My name is Zhou Liping, and I am an actor in Zhejiang Xiaobaihua Yue Opera Theater. Now I have a new identity—the leading role and producer of Yue Opera themed film He Wenxiu.

Not long ago, He Wenxiu was shown in the cinema for the first time. I am very happy to see some young audiences enter the cinema and watch this movie. It is my motivation to inherit the classic traditional culture of Yue Opera in the form of movies and make it known to more people, especially young people.

Let the drama film go steady and far

The story of He Wenxiu happened in Ming Dynasty. Scholar He Wenxiu went to Hangzhou with his wife Wang Lanying and met Zhang Tang. Zhang Tang wanted to take Wang Lanying and set up He Wenxiu. After going through hardships and dangers, He Wenxiu was offered an official post, and he punished Zhang Tang and reunited with Wang Lanying.

In order to make the presentation of the story more in line with the expression of the film, we, together with the producer, director, screenwriter, and so on, have adapted the script from the aspects of duration, narrative rhythm, and story structure.

Opera film should make the language of the film clear, and then deduce the story based on it. Therefore, when shooting, we chose a large number of real scenes, and thus went to Hengdian, Xinchang, and Shangyu, trying to make the audience feel personally on the scene.

In my opinion, as a unique film category in China, opera film is not only a re-enactment of the stage but also an innovation in the presentation of opera art through the use of modern film concepts, so as to bring opera film into a new stage of development and move towards a broader world.

Let the contemporary and the traditional match each other

When shooting, we often encountered the situation that the two artistic concepts of film and drama collide. For example, in a play about He Wenxiu and Wang Lanying escaping, because there are standard movements in running and walking in Yue Opera, the drama guide insisted on following the standard steps. However, the film director thought that when shooting in a real scene, the actors' performances must be natural and life-oriented. The two sides argued, and in the end, we took two versions, one of which was chosen according to the actual screen effect.

Different from ordinary film shooting, our actors had to make up before shooting, which took one or two hours each time. In order to restore the most essential features of Yue Opera, I got up and prepared before 4 o'clock every day.

I still remember because the mulberry season had passed when the shooting started, the clip of He Wenxiu visiting wife in the mulberry field had no mulberry field as the background. For this reason, in May of the next year, my shooting team and I found a mulberry garden to make up the shooting. For a long time, I always think that film is an art of regret, and all I can do is "trying to leave as little regret as possible”.

Let the audience enter the opera gardens

Once, when I came up with the idea of making He Wenxiu into a Yue Opera film, people around asked me, "You don't have the experience and team to make a film. Is it worth all your own investment?" Yes, it's not easy to plan a movie, but I have never regretted it.

Although Yue Opera is known as the second-largest drama in China, the number of its audience has been decreasing. I began to think about whether classic Yueju Opera could be preserved in the form of movies and popularized to more audiences. The image of He Wenxiu was created by the master of Yue Opera Yin Guifang. This Yue opera film is not only a tribute to Mr. Yin but also my original intention and determination to inherit and carry forward the culture of Yue opera.

(Compiled by Xu Yuhong, translated by Tao Mingzhou)