January 8, 2007
2007年1月8日
The Falun Gong Show: SFist Goes To The NTDTV Chinese New Year
观看法轮功新年晚会有感
Guest review by M.C- of The Standing Room, with pictures by Civic Center's SFMike. N.B.: No one reviewing this concert, and no one posting the review of this concert has any affiliation with either Falun Gong or the People's Republic of China.
作者M.C. 摄影：SFMike 晚会评论者和发帖者不附属于法轮功组织或中华人民共和国。
When we heard about the NTDTV Chinese New Year Spectacular at the Opera House this past weekend, we were absolutely certain we knew what to expect. In our tender youth, our parents dragged us to every Chinese cultural variety show that came through town -- hell, we even performed in some of them! Chinese acrobats bent over backwards with giant porcelain vases balanced on their foreheads? Been there. Lithe ribbon-dancers with zither-strumming and pipa-plucking ladies as backup? Done that. Huge-headdressed Beijing opera singers twirling their long sleeves while a guy dressed as a monkey bounces around the stage eating a peach, accompanied by hella loud gongs and a blaring shawm? Yawn, so last 500 years.
上周末听说新唐人电视台在歌剧厅举办新年晚会，我们曾毫不怀疑能够估摸出晚会大概的样子。在我们小的时候，父母总是拽我们去参加中国文化的各种活动，甚至我们还会参与一些表演。中国的杂技演员顶着瓷碗向后弯腰及地。至于琵琶和古琴弹奏，我们都见识过。还有浓饰重彩的京剧演员甩着长袖，扮演猴子的武生上窜下跳满场翻飞，以及那伴着锣鼓家伙的嘈杂声。这些艺术都有五百年的历史了。
But a computer-animated backdrop showing a angel flying down to Earth to rescue a dancer portraying a Falun Gong meditator being beaten senseless by Communist goons, together with a song proclaiming, "The Falun Gong is good!"?
不过我们这里看到的却是：在电脑动画背景下，一位天使降临人间来拯救“被共产党迫害”的法轮功练习者，还伴随着“法轮功就是好”的歌曲。
OK, we admit it: that, we've never seen before.
是的，我们得承认：这是我们从来没有看过的。
After the jump: how the NTDTV Chinese New Year Spectacular has nothing to do with/all to do with the Falun Gong, the ubiquity of sequins throughout 5000 years of Chinese cultural history, plus -- pictures galore!
在降临之后，整台晚会似乎就和法轮功毫无联系，但又可以说息息相关，似乎它贯穿了整个中国5000年的文明历史，外加多彩的画面。
It turns out that the NTDTV Chinese New Year Spectacular, now in its fourth iteration and presented in close to 30 cities around the world, is utterly unlike any other Chinese performing arts event we ever expected to attend. The 2-hour program is co-sponsored by New Tang Dynasty Television (NTDTV), The Epoch Times, and the Sound of Hope radio network.
新唐人电视台的这场晚会已经是第四届了，在全世界近30个城市巡演，和我们参加的其他中国文艺节目大为不同。晚会两个小时的节目是由新唐人电视台，大纪元和希望之声电台主办的。
NTDTV is an "independent, nonprofit Chinese language TV broadcaster" that happens to have been founded by Falun Gong practitioners, but they go out of their way in their wording to avoid any official connection between NTDTV and Falun Gong. The Epoch Times is "the most widely distributed newspaper in the world, publishing in 40 cities across 28 countries worldwide, and in 8 languages," available for free with practically no advertisements—think about those economics for a moment—also claims no official connection with the Falun Gong but coincidentally happens to have been founded by Falun Gong practitioners. (We are reminded of the Epoch Times reporter who heckled Chinese president Hu Jintao's visit to the US last year.) The Sound of Hope radio network provides "listeners with news and programming that is both honest and objective" and is run by... you get the idea.
新唐人电视台是一个所谓“独立的，非赢利性的华语电视台”，但它又恰恰是法轮功练习者创办的，不过在言词中却尽量回避新唐人电视台和法轮功的联系。《大纪元》称自己是全世界发行最广泛的报纸，在全世界28个国家40个城市中用8种语言发行，而且不刊载任何广告。让我们思考一下它究竟是如何经营的。同时它也宣称和法轮功没有任何联系，只是由一些法轮功练习者创办的。（这使我们联想到《大纪元》记者骚扰访美的中国国家主席胡锦涛的情景）。希望之声电台也声称自己为听众提供客观诚实的新闻节目，不过它也是由你所知道的那些人经营的。
Armed with this knowledge, which we only learned after the show, did we finally understand why vignette after vignette of the two-hour NTDTV Spectacular extolled the virtues of practicing Falun Gong, cursed the demonic evils of the Communist Chinese government, and promoted Truthfulness, Compassion, Patience—three pillars of Falun Gong thought.
有了这层了解（我们是事后才知道的），我们才明白为什么两个小时晚会中，一个个节目都要赞美法轮功，而诅咒中国政府的“邪恶”，也就知道他们为什么要推崇“真，善，忍”，所谓法轮功的三大支柱。
Our hosts for the evening were a lovely young couple, a Caucasian man and an Asian woman, both of whom comfortably delivered intro patter in fluent English and Mandarin. We didn't catch the Asian MC's name, but we were interested to learn later that the gentleman, Leeshai Lemish, is a reporter for the Epoch Times and in 2001 was one of 35 Westerners to be arrested and beaten for meditating under a banner that said "Truthfulness, Compassion, Patience" in Tiananmen Square.
晚会的主持人是一对可爱的组合，一个白人男性，一个亚洲女性，操着熟练的英文和普通话。我们没有弄清女士的姓名，不过后来我们发现那位男主持人，里塞乐米施实际上是《大纪元》的记者，他也是2001年在天安门广场因为打出“真，善，忍”的标语而被拘留的35个西方人之一。
The grand majority of the dozens of performers were dancers whose style incorporated some gestures from traditional Chinese dance, but which was clearly based in Western ballet technique. They came from a number of schools and troupes, including the Fei Tian Dance School, which is "known for celebrating virtuous deeds [and] reverence for the divine" and the Lotus Perfoming Arts Troupe, which, coincidentally, is "committed to celebrating the values of Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance."
大多数的演员是舞蹈演员，他们结合了中国传统舞蹈和西方芭蕾的动作。他们来自学校和艺术团体，其中包括飞天舞蹈学校，该学校宣称自己主张善行和敬神，还有莲花艺术团，它的口号也是宣扬“真，善，忍”。
The dances were generally choreographed for groups. Some were inspired by Tibet and Inner Mongolia (areas that, coincidentally, have also been infamously oppressed by the Communist Chinese government); others told narratives of various characters being rewarded for their embodiment of Traditional Chinese Values, namely, piety and faith in the "divine path."
大多是集体舞蹈。有些节目受到西藏和内蒙古地区风格的影响（这些地区也被认为受到中国政府压迫的），有些台词褒扬所谓中国传统文化的精髓，如忠诚，信仰“神圣之路”等。
Interestingly, SFMike pointed out that romantic love, which does feature prominently in plenty of traditional Chinese literature and theater, made not a single appearance on stage all evening. The only remotely sexy gesture was when one of the male dancers suddenly and bizarrely ripped off his shirt in front of his mother, who then tattooed four characters on his back as he gritted his teeth on a bloody rag.
有趣的是，整场节目中从头到尾没有一个涉及到我们熟悉的爱情，尽管爱情也是传统中国文学和戏剧的主题。唯一有些牵强的涉及爱的场面是，一个男舞者突然在自己母亲面前撕掉自己的衬衫，让母亲在自己背上刺下4个字，而他则紧咬着一块满是血迹的布条。(翻译者：似乎指岳母刺字）
Nearly all of the music was piped in over the sound system by a prerecorded orchestra with Western instrumentation, the exceptions being live performances by a 13-year-old harpist performing a work by the 19th-century Belgian composer Félix Godefroid, three singers with Western operatic vocal technique, and an accompanist performing on a traditional Chinese Steinway 9' grand piano. (To be fair, there was also one contemporary piece written and performed by an erhu player, with piano accompaniment.) No zithers, no wild Chinese percussion, and the only pipa to be seen was a non-functioning prop covered in glitter.
配乐都是播送一些事先录好的西乐片段，唯一的例外是一个13岁的竖琴演奏者表演了比利时作曲家费利克斯歌德富瓦的作品，有三个歌手表演了西方歌剧，另外有演奏者在施坦威钢琴上伴奏，还有一段二胡演奏。没有任何古琴，中国打击乐器，虽然有一个琵琶，那是做道具用的。
In fact, aside from the Falun Gong references, the unifying characteristic of all the evening's vignettes was the overwhelming preponderance of shiny baubles: one might add "Tiaras, Rhinestones, and Sequins" to the triumvirate of values. Stage fog was also used in abundance. Like little birds we were dazzled by all the small mirrors reflecting light at us, the shiny and brightly colored costumes in constant motion, and the smoke which often obscured the dancers' feet.
实际上，除了法轮功的烙印以外，晚会最大的特点就是处处可见的闪亮小饰物，什么头冠啊，人造钻石啊，还有闪光亮片等等。舞台烟雾也被大量使用。我们不断被舞台上反射的光线、闪闪发光的服装和覆盖舞台的烟幕弄得头晕目眩。
All of which led us to think, what an ironically apt metaphor for the NTDTV Chinese New Year Spectacular. Under the glossy surface and behind the marketing fog of an event touted only as a New Year celebration of traditional Chinese culture, we actually find a 2-hour sales pitch for the Falun Gong. Though none of the ads mention the Falun Gong, when we asked New York-based SFist Mom whether she had ever heard of the Spectacular, her immediate response was, "Oh yeah, the Falun Gong show." Turns out SFist Mom and SFist Dad have been to performances three of the past four years, each time with a complimentary ticket provied by a Falun Gong member. (They add that this December's show was the most explicitly Falun-Gong-centered.)
现场的一切使我们想到，这真是个极具讽刺意义的比喻。在表面光鲜之下，在市场迷雾之中，晚会被描绘成中国传统文化的颂歌。我们发现的确是对法轮功高调的叫卖。尽管每个广告都没有提到法轮功。但当我们问了一位母亲是否听说过那个新年晚会时，她不假思索的回答“哦，是的，不就是那场法轮功晚会嘛。”她和他丈夫过去三年都参加了这个新年晚会，而每次都是拿着法轮功分子塞给的免费门票去看的。（他们告诉我今年的晚会是最突出地以法轮功为主题的一次。）
It should be noted, too, that the traditional Chinese culture promoted by this show is not necessarily one that is recognizable to most Chinese people; indeed, none of the songs performed—with the exception of the Kanding Love Song that MC Leeshai sang as a joke—were traditional Chinese songs that people would recognize. They were all contemporary songs written by Falun Gong practitioners. (As SFist Mom said about the show, "It's not 'culture'... but it sure is colorful!") The expression “traditional Chinese culture and values” in this context, it would seem, equates directly with Falun Gong spirituality. Somehow, it was disturbingly reminiscent of these Traditional American Values we've heard a lot about in recent years.
需要指出的是，这次晚会中所宣扬的中国传统文化主题并不是大多数中国人所了解的那个传统文化。事实上，除了主持人拿来逗乐用的康定情歌以外，没有听到任何一个传统歌曲，而大多数都是法轮功练习者创作的现代歌曲。（正象有些观众所说的，“晚会根本不是文化，不过倒是色彩光鲜”）他们所说的中国传统文化和价值倒是可以等同于法轮功教义。晚会却让我们联想到一些近些年来常常听到的传统美国文化价值。
Honestly, if a movement has to lure in unsuspecting audience members via a duplicitous bait-and-switch marketing campaign, perhaps “Truthfulness” should be replaced with “Truthiness.” Likewise, we’d be surprised if the program advertisers (like the SF Opera, who took out a full-page color ad in the inside back cover) and all the politicos (like Barbara Boxer and Gov Arnold), whose letters of support appear at the front of the program, were aware that they were implicitly supporting the Falun Gong.
老实说，如果一个运动要想通过这种具有诱饵性质的市场推销手段来招募新成员，那么他们应该把“真”换为“似真非真”。而且我们也奇怪地发现，该节目的广告和政客的支持信也出现在节目单里，我不知道他们是否意识到自己在幕后表达对法轮功的支持。
That said, if you're a big fan of sequins, be certain not to miss next year's Spectacular when it comes around—we swear to the high heavens you won't ever see anything quite like this again! Just go with the knowledge that the NTDTV Chinese New Year Spectacular is not at all a traditional celebration of the Chinese New Year that reflects the experience of most Chinese people.
广告说，如果你喜欢表演者身上的小亮片，那别忘了参加明年的晚会——不过我发誓我们再也不要看到这样的演出。我们总算明白了，新唐人电视台组织的这场新年晚会，压根就不是什么反映出大多数中国人经历的传统庆祝新年活动。
Disclaimer: M. C— holds absolutely no affiliation with or admiration of the oppressive Communist government of the People’s Republic of China. Likewise, he has had no previous encounters with the Falun Gong.
披露者：本人和中华人民共和国政府没有任何联系也不是该政府的赞赏者，同样的，也从没有接触过法轮功。
来源：http://www.sfist.com/archives/2007/01/08/the_falun_gong_show_sfist_goes_to_the_ntdtv_chinese_
new_year.php