It is not often we get a real glimpse into Chinese culture. Ai Wei Wei is one of the few artists who has achieved global recognition and of course there are many world famous Chinese classical musicians, but most play from the European canon. There are garish grand touring spectacles purporting to show Chinese culture but I suspect these shows are as relevant to the true China as Game of Thrones is to medieval history.
The amazing spectacle that was Star Returning, and presented under the banner of the Holland Festival, provided a rare insight into the contemporary performing arts in a part of the world that is still largely unknown.
Hard to categorise, and all the better for that, I suppose Star Returning was more opera than anything else. There was no real dancing, although there was some choreographed movement, and there was virtually no spoken work. Had there been, we would not have understood it as the director made the unusual, but I think praiseworthy decision, of not having surtitles. This was a controversial judgement but a brave one. If you are reading the surtitles you are not watching the performance and if you don’t want the surtitles they are a huge distraction, either flickering away just in your field of vision or forcing you to read them despite yourself. So, what with that and the lack of any programme or documentation, it was hard to follow what was going on, but that didn’t matter one little bit. Star Returning, created by Samoan theatre director, choreographer and artist Lemi Ponifasio, was a visual and sensual feast, a piece of extraordinary and original theatre that one felt privileged to have seen.
The show was a sequence of cameos offering an insight into the ancient Yi culture, mainly through song. The Yi people are the sixth-largest ethnic minority in China, with a population of nearly ten million and a history going back 3,000 years. According to Yi legend, all life originated in water and water was created by snowmelt, which, as it dripped down, created a creature called the Ni. The Ni gave birth to all life. Ni is another name for the Yi people.
The vast stage was in total darkness throughout, lit only by a neon strip stretching the entire width of the stage where the footlights used to be. A pale spotlight would come up on each performer as they entered. In the opening sequence a woman in a long black dress emerged from the shadows and slowly picked up an astronaut’s helmet which was lying on the floor. In slow motion she turned the helmet until a stream of sand trickled from it like an hour glass, creating a tiny cone on a mat at her feet. Another identically dressed woman appeared, folded the mat, clutched it to her bosom and started to sing. To call it singing is perhaps an understatement. The voice, and those of the other singers, was like nothing I have heard before, the only thing I could remotely liken it to is yodelling. The vocal range and power, one suspects, could pierce armour plating at a range of fifty meters and, had they been aware of it, would have forced the NATO leaders meeting across town to sit up and pay attention.
There were sequences involving projections on the giant screen forming the back of the stage and several ensemble pieces, a notable one being when ten of them sat cross-legged at the edge of the stage miming what looked like a meal and another as the entire company trooped across the stage under black umbrellas. A lot of the action took place in slow motion in the shadows, giving an eerie, ephemeral feel to the proceedings.
For the final sequence an astronaut stood silently, sans helmet, until the company, now all in white, appeared, gave him his head-gear and he floated off into a watery space.
This was total theatre the like of which would be hard to surpass and a performance which, I for one, was glad to have witnessed. Michael Hasted at Amare in The Hague, 25th June 2025
Photos by Ben Mrad Bayrem
