Experimental Drama Ghaffar’s Chinese Dream
Using multimedia (music, image and video) Ghaffar Pourazar tells his story and demonstrates how watching Beijing Opera one night in London in 1993, completely changed his life. How he chased the troupe to Beijing and started living and training with children at the Beijing Opera school and through sickness and pain reconditioned his 32 year old body fit for football and hockey into a singing dancing acrobatic Beijing Opera Warrior and Monkey King.
Throughout the story telling Ghaffar puts on costumes, paints his face and demonstrates parts of his early plays: SAN Cha Kou, Tiao Hua Che, Wusong plays and Shi Xiu Tan Zhuang and Monkey King plays. This is about amazing costumes from the Ming Dynasty and colors, designs, forms and movements on the stage which were passed down from ancient times, then refined and passed down again. Ghaffar uses audience participation throughout the evening, inviting the audience to learn Beijing Opera movements and sounds and use of props.
In between the live performances and multimedia demonstrations we hear about the tragedies of loneliness, sickness and physical pain next to the joy and excitement of learning a beautiful art form with energetic young people, making friends and learning a new culture. Hearing immense group shouts of joy at the site of dumplings in the Beijing Opera school canteen, and becoming the kid’s football Trainer at lunch time. IT IS ABOUT THE EXTRA RESPECT AND KINDNESS THAT MOST CHINESE SHOWED TO A FOREIGNER. It is about a kind of humanity that survives in China. It is also about traveling the YI Dai YI LU countries with Beijing Opera, some for the first time in history and performing his role as the monkey King in Persian, Turkish, Spanish and English, in addition to the original Chinese. Finally it is about winning recognition and awards and performing for Dukes and Duchesses, ministers, ambassadors, Mayors, Secretaries of State, pop stars and VIP guests of the Chinese government. It is about touring China and the world with the Beijing Opera companies and some of the most beautiful, skillful and lively actors, actresses and masters of the art and sharing their lives, joys and tragedies. He completes his monkey face and costume and performs an excerpt from Havoc in Heaven. Finally Ghaffar performs excerpts from his latest program combining Beijing opera with Broadway musicals.
