“The Red Detachment of Women”
National Ballet of China
David H. Koch Theater
New York, NY
July 11, 2015
by Leigh Witchel
© 2015 by Leigh Witchel
“The Red Detachment of Women” may be the least subtle ballet ever, but it’s also the least boring. The ballet charges through its narrative with the speed and efficiency of a wind-up toy. There aren’t any kick lines; instead dancing soldierettes with rifles streak across the stage in split jetés. Misquoting the Gang of Four (the ‘80s band, not the political faction), the girls, we love to see them shoot.
Zhang Jian and Lu Di in “The Red Detachment of Women.” Photo © Stephanie Berger.
It was easy to follow the story. Downtrodden Heroine escaped the clutches of Big Bad Villain (in this case, actually smallish and wiry, but Big Bad is a state of mind). Handsome Hero found Downtrodden Heroine and hooked her up with the People’s Army. Downtrodden Heroine became Plucky Rebel and learned the ropes of revolution. Handsome Hero experienced a glorious martyrdom, Plucky Rebel carried on the people’s fight through to victory. Everyone sang.
Half a century after the Cultural Revolution it was easier to be amused at the blunt dualist view of a ballet where the major prop is firearms. Act 2 opened with a political lecture. Really. In a worker’s paradise near lakes and a view of snow-capped mountains, an al fresco blackboard proclaimed in bold Chinese characters, “Organized and well-disciplined.”
The capitalists lived in dimly-lit misery, under a chain of oppression, where everyone toadied to those of higher rank and bullied those at a lower one. The workers lived under an impossibly blue sky. They harvested lychees and sang uplifting anthems.
Zhou Zhaohui, who played the hero, Hong Changqing, was matinee-idol handsome, and interestingly, alternated with his other cast as the main villain. Zhang Jian, who danced the heroine Qionghua, was an exemplar of the company’s women. She had attenuated gymnastic lines; her legs in a renversé went sky-high as if ballet were an Olympic sport. With her eyes coal black shadows, she felt severe, but that was in part the role. The female corps was more of the same: skinny with pulled-out limbs like taffy.
The ballet vocabulary was hobbled ideologically since neither the steps nor dress could seem Western. Instead you saw a cadre of gals with rifles in sensible bobs and knee socks. Arms ended in resolute fists with lots of “Well done, Comrade!” gestures. Piqué arabesque to grand jeté stood in for a war cry. If the choreography was utilitarian, it was tighter than a snare drum. Jumps derived from traditional martial arts and that hoary old trick of a seemingly endless line of dancers leaping across the stage were used to precision effect. The dancing wasn’t juicy; it was precise and linear. The women’s pointe work had an odd look that seemed to be from low-cut, mushy-arched shoes.
The company’s stay in Lincoln Center was a semi-comfortable meeting of Western and Chinese audience traditions. The Chinese clapped along with familiar tunes and the Westerners instinctively shushed them. We view the theater as hallowed ground; a secular temple. The Chinese don’t even view temples that way. Theaters are social places.
The perfume of “Red Detachment” might be Eau de Gunpowder, but simplistic doesn’t mean stupid – or dull. Like stained glass windows in a cathedral actually being as much on-site bible study as art, this is ballet as a didactic tool for the masses. Its comic-book vigor and tight pacing made “The Red Detachment of Women” more exciting and fun than a barrel of communist monkeys.
© 2015 by Leigh Witchel