Jiang Wen and Xu JingLei
2006年8月26日星期六
外来的茶花女会唱歌
周二到中央公园去听大都会歌剧院新版的《茶花女》，因为是免费的室外音乐会，所以四州八郡的闲杂人等都早早聚集在大草坪上。我们7点钟到的时候，只有光秃秃的黄土地还没人占着，只能将就了。今年是大都会室外音乐季的40周年庆典，所以特特地把《茶花女》和《弄臣》两部声情并茂的大戏排出来献给以挑剔著称的纽约客。虽然我已经买了2006-07年度的季票，但是也不反对先看看Trailer。今年大都会为了扩大观众群，特地把季节套票的最低档票价从$25降到了$15，所以我自己组合的8场演出套票只要￥120美元。因为年龄已经过了29岁，今年就不能再买学生票了，不过如此物美价廉的套票也不失为明智的选择。
再来说说大都会歌剧院。虽然早已听说过它的大名，但是真正熟悉起来还是从前年。那时和一个台湾的女孩子一起去买站票，所看的第一场就是令人难以忘怀的《假面舞会》。说起大都会歌剧院，它成立于1880年，虽然１８８３年才推出第一场演出，即《浮士德》。老歌剧院位于百老汇西39街和40街之间，在时代广场的边上。这个剧院1892年8月毁于一场大火。新的大都会在西63街和64街之间，于1966年9月首次开放，首场演出是Samuel Barber's Antony and Cleopatra。剧场正立面的两幅壁画是Marc Chagall的作品，正中间的舞台54英尺长54英尺宽，有7部电梯供演员出入。大都会是美国最大的古典音乐剧院，每年大概演出240场次。记得第一次看到大都会，是在《月色撩人》那部电影里。尼古拉斯凯奇所饰演的小意大利面包师在大都会喷泉门口等待自己的爱人，而切尔就像是歌剧院里的璀璨的水晶大吊灯，闪烁着迷人的光彩。
二战后 由于艺术中心从欧洲向美国的转移，大都会也逐渐成为重要的歌剧艺术中心。历任的歌剧院总监也渐渐从欧洲艺术家逐渐变成美国艺术家。历任的首席指挥囊括了世界顶尖的艺术家，其中包括我所喜爱的Gustav Mahler (1908–1910) (Principal Conductor)，因为当时的舆论偏爱托斯卡尼尼，所以马勒没能在大都会停留更长的时间，只能黯然回到维也纳，并于次年辞世。大都会最引人注目之处在于，虽然是世界一流的演出场所，但是它的大门对所有的观众打开。它充分发挥自己的教育功能，为喜爱歌剧的年轻学生提供低廉的票价。我曾经以$25的学生票经常坐到orchestra 的前排。此外，大都会还通过广播向广大的听众群提供现场演出的录音，从１９３０年开始，已经历经７０年而不间断。大都会不仅排演经典的歌剧作品，也非常欢迎新的作品和艺术家。比如２００６－０７年度，大都会就将首演谭盾的作品《秦始皇》。世界各地的年轻艺术家也常常在这里崭露头角，其中包括来在中国的艺术家。有一次我去听《浮士德》，出演马格利特哥哥的就是中国的男中音。这一次的《茶花女》也不例外，指挥是来自加拿大的Derrick Inouye，两位主角都来自韩国， Wookyung Kim as Alfredo和 Hei-Kyung Hong as Violetta。此外出演《弄臣》中的女儿Gilda的是来自于俄罗斯的Olga Makarina，演出Maddalena 的Nancy Fabiola Herrera则是法国的艺术家。看来不仅外来的和尚会念经，外来的艺术家更会唱歌。在大都会观看演出，不用担心语言的障碍，因为每一排座位的背后都有一个小小的屏幕，为后面一排的观众打出英文的字幕。此外，剧院的网页上也会提供剧目的详细介绍，以及欣赏歌剧的要领和歌剧中的片断。
虽然与一般的戏剧相比，歌剧的情节简单、洗炼，但是这并不妨碍观众的欣赏。相反，它言简意赅，用音乐的语言把人物的性格和故事的情节一步一步向前推进。我的层次不高，还是偏爱那些比较煽情的故事。比如Un ballo in maschera中瑞典国王古斯塔夫在临终前在假面舞会上的一段咏叹调，赚取了我不少的眼泪。明知自己将要在舞会上被谋杀，古斯塔夫依然单身赴会，在埃米利亚的面前用最后的呼吸倾诉自己不幸的爱情，真是让人不哭也难。经典名剧《阿伊达》是大都会的保留剧目，Michele Crider as Aida，Carlo Bergonzi as Radames，将一段如泣如诉的古埃及爱情故事呈现出来。埃塞俄比亚的美女阿伊达和埃及的勇士拉达莫斯不合时宜的爱情，最后在神庙的地牢中结束。两个人临终的一段对唱，惊天地泣鬼神，堪称爱情的绝唱。大热门《图兰多特》没给我留下太深的印象，除了公主的胖和刘氏牺牲的无意义。倒是《浮士德》中的魔鬼梅菲斯特不负众望，把古诺的神来之笔，表现得淋漓尽致。在戏剧之中，《费加罗的婚礼》把插科打诨发挥到极致，据说在合唱中最多达到了六个声部的叠加。原来北京音乐台的“歌剧欣赏”栏目用《艺术家的生涯》中咪咪的一段咏叹调开头，所以一听到此处，就觉得打开了记忆的闸门。在观看《波西米亚人》的时候，忍不住跟着咪咪一起把她对于爱情的憧憬和遗憾又经历了一遍。
我小的时候跟着姥姥喜欢听越剧和黄梅戏，长大以后比较喜欢昆曲。在中国的戏曲里，即便有爱情，总是比较含蓄的表现出来。梁山伯和祝英台到死都没有牵手，《西厢记》里张生也不过是和莺莺暗诉衷情而已。《牡丹亭》不过是思春少女杜丽娘的黄粱一梦，想那情思婉转，其实没个着落。一开场便是“忙处抛人闲处住。百计思量，没个为欢处。白日消磨肠断句，世间只有情难诉。玉茗堂前朝后暮，红烛迎人，俊得江山助。但是相思莫相负，牡丹亭上三生路”，直到结尾处感慨“从今后把牡丹亭梦影双描画，亏杀你南枝挨暖俺北枝花”。这就是我们所接受的最初的爱情教育，至纯至美，但是对于现实生活全无教化意义。哪像西方的歌剧，从勾引到插足，从一见钟情到双双殉情，把爱情的七十二变统统表现出来，多痛快。我建议大学生以后统统选修《西方歌剧赏析》，爱情的启蒙越早越好。看看人家歌德，年轻的时候写《少年维特的烦恼》和《威廉迈斯特的学习时代》和《威廉迈斯特的漫游时代》，壮年时期开始著述《浮士德》，老了就写三角关系的《亲和力》，一刻不停地思索人生、追求真理和谈恋爱，这才是人生！ＢＲＡＶＯ！！！
任凭你在千种形式里隐身 （歌德， 钱春绮 译）
任凭你在千种形式里隐身，可是，最亲爱的，我立即认识你；任凭你蒙上魔术的纱巾，最在眼前的，我立即认识你。看扁柏最纯洁的青春的耸立，最身材窈窕的，我立即认识你；看河渠明澈的波纹涟漪，最妩媚的，我能够认识你。若是喷泉高高地喷射四散，最善于嬉戏的，我多么快乐认识你！若是云彩的形体千变万幻，最多种多样的，在那里我认识你。看花纱蒙盖的草原地毯，最星光灿烂的，我美好地认识你；千条枝蔓的缠藤向周围伸展，啊，拥抱一切的，这里我认识你。若是在山上晨曦照耀，愉悦一切的，我立即欢迎你；于是晴朗的天空把大地笼罩，最开扩心胸的，我就呼吸你。我外在和内在的感性所认识的，你感化一切的，我认识都由于你；若是我呼唤真主的一百个圣名，每个圣名都响应一个名称为了你。
2006年8月25日星期五
Letter from an Unknown Woman --Brief einer Unbekannten
I watched Xu JingLei's "Letter from an Unknown Woman" a second time and was surprised by its focus on details and a nice vibration of music throughout the movie. It is a re-adaptation of a 1948 Max Ophüls film, based a screenplay be Howard Koch and featured by Joan Fontaine as Lisa Berndle and Louis Jourdan as the charming Stefan Brandit in Vienna. Ophuels is a European director and so that is why the film was so much not Hollywood style. It was claimed by Library of Congress as a film with "culturally significance". There are something interesting about the director Max Ophuels and the author Stephen Zweig. Both of them are Jew. According to Wikipedia:
"Predicting the dread of the Nazi ascendancy, Max Ophuels, a Jew, fled to France in 1933 after the Reichstag fire and became a French citizen in 1938. After the fall of France to Germany, he traveled through Switzerland and Italy to the USA in 1941, only to become inactive in Hollywood. Fortunately, he was rescued by longtime-fan Preston Sturges and went on to realized a number of distinguished films. He returned to Europe in 1950. Though he died from rheumatic heart disease in Hamburg, Ophuls was buried in Le Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. He had made just over twenty films. " "Being a Jew, Zweig fled Austria in 1934, following Hitler's rise to power. He was famously defended by the composer Richard Strauss who refused to remove Zweig's name (as librettist) from the posters for the premiere, in Dresden, of his opera Die schweigsame Frau (The Silent Woman). This led to Hitler refusing to come to the premiere as planned; the opera was banned after three performances. Zweig then lived in England (in Bath and London), before moving to the United States. In 1941 he went to Brazil, where he and his second wife Lotte (née Charlotte Elisabeth Altmann) committed suicide together in Petrópolis using the barbiturate Veronal, despairing at the future of Europe and its culture. "I think it better to conclude in good time and in erect bearing a life in which intellectual labour meant the purest joy and personal freedom the highest good on earth," he wrote. His autobiography The World of Yesterday is a paean to the European culture he considered lost." Because of the cultural background and the timing of the film, the original adaptation is more of a nostalgia love song to the disappearing pre-war European culture, rather than a sentimental drama. For Ophuels and Zweig, the fate of the unknown woman was a symbol of the journey of intellectuals in the old Continent. With their deep and obsessive love for the culture of the past, these intellectuals became aliens of their own countries. The metaphor of the novel was masterly captured in the film, a black and white classic of all times.
The Chinese adaptation is a little bit weird. Set in the turbulence of war and revolution of 1930s and 1940s in Peking, the film tells a story of love and betray in a sweet manner. The obsessive love of the young girl for the older dandy seems more rational given the traditional ethics for Chinese womanhood. The film pays the least possible attention to the external environment, and mentions the wars only to make the love of the heroin more purely and her self-sacrificing behavior more adorable. However, it is at most a better version of Zhang AiLeng’s “Qing Cheng Zhi Lian”. The film is beautifully made, like delicate glassware reflecting the glamorous moment of Peking in late 1940s. But it lacks the pain of losing a culture of the past, and the history was only used to decorate the sitting room of the unknown woman. Maybe Lin YuTang did a better job in the “A Moment in Peking”, but there is no good film adaptation yet.
I have loved Zweig and his work for so many years. I guess he was one of the first group of authors I begin to read systematically in middle school. From his well known short stories, which were favorite picks of Chinese translation, to his longer works such as Three Masters, the Right to Heresy, and Letters from Unknown Woman, I indulged myself into his world of old-styled Europe with all its glory. I can not help compare him with Edith Wharton, another writer I like a lot. With her works such as A House of Mirth and Age of Innocence, Wharton became one of the most astute critics of the upper-class pre-WWI society. I guess two of them can be called the social-historian of their times, even though they observed their societies from quite different angles: one as a marginalized writer from classic literature tradition and one as a foreigner to any country. I think Lao She can be called their Chinese counterpart, a cultural critic of his time and an unconditional lover of old fashioned Peking. Unfortunately, except for Edith Wharton, the other two committed suicide in their prime ages. Is this the fate of cultural critics? Or is it the fate of culture itself?
2006年8月22日星期二
Big Brother
My brother turns 34 today and he keeps a low key about it. I called him several times and always got the polite message: The customer you try to reach is not in service area. So where is he? Mom had to call grandmother and asked her to call my brother and sent our greetings. So it will cost one international call and one domestic long-distance call to forward our message to him. I wish he will grow up a little bit this year and so we don't have to worry about him often.
My brother is a real "anti-brother" and he never cares about being a brother. He asks much from life but does not work as hard. He can only survive in Beijing, and he seems having no interest in other cities or places at all. Although he is young, he always reminds me of the passive tense--something slow, lay back, lack of energy and easy to comprimise. He knows the best food in town, he knows how to dress up and catch the fashion, he knows the best clubs and KTVs, and he knows girls. He is charming to strangers, because he is talktive, neat, decent dressed and cute. He knows how to entertain people. It seems to me that he belongs to the old city of Peking, to the lost generation of idle class, to the pre-industrial society which values sophisticated taste for life and useless knowledge of entertaining and be entertained.
What worries me most is that he attaches no weight to his life. I don't want to judge his life and I should not do that, but sometimes I wonder where he will drift away with the coming tide of time and social change. Oh, my big brother, where are you going and what are you gonna to do with your life?
My brother is in every sense like Na Wu, a fictional figure created by Deng You Mei.
那五
“房新画不古，必是内务府。"那五的祖父作过内务府堂官。所以到他爸爸福大爷卖府的时候，那房子卖的钱还足够折腾几年。福大爷刚七岁就受封为"乾清宫五品挎刀侍卫"。
他连杀鸡都不敢看，怎敢挎刀？辛亥革命成全了他。没等他到挎刀的年纪，就把大清朝推翻了。
福大爷有产业时，门上不缺清客相公。所以他会玩鸽子，能走马。洋玩意能捅台球，还会糊风筝，最上心的是唱京戏，拍昆曲。给涛贝勒配过戏，跟溥侗合作过《珠帘寨》。有名的琴师胡大头是他家常客。他不光给福大爷说戏、吊嗓，还有义务给他喊好。因为吊嗓时座上无人，不喊好时透着冷清。常常是大头拉个过门，福大爷刚唱一句："太保儿推杯换大斗，他就赶紧放下弓子，拍一下巴掌喊：一天睡得不够，嗓子发干，听他喊完好也有起疑的时候："我怎么觉着这一句不怎么样哪？"
“嗯，味儿是差点，你先饮饮场！"大头继续往下拉，毫不气馁。
福大奶奶去世早，福大爷声明为了不让孩子受委屈，不再续弦。弦是没续，但今天给京剧坤伶买行头，明天为唱大鼓的姑娘赎身。他那后花园子的五间暖阁从没断过堂客。大爷事情这么忙，自然顾不上照顾孩子。
那五也用不着当老子的照顾。他有自己的一群伙伴。三贝子、二额驸、索不堂的少爷、袁宫保的嫡孙。年纪相仿，门第相当。你夸我家的厨子好，我称你府上的裁缝强。斗鸡走狗，听戏看花。还有比他们老子胜一筹的，是学会些摩登派的新奇玩意儿。溜冰，跳舞，在王府井大街卖呆看女人，上"来今雨轩"坐茶座泡招待。他们从来不知道钱有什么可珍贵的；手紧了管他铜的瓷的、是书是画，从后楼上拿两锦匣悄悄交给清客相公，就又支应个十天半月，直到福大爷把房产像卖豆腐似的一块块切着卖完，五少爷把古董像猫儿叼食似的叼净。债主请京师地方法院把他从剩下的号房里掏出来，这才知道他这一身本事上当铺当不出一个大子儿，连换个硬面饽饽也换不来。
福大爷一口气上不来，西天"接引"了，留下那五成了舍哥儿。
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