward, lifts her leg skyward, and grabs the long pheasant plumes on her helmet, mimicking the elegance of a flying swallow.

Inside a modern Beijing theater, over 100 spectators erupt into cheers and applause, captivated by her performance.

It’s an early September Sunday afternoon, and Zhang is starring in “The Masked Heroine,” a hallmark production of the Song School of Peking opera. This school was established in the early 20th century as part of China’s rich cultural heritage. At 30, this is Zhang’s first lead role in a full production, a culmination of more than a decade of dedicated effort that traces back to her childhood.

“From the moment I started learning this play,” Zhang shares, “I always aspired to perform it in its entirety.”

The intricate chair maneuver she performs is a feat that requires a decade of practice to master.

Zhang’s journey began in northern China’s Hebei province, where she first encountered Peking opera at age seven. She watched in awe as children practiced at a local cultural center, sparking her passion. Recognizing her natural talent and drive, she decided to pursue the art form professionally. After completing primary school, Zhang moved to a theater school in Jiangsu province in eastern China to hone her skills.

Most performers in Peking opera — its name comes from a now-obsolete way of saying Beijing in English — start training at a very young age to lay foundation for good physical strength and flexibility. The process, full of repetitive practice, leaves participants soaked with “sweat and tears.”

The pose Zhang does on the chair requires balancing on one leg, arching backward, and stretching her arms forward with absolute stillness. It derives from a basic skill in Peking opera called tanhai — literally, “gazing over the sea” — that most performers learn at the beginning of their career. Originating in Chinese martial arts, the skill demands immense balance, flexibility, and control.

At theater school, Zhang started training at 5 a.m. daily. “After each session, I’d lie on the floor and cry,” she recalls.

Throughout the school’s training, Zhang had her first exposure to Song school’s plays and became fascinated. In 2015, at college, Zhang finally got the chance to study with a Peking opera artist named Song Danju, the daughter of the Song School’s founder. At a time when Peking Opera troupes traditionally favoured roles like qingyi (a role type for dignified, virtuous female characters) as headliners, the Song School brought female martial roles to the stage center with their creative stunts and a fresher performance style.

The chair trick is a Song family specialty. Zhang’s teacher inherited it from her father and revived it by blending martial and acrobatic movements learnt from folk opera performers in northwestern China. The move includes moves like jumping through the chair’s frame in one go, standing on its handle on one leg, spinning the chair using the palm of one’s hand, hooking the chair leg with one’s instep and hopping forward — and so on.

Though Zhang had a good foundation in skills like tanhai, incorporating them into the chair technique, she says, is “another level.”

“The first thing I have to overcome is my fear,” she says.

Zhang spends an entire semester repeatedly standing on a chair handle about 3 inches (8.5 centimeters) wide and more than 2 feet (70 centimeters) off the ground, just to conquer her fear and master balance. “I carried a chair everywhere and practiced whenever I could,” she says.

Each move might take months to practice. For the jumping move, Zhang sets a goal of about 50 leaps into the narrow open space of the chair’s back each day. By day’s end, her muscles tremble and her thighs are pocked with bruises.

But the practice continues. And there came a moment when Zhang knew she had broken through. “The moment standing on the chair no longer feels so strenuous, and this is when I know I have truly advanced.”

Young performers continue to deliver the appeals of Peking opera

For much of the 19th and early 20th centuries, Peking opera had developed into a popular form of urban entertainment. Its roots, however, stretch back even further into the Qing Dynasty, when performances were closely associated with the imperial court in Beijing’s Forbidden City.

Today, the art form faces strong competition from digital entertainment and modern performing arts, and some worry it may be losing its appeal. Yet a growing number of young Peking opera artists like Zhang continue to devote years to perfecting its demanding techniques — and, they hope, to capture today’s audiences.

Yang Hecheng, 26, a teacher at the Beijing Film Academy, came to watch Zhang’s performance in September. “It’s my first time seeing the full production and the chair sequence,” he says, “What attracts me most is the beauty and spirit shown in the performer’s techniques on stage.”

In “The Masked Heroine,” Zhang plays Wan Xiangyou, a chivalrous woman who fights injustice and protects the weak. She leaves her family and becomes a militia leader in ancient China. During a confrontation scene, Zhang performs the tanhai pose on the chair handle while interrogating a male character. Zhang thinks the coherent integration of the trick into the play’s plot makes it compelling for the audience.

“We have the classic saying: ‘A play without skill is not amazing; a play without emotion is not moving,’” she explains.

Now a professional performer with the Jingju Theatre Company of Beijing, one of the top Peking opera troupes in China, Zhang has delivered more than 150 shows in nine years. Each production requires learning new stunts — or refining old ones to perfection.

Zhang says improving her technique in Peking opera remains a lifelong pursuit. “I just want to make progress step by step and perform each show the best I can,” she says. “The most rewarding moment is when the show ends and the audience applauds.”

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Researcher Shihuan Chen in Beijing contributed to this report.