Класс, у китайцев видать денег хватило...
Les Miserables debuts in China
CNN July 18, 2002 Posted: 10:57 PM EDT (0257 GMT)
SHANGHAI, China (Reuters) -- In a hushed auditorium in Shanghai's People's Square, hundreds of well-dressed Chinese hold their breath as an actor mounts a revolving barricade, plants a billowing red flag and strikes up a song about revolution.
A chorus of comrades -- many of them students -- join the call to arms, only to die in a volley of bullets from the army offstage. The parallels with China's recent past -- the 1949 communist revolution and the Tiananmen Square student-led pro-democracy movement -- are undeniable. But what really strikes a chord with the audience in the packed, multi-million-dollar theatre in China's chic commercial hub as the smash musical "Les Miserables" makes its Shanghai debut is the sheer Broadway magic of it all. The audience of business folk and students was bowled over by the songs, the costumes and the sets at "Les Mis," which conquered more than 30 countries before becoming the first Broadway production to enter China's tightly sealed cultural world. "It was amazing, the costumes, the music, everything," gushed 15-year-old high school student Huang Xiaoyan at a week-night performance after the July launch of the production. Her classmate Hong Yumei pumped her head up and down in agreement as the pair headed for a souvenir stand stocked with CDs and T-shirts. The musical, adapted from Victor Hugo's tale of street urchins, students and reformed thieves plotting a new future for France, had powerful echoes with China's own turbulent history.
cnn report