By NICK FRISCH
Teresa Teng, the first empress of Chinese pop, is beloved by one-fifth of mankind, and virtually unknown by the rest. But that may be about to change. A Chinese-produced, Broadway-style musical about the late Taiwanese singer's impact on mainland China opens in Hong Kong next week. And this is a show that could travel not just full of the bittersweet songs her fans expect, it also packs some eye-opening social commentary about today's China.
An impressive creative team is responsible for the production, performed in Mandarin with English and Chinese subtitles. Several showbiz veterans, including director Joey McKneely (last year's "West Side Story" revival) and bandleader Daryl Waters ("Memphis"), have thrown their talents behind "Love U, Teresa." Li Dun, the mainland producer who steered a hit musical in Beijing last year, "Butterflies," provided financial and logistical muscle. At HK$30 million ($3.9 million), the musical is already the most expensive ever to be mounted in China.
But at a preview performance last Friday night in Dongguan, 60 miles north of Hong Kong, lavish sets and smooth execution are not the biggest surprise. After all, the 2008 Olympics and this year's Shanghai Expo featured dazzling depictions of a "harmonious society." The real shock is that unlike those sound-and-light extravaganzas, "Teresa" is a show with soul.
The musical's creators use nostalgia for the simple values extolled in Teng's songs as a vehicle to expose the darker side of the reform era that has unfolded since her heyday in the 1970s and early '80s. Ms. Teng, who died in 1995 at the age of 42, was originally forbidden fruit for China's young. Taiwan's ruling Kuomintang used Ms. Teng's music in anti-Communist propaganda broadcasts. She was banned as "decadent" on the mainland, but that only increased the popularity of her recordings, which circulated like samizdat.
The show's protagonist is Zhou Mengjun, a country boy born in the '80s trying to make it as a singer in Shanghai. His reconnection with Teng's music parallels a voyage of self-discovery. One flashback shows how his parents meet: Exiled to the countryside as part of the Cultural Revolution, they crowd around a contraband tape recorder to listen to "The Place of First Love."
Through Mengjun, the musical explores the rise of urban-rural, generational and gender tensions. In one scene, the protagonist's love interest is dragged off for a meeting with an "investor," clearly dreading the pressure to become his ernai, or mistress. Shanghai's nouveaux riches prowl a set that looks just like the chic Xintiandi district in that city. The women's pouty scowls are pitch-perfect for any mainland nightclub.
But the showstopper audacious both in its depiction and design is the demolition of a ramshackle Shanghai home, as the residents are forced to flee. To see expensive, whiz-bang stage effects deployed around such a sensitive issue is surprising, to say the least. On the building's side is painted the infamous, and ubiquitous, character chai, meaning "demolish." The word represents corrupt land deals and forced evictions to millions of ordinary Chinese.
Mengjun's struggle is the story of hundreds of millions of Chinese who have migrated to the cities. "That really spoke to me," says Zhou Jianhua, a theater security guard, after the show. "I am from Hunan Province, and I came to these coastal regions to earn money for a better life." His two colleagues from other interior provinces, Jiangxi and Hubei, nod knowingly. Teng's music was the soundtrack for this generation's formative years. Mr. Zhou breaks into a broad smile: "I remember my older sister listening to those tapes right when China was starting to open up. I like the music, but she really loves it."
The production is equally creative in its use of that music, with some of the classics nimbly reprised as rock 'n' roll or tango. The songs might sound superficial on first listen, but the newcomers will come to understand how Ms. Teng's simplicity beguiled crowds night after night. "She was the first Chinese ever to appear in the biggest venues in New York, L.A., Las Vegas," Frank Teng, her brother, explains. "She did a great deal of charity work. Her songs are always about love, cherishing love."
"Love" is a theme used and abused in many a production, and Ms. Teng's songs could have lent themselves to a saccharine nostalgia-fest with little substance. Perhaps the detachment of a Taiwanese perspective gave depth to the script of Wang Hui-ling, whose credits include "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and "Lust, Caution." The resultant mix of pop escapism and realism is reminiscent of Fox's hit show "Glee."
But it is the professional Broadway polish that keeps the viewer's attention. A solid band overseen by Tony winner Daryl Waters keeps the story and songs moving along. "The one bad thing about [Stephen] Sondheim is . . . this idea that shows always have to be all clever and intellectual," director Joey McKneely tells me. Nominated for Tonys in choreography, he has successfully transitioned to directing. "The key question is, did you enjoy it? Did you have fun?"
"Right now, the biggest problem we have is a lack of good Chinese musicals," producer Li Dan tells a roomful of reporters before the show. "We have some musicals produced in China but they have," he pauses to smile slightly, "aesthetic problems." No longer. "Love U, Teresa" wears its kitsch with a winning smile and even has a message or two. And I didn't look at my watch once.
Mr. Frisch is a free-lance journalist based in Hong Kong. He was a 2009-2010 Fulbright Fellow at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing.
