Ballet celebrates Chinese epic, draws from opera

A Dream Of Red Mansions 

National Ballet of China

Esplanade Theatre

Friday 13 March, 8pm

Quite unlike much of the standard Western ballet repertoire, the National Ballet of China’s A Dream Of Red Mansions is memorable for its particular aesthetic flavour. Based on the eighteenth-century Chinese literary classic of the same title, this work combines pointe shoes and ballet technique with strong influence from Chinese dance and opera. 

The result is a refreshing change from the classical Western princes, princesses and fairies that one usually expects at the ballet. Here, the costumes worn by the main characters are distinctly Chinese. In terms of movements, the stylised walking in some scenes, and the upper body and arm movements of the performers, are drawn from Chinese movement traditions.  

The dominant stage image is a striking stage flat spanning almost the whole length of the stage, with a circular aperture in the middle big enough for performers to pass through.

The flat moves up and downstage, and rotates around a centre axis at different points in the performance. This emphasis on rotation and circularity perhaps mirrors the Buddhist philosophical idea of karmic cycles, which is one of the influences in the source text of Dream.

Rather than the technical stunts that are often the highlight of Western ballet repertoire, in Dream the performers are faced with another challenge – that of conveying the emotional depth of the work. Chen Zhuming as the protagonist Jia Baoyu, and Fang Mengying as his love interest Lin Daiyu, take on this challenge with admirable finesse.

Their scenes together in the first act evoke the joys of innocent young love without being cloyingly sweet. There is also a beautiful pas de quatre in which Jia Baoyu and Feng Mengying dance with the Deity Shenying and Fairy Crimson Pearl, supernatural alter egos of the two lead characters.   

In the big mansion scenes, the corps de ballet also impress with their exceptional lightness – one hears hardly any sound from pointe shoes or landings from jumps, which is unusual even for the most acclaimed ballet companies.

At times, the synchronicity of movements could be tighter, but on the whole it is easy to appreciate the delightful aesthetics of the performance.

However, there is a downside to creating a performance work based on a literary epic. The novel, besides its tremendous length, is celebrated for the complexity of its themes and use of imagery.

As with much of classical Chinese literature and Chinese theatre tradition, meaning is often conveyed through non-literal ways. It is likely assumed that the audience has some familiarity with the source material and its iconic scenes.

For audiences unfamiliar with it, the ballet can be alienating as the meaning of the imagery, such as that of Lin Daiyu mourning the flower petals at the end of the first act, may not be obvious to them. 

This is no easy conundrum to solve with a work of such epic proportions, and the overall artistic coherence is nevertheless commendable. One hopes to see more works created by Asian dance companies that continue to simultaneously celebrate and challenge the established traditions of ballet.