page_title: The Peony Pavilion
section_title: Performance productions
hierarchical_section_title: The Peony Pavilion / Performance productions
caption_attribution_description: English: Kunqu performance at the Peking University
context_page_description: The Peony Pavilion, also named The Return of Soul at the Peony Pavilion, is a romantic tragicomedy play written by dramatist Tang Xianzu in 1598, and the plot was drawn from the short story Du Liniang Revives For Love. It depicts a love story between Du Liniang and Liu Mengmei that overcomes all difficulties, transcending time and space, life and death; the pair unite at the end. Tang's play diverges from the short story in that it dynamically integrates the legendary and the reality in Ming Dynasty. Scenes of love in dreams, Du Liniang's revival, or any supernatural element seem absurd in play, but it reflects the sprout of humanism, through protagonists' strong desire and unremitting pursuit of free love, and uncovers the degeneracy of the society under feudalism at that time.
  The play was originally written for staging as Kunqu opera, one of genres of traditional Chinese theatre arts. It was first performed in 1598 at the Pavilion of Prince Teng.
context_section_description: In 2012, an outdoor production of Metropolitan Museum galleries presented The Peony Pavilion in a compact seventy-minute version developed and directed by celebrated composer Tan Dun with choreography by Huang Doudou, one of China's most prominent dancers, in the Met's Astor Court, the courtyard modeled on a seventeenth-century garden. This production is available on demand on the Metropolitan Museum's website.
  In 2012, the China Arts & Entertainment Group, a creative enterprise under the administration of the Ministry of Culture for the People's Republic of China, announced the United States premiere of a new dance drama production of The Peony Pavilion by China Jinling Dance Company of Nanjing would be performed at the David H. Koch Theater, Lincoln Center, for four performances in early January.
  In June 2008, the Suzhou Kunqu Opera company performed The Peony Pavilion at Sadler's Wells, London, the UK premiere. It was presented in 3 parts on consecutive evenings, each lasting 3 hours, though still much shorter than the original 20 hours.
  In May 2008, the National Ballet of China premièred a two-scene ballet adaptation of The Peony Pavilion in Beijing. This production was rewritten and directed by Li Liuyi, choreographed by Fei Bo, and the music was composed by Guo Wenjing. It also attended Lincoln Center Festival in 2008, at David H. Koch Theater, and Edinburgh International Festival in August 2011.
  The Imperial Granary's production The Peony Pavilion in Beijing, directed by Kunqu Opera master Wang Shiyu and scenography by the renowned Lin Zhaohua, was a permanent residency show for about 5 years since the premiere in 2007.
  In 2004, Pai Hsien-yung's youth edition of The Peony Pavilion aims to rejuvenate the traditional staging. Pai, a Chinese scholar at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and his colleagues - scholars and performers, some brought back from retirement - spent five months editing Tang's script. Working out of the Jiangsu Suzhou Kunqu Theater, the group condensed and adapted the original fifty-five scenes to twenty-seven scenes, and twenty hours of performance time to nine. Bai, who had chosen The Peony Pavilion because of its universal message of love, hoped that his rendition would attract youth to Kunqu. In fact, in its tour of China's top universities, the show was marketed as the Youth Edition of Peony Pavilion. (The production also toured in Taipei, Hong Kong, Macau, seven cities in mainland China, and the Zellerbach Theater in Berkeley, California.) According to Bai, the goal of this youth-oriented production was to "give new life to the art form, cultivate a new generation of Kunqu aficionados, and offer respect to playwright Tang and all the master artists that came before." His production of The Peony Pavilion was his way of doing so. Pai Hsien-yung has also used The Peony Pavilion as inspiration for a short story and a television script.
  Recent adaptations of The Peony Pavilion and allusions in popular music have revived interest in Kunqu, an art form that had been in danger of disappearing into obscurity. In 2001, UNESCO proclaimed Kunqu as a "Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity," yet the secrets of that heritage were kept by only a few aging masters in even fewer schools and institutions.
  In 1999, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts produced a 20-hour version of The Peony Pavilion, directed by Chen and starring Qian Yi as Du Liniang. This 20-hour version was perhaps the first full-length staging in 300 years. Lincoln Center's version toured extensively, including New York, Paris, Milan, Singapore, Caen, Charleston, Aarhus, Berlin, Perth and Vienna.
  In 1998, an experimental or “avant-garde” production of The Peony Pavilion composed by Tan Dun, directed by Peter Sellars and performed by Kun Opera Troupe, premiered in Vienna, and travelled to London, Roma, Paris, and Berkeley later. Also, a CD recording of this opera was released entitled "Bitter Love".
caption: Young Lovers' Edition of ''The Peony Pavilion'', produced by Pai Hsien-yung, performed by Suzhou Kunqu Opera Theatre of Jiangsu at Peking University Hall, 2006
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