BEIJING — Can a Chinese man successfully portray the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on stage? Should he darken his face and change his features to do it? Should American notions of political correctness determine how one of China's premier theatrical troupes stages a play?
Those are some treacherous cultural minefields, almost comically filled with opportunities for racial, ethnic and nationalistic missteps. So perhaps the most remarkable thing about "Passages of Martin Luther King," a Sino-American production that opened Thursday in Beijing, is that the producers, cast and crew are not only still speaking to one another but also holding hands and singing "We Shall Overcome."
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Friday June 29, 2007 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 1 inches; 40 words Type of Material: Correction
MLK in China: An article in the June 22 Calendar section on a play in China about the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. said that producer Caitrin McKiernan was on a Fulbright fellowship in Taiwan. She was in mainland China.
Mounting this production by China's National Theater has been a case study in the frictions, insights and surprising breakthroughs that can occur when one culture attempts to refract another through the lens of theater.
"That's the real beauty and challenge of the play -- how do you translate Martin Luther King?" said Caitrin McKiernan, the 27-year-old American co-producer. "Martin Luther King talked about 'being a drum major for justice.' How do you succinctly say\o7 that\f7?
"I don't think we're going to resolve all this, but it's a start. And I hope this play goes beyond Beijing, beyond China. I want the play to be performed all over the world."
OK, but first things first.
This year marks the centennial of the first modern drama performed by Chinese actors: A version of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" produced by Chinese students in Tokyo in 1907. Different versions of the Harriet Beecher Stowe story were produced in Shanghai later that year and in Beijing in the early 1960s.
The "Uncle Tom" plays, still revered in China for their role in the creation of modern theater, were among a number of productions in China built around black characters, including "Drums on the Equator," another '60s production about Patrice Lumumba's independence movement in the Congo.
And in every case, the Chinese actors appeared in black makeup, with their features altered to suggest African or African American characteristics. William Sun, a playwright who is vice president of the Shanghai Theater Academy and has written extensively about foreign images in Chinese theater, said the Chinese saw it as the only authentic way to play the roles, much as they adopted "white" makeup and features to portray Europeans in such plays as Ibsen's "A Doll's House."
