The QQ penguins are adorable. Beijing Opera is adorable as well. Beijing Opera QQ penguins are most adorable.

You can download them as png and ico files from megapoxy.net here: [PNG] | [ICO]
For the more adventurous: they come from here.

Forget the Dalmatian. Welcome the Newfoundland. Meet him this Saturday on CCTV11.

Strictly for fun. Most likely many of you has seen this video already, I haven’t.

Guy demonstrates ten regional accents of China – in English. At Taiwan I almost fell off my chair laughing.

Refresh the page if it doesn’t load.

And when I thought now there’s really nothing that can beat the beagle version… a DALMATIAN shows up!

Splendid! Brilliant!

(updated, originally posted on Dec 14, 2011) Do you still remember this? So this it was, a fun little show:

→ 京剧《白蛇新传》New Legend of the White Snake  [DOWNLOAD] 118MB

Highlight: at 16:10 Fu Xiru sings yueju (Shaoxing opera).
Nowadays I frequently see Fu Xiru, but not Zhao Qun. I hope everything is OK at home.

Why the enthusiastic cross-dressing? It’s Fang Xu’s newest crazy New Year’s Eve project? Or something bigger? We’ll see soon.

Fu Xiru looks charming as Bai Suzhen…

Pregnant skirt and stubble

Half Fang Xu, half Xiaoqing

I added the download links of the “reversed” Long Feng Cheng Xiang to the program list post (5th dragon) – I was laughing my pants off!
I hoarded some great stage- and backstage photos too, [DOWNLOAD] (40MB) and enjoy them!

The play was following the original script, just some funny lines and props were added.

Jin Xiquan expressed his worries lately that he slowly gets too old for massively acrobatic roles, jingju profession severely lacks wuxiaosheng performers and theaters don’t intend to stage plays like Ba Da Chui - at least in this half-comedy version of this classic he could show he’s still in good condition.

Fu Xiru as Sun Shangxiang deliberately falls out of his role for the sake of a joke:

“Aren’t you Jin Xiquan by chance?”

An Ping looks and sings as qingyi much better than I thought!

Wang Peiyu removes her weaponry: big halberd, plastic laser sword, space gun… and answers “his” sweetheart’s call. (The phone call is cited from an iconic sketch of famous comedian Zhao Benshan, thus much more funny for Chinese audience.)

“Hello! Meal’s ready? ‘kay, I tell the Empress I killed Liu Bei, brb Honey!”

This imperial court was to my liking: all palace maids were boys. Chen Lin and Hao Shuai are both .

Wang Xilong, Lan Tian, Chen Lin, Hao Shuai, Hao Jie, Chen Shengjie, Wang Dun, Zhu Heji

No chance to recognize: young and pretty wudan Yang Yanan.

Yan Qinggu is pro in any role…

Have you seen such a beautiful Zhou Yu before?

Photos: 秦钟wzl, 刘骏, 卢雯2011, 蕙蕙83, 乌托邦帮

Videos of the trunk sealing performance, aired yesterday, appeared online surprisingly fast.

Downloads:
CNTV: [1] | [2]
ed2k: [COPY]

(1)《戏迷家庭六》Sixth edition of the Family of Theater Fans show.

Year of the Dragon is close, so the theme was Long Feng Cheng Xiang (The Auspicious Dragon and Phoenix). Last year Wang Yan was playing the flute in bunny mask, this year we could enjoy Zhu Qiang as Empress Dowager.

An interesting part is at 11:28, Zhu Shihui (朱世慧), famous chou is singing Qi school excerpt, I liked that. At 15:12, Xu Mengke is doing the same – well, obviously Zhu Shihui has much more stage experience.

Zhu Shihui excels, but the Dowager falls asleep

Wusheng Chang Dong’s (常东) scene starting at 19:25 was entertaining. After the strict security check, he’s informing the Dowager about the happenings by performing some spectacular spear action.

An Ping and Li Hong’s Chisangzhen in reversed setup was interesting, however, I’m happy both of them stick to their original profession. By the way, if it weren’t written there, I would have never figured out it’s Li Hong under the Bao make-up.

Snatching the wig of an elderly lady isn’t a good idea whatsoever

After Song Xiaochuan and Bao Fei’s Tale of the White Snake excerpt Shi Yihong was singing Shaoxing opera Prince of the Desert – she surely won’t be a rival for Wang Junan or Zhao Zhigang, but wasn’t bad at all.

This show always has a “guest star”, last year Ye Shaolan was invited, this year Zhang Xuejin came surrounded by disciples. Their little “orchestra” was really cute, Zhang Xuejin and Song Haoyu were playing qin, Mu Yu debuted as drummer, Gao Tong and Zhao Hua as gong and cymbal players. They accompanied Mei school qingyis Zhang Xinyue and Wang Yi, who performed a Ma school laosheng excerpt: I liked them both! (Starts around 44:35.)

Zhang Xuejin is still handsome. Mu Yu gained weight (again).

Scene of the “five laosheng Sun Shangxiang” was a real surprise.
I thought that Fu Xiru, who has a comparatively high pitched voice, will excel, but actually he was the weakest link with his shot at Cheng school singing.
Du Zhe wasn’t feminine in his movement, but his singing was very nice, stylish.
I liked Yang Shaopeng too! Without costume, there’s nothing in that boy that even shallowly resembles a girl, yet he was a pretty Shangxiang with a really good voice.

My favorite of the five was undoubtedly Ling Ke! Delicate, beautiful, subtle.

Tianjin’s young laosheng Ling Ke - pretty!

After one hour, Shang Changrong made his appearance with giant calligraphy brush. After painting a scroll he performed an excerpt from one of his childhood favorites, Liu Baoquan’s (刘宝全) jingyun dagu Da Xixiang (大西厢).
As a special highlight, Ouyang Zhongshi appeared on the screen and painted a traditional “dragon” character live.

龍

After some happy audience singing, the show ends.

(2) 京剧《大白水滩》Big White Water Beach

Next program was the long edition of jingju White Water Beach, with lots of martial action and handsome wusheng boys. Everything goes in order until 58:30 (second video)…. I don’t want to spoil the fun, so I just tell you if you’re fond of Latino rhythms, you surely will like the next two minutes.

Supersexy Feng Yun seduces the attractive executioner…

CCTV11 Theater In the Air TV program - “Trunk sealing plays” 《戏迷家庭》,《大白水滩》

Date: 16 January 2012, 11:20 UTC
Description: The first one is the annual “Theater Fanatics” show with lots of reversed roles, parodies and nonsense. The second one is the “funny glasses” performance, mentioned here.

Look at these faces…

A highlight of the first show: laosheng qingyis. Do you recognize everyone? I needed help. (Answer in the first comment.)

Photos: Xiao Hanqiu

(updated on 10 January) These stage photos are awesome. 

Wang Daxing (王大兴): “I…won’t…laugh…”

Chang’an Grand Theater held its “trunk sealing play” today – for my greatest pleasure, it’s featuring many funny glasses! I collect photos with crazy props.

In former days, before the Lunar New Year performers sealed the costume chests. The last performance held before this was called fengxiangxi (封箱戏), “chest sealing play”.

The tradition is continued till present day, and these performances are usually funny, humorous plays.

Feng Yun (冯蕴), Huang Ju (黄臣)

Xu Mengke (徐孟珂)

Douzhiji. I haven’t seen Jin Xiquan’s version before. These face expressions are hilarious.

“I buwnt my twongue!”