L’orfe del Clan dels Zhao

There are many things that lead me to think that L'orfe del clan dels Zhao Family is an important, strong, and brave text to perform in our days.

On one hand, Junxiang's text opens the doors to Chinese drama, almost to its beginnings. It opens a window to a world we do not know and that the majority of our audience does not know. A new world for us, and at the same time so old that it impresses when you calculate all its greatness and age.

On the other hand, The Orphan tells a story of vengeance that leads the protagonists through a world of extremely high tragedy and epic. This also attracts me. It reminds me of Sophocles, it reminds me of Mouawad... it reminds me that humans invented tragedy to explain our own existence.

The characters come before the audience, introduce themselves, and with all solemnity tell their story. Little by little, we immerse ourselves in it, we enter their lives. It is a different way of telling a story, it has a deep flavor that evokes scenes from Shakespeare, Sophocles, Brecht, or Mouawad.

Cheng Ying, the protagonist, must take charge of the education of the last survivor of a clan, the Zhaos, who have been exterminated by the villainous Du’an Gu. Ying must sacrifice his own son for the lineage that represents all the noblest, and at the same time simplest, values. The lineage of good men and just rulers, who follow the good codes of the distant Chinese empire. And this is its great drama and this is its great virtue.

The actors will inhabit a space with four sides, with the audience surrounding them, in a new and risky arrangement of the Teatre Romea, so that the theater reaches from all points, and so that the story is close and direct. In summary, to make possible what La Perla 29 seeks, a special way of meeting actors, the audience, and stories.

Oriol Broggi