Puppets Help Evoke China's History of Love and War

November 1, 2005
THEATER REVIEW | 'CATHAY: THREE TALES OF CHINA'

By MARGO JEFFERSON
For Marco Polo in the 13th century as for Ezra Pound in the 20th, China was "Cathay," a land of mythic wonders. For the American-born director and writer Ping Chong, to visit China and make theater in the West meant exploring myth and history, joining Asian and Western traditions. The result is "Cathay: Three Tales of China," playing at the New Victory Theater through Nov. 13. It is enchanting.

"Cathay" is a collaboration with China's Shaanxi Folk Art Theater. Mr. Chong is well known for his ingenious blend of film, theater and graphic art. Here, working with the director Liang Jun and a superb design team, he adds nine puppeteers and various puppets to the mix.

Instead of a curtain onstage, we see a screen with the imposing look of marble. Dark wood divides it into panels. Once the lights go down, different panels will become settings for the action: traders, horses and camels trudging along the Silk Road; the jewel-toned opulence and cruel intrigue of a medieval court; World War II devastation; and the sleek efficiencies of a 21st-century hotel.

But our first encounter is with two enormous animal statues, bronze-colored with winged heads and bright blue eyes. We hear their loud, grumbling voices. They've guarded the royal tomb for centuries; they're bored. What happened to the old days, they complain, "the enchantment of splendors past" in the Tang dynasty, when they were important?

The stage goes dark, and the "The Emperor and the Lady" begins. It is a tale of love, greed and rebellion that ends in tragedy. Two circles light up on opposite sides of the panel. The emperor is inside one, wearing robes of gold and black brocade. His discreetly elegant prime minister is inside the other. Above them is a long rectangle of deep blue sky, a full blue moon and a branch with just four leaves.

The panels serve as puppet stages. But they could be small movie screens, too, given the variety of line, shape and perspective. When the chamber of the emperor's beloved lady, Yang, appears, it is shaped like a fan. The colors are lustrous pinks, and blues, pale yellow and coral with a touch of strawberry.

The second tale, "Little Worm," takes us into a world of pale grays. This is the countryside of ponds and reeds, frogs, water buffalo and huts. Families anxiously watch the sky for Japanese planes. Mr. Chong uses shadow puppets and digital animation up to the moment the Japanese attack. Then the animation becomes newsreel images. We see plunging airplanes, fire, soldiers turning guns and bayonets on unarmed people. It is shattering.

The third tale "New," brings us to an ultramodern hotel in China. Each floor is named after a dynasty, and women who would once have schemed to win an emperor's favor scheme to win a promotion from the hotel manager.

I won't reveal the ties that bind this tale to the other two. I will say that the result is charming, but also poignant. Mr. Chong is a theatrical magician with heart and an acute sense of history.