National Ballet of China

National Ballet of China: "Raise the Red Lantern"
Orange County Performing Arts Center
September 20, 2005, 8 p.m.

Ballet has primarily been considered a "Western" artform during the course of its roughly 200 year history. Only recently has it become of interest to rapidly Westernizing Asian cultures, and only even more recently have these Asian ballet companies come under the radar of US and European audiences. Young dancers from China, Japan and Korea are making an increasingly strong presence at the Prix de Laussane, an important competition for young dancers in Switzerland each year. And this coming January, the New National Theatre of Japan's Young Artists Training Program for ballet will make an appearance at the Kennedy Center's ballet academy festival in Washington, D.C. So the National Ballet of China's appearance on a three-city US tour is of particular interest.

The National Ballet of China has, according to the program notes, been in existence since 1959, and the development of ballet in China certainly makes sense considering the country's ties to the communist Soviet Union at the time. Russian teachers still play a major role in training and developing the company to this day.

"Raise the Red Lantern" is a ballet adaptation of the film with the same name. The story focuses on a young girl who is forced to marry a powerful man as his second concubine. In-fighting insues between the man's wife and the first concubine, both of whom plot to destroy the young girl - a matter made easy by the fact that the girl has a lover whom she has been torn away from.

The ballet works best when it is presenting strong images. Shadow play, spectacles of set and costumes, dancers leaping through paper walls or ripping lanters to shreds all form powerful and stunning stage images for the audience to lap up. There is also the spectacle of the Peking Opera, re-enacted in an elaborate scene during Act II.

But where the ballet certainly does not succeed is in the choreography. Most of it is bland Westernish choreography filled with arabesques and melodramatic partnering. The dancing, while technically strong and admirably delivered by the Chinese dancers, appears as more of an afterthought to the visual spectacle on display.

Thus, "Raise the Red Lantern" doesn't completely succeed as dance drama, despite its best intentions. One wonders, too, if all the "Chinenese-ness" of the piece - the Peking Opera, Chinese designs - is more of an element to lure Western audiences into the theatre. The ballet is, after all, based on a Western film - Western fetishism, it seems. One wonders what "Chinese ballet" really is like at home.

Photos from the National Ballet of China's publicity materials.

The National Ballet of China performs "Raise the Red Lantern" at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa through Sunday, Sept. 25. The company will then perform a program of mixed repertory, in addition to "Lantern" in Washington, DC from October 4 to 8 at the Kennedy Center.