Q: Since two years ago, when Lan Ling closed up the drama workshop, it seems to have stayed silent. What has been the reason?

Chuo: Originally we closed the drama workshop because the landlord wanted to raise the rent and we couldn't afford a rent of NT$80,000 per month, and we couldn't find a similarly suitable location, so the only thing to do was to close up temporarily. But this way was also better. In the past the drama workshop was looked after entirely by Shih-chieh and myself, and we felt like a mother and father working hard to earn money to take care of the family, and we had a large number of "dependents" crying out of hunger. We were afraid that we couldn't feed them, but also were afraid we would be overprotective, so that the children would not mature. Now, after stopping temporarily, we can turn over this responsibility.

Chin: One reason we couldn't pay the rent was because the Council for Cultural Planning and Development no longer assigned Lan Ling to undertake the "The Performing Artist Preparatory Training Class." So Lan Ling immediately faced financial pressure. But even more important was that for these past ten years we haven't had a single rest. In fact, we are quite tired. For creative artists, resting from time to time is essential.

Q: Many people currently active in drama, such as Li Kuo-hsiu of the Screen Theater or Liu Ching- min of Unique Theater were formerly major players at Lan Ling. Is it possible that over the whole ten years Lan Ling never thought to establish a professional company in order to tap the potential of these talented people?

Chin: When Lan Ling had just been established, there was certainly a great deal of talent around. But to speak truthfully, because we couldn't pay salaries, we had no professional performers who belonged exclusively to us. Also at that time Chuo Ming and I had a common idea that Taiwan still did not have the right conditions for establishing a professional drama company. For one thing, Lan Ling's own writing and direction and actors were still in a stage of learning, and were simply not up to professional standards. For another, a "professional" company seems to imply a "commercial" drama company. But the way Lan Ling did things was onl y to put out one or two performances each year. This wouldn't be enoughmto keep a professional company alive. It would have been necessary todevelop new things, and have a large number of programs. This would have been very difficult as far as I'm concerned. I believe that you can't rush artistic creativity, nor force yourself to "serve the market." This would just lead to alienation and a change in the nature of the relationship between myself and my work. This also includes the problem of inadequate skilled personnel. If Lan Ling had several teams of directors, writers, and actors, perhaps it could have been pulled off. Today, ten years later, the audience for drama has increased a great deal, and audience tastes have opened up. There is space for survival for professional drama companies.

Chuo: In fact, when Lan Ling had just been established, we had no real concept of commercial drama. In order to appeal to a broader base, our ticket prices were very low. In Taipei, sales were OK, but this was impractical in the center and south of Taiwan. Sometimes sales would only be one-third or one-fifth of Taipei. Add to this that artistic director Wu Ching-chi had come out of a background in education, and that Lan Ling wanted to establish itself as a small experimental seedbed company, so that as a result Lan Ling was always vacillating between education and commercialism. Later Preparatory Training Class operated in cooperation with the CCPD, as well as several other short-term training classes, brought the center of attention gradually over to the development of students, which diverted our attention. Moreover, given the fact that there were not that many performances in which the first generation of actors in the company could act, and many went abroad to study and learned different things, it was very natural that in the end we would go our separate ways.

Q: You just said that in the latter period Lan Ling put a lot of effort into training. But, as was the case with Cloud Gate, what left the deepest impression on the audience was still the first generation of actors. It seems the new generation of students is not especially outstanding. What do you think?

Chuo: This is related to the Preparatory Class system. The CCPD ruled that each student could only attend one class (one year) in order to give everyone a chance. In fact, many students had just gotten involved, and could not use their bodies properly, and could not relax--not to mention doing a full-blown drama. So the training was at best "preschool education."

Chin: Perhaps you just can't see the fruits of the training overnight. This was a setting down of roots, and I don't think it will have been meaningless. Already 500 short- or long-term students have passed through Lan Ling.

Q: Two years ago, when martial law had just been lifted, there was a vogue of "vanguard drama troupes," which were mainly university clubs whose performances directly discussed social issues. Some people said that these vanguard companies scared away some of the audience that had been cultivated during the Lan Ling period.

Chuo: I think that audiences that truly enjoy drama will absolutely not decline because of the small companies. Moreover, it is not necessarily the case that the audience for Lan Ling and that for the vanguard companies is identical.

Chin: Perhaps when the wave of vanguard small companies was getting under way, many people were still not ready, and hastily thought that "bad money will chase out good money," and this frightened some of the audience for drama. In fact, many younger people who participated in the drama had either student or friendship relations with Lan Ling. We encourage d them. But because of Lan Ling's liberal tradition, we did not take it upon ourselves to give them any suggestions. Of course, sometimes when I would see a certain kind of arbitrariness in their performances, naturally I would feel unhappy along with the audience.

But if you say that if there was no period of allowing small troupes to spring up all over that Lan Ling might still be around, well, perhaps this is true. But if there were no Spring and Autumn period or Warring States, maybe the Chou dynasty would still be around, but what would be the meaning in that? Fundamentally, I'm not concerned about this era or that era, about who is successful or who fails. Just think back to the beginning. All the way up until 1984, before the Performance Workshop was established, Lan Ling had always maintained a monopoly situation and there were no competitors. Wasn't that really too bad?

Q: Lastly, can I ask you to talk about your feelings about the last ten years, as a kind of summing up?

Chin: I will always remember in a novel, in the end when the fawn dies, the little boy asks, "Why do I have to be so sad, Mama?" The mother replies, "Child, this is growing up." Life is bittersweet, and complicated. The life I hope for is not that everything be a piece of cake, but that there continually be growth. That's enough for me.

Chuo: I believe that Lan Ling's appearance was a passing phenomenon. I often have said, as early as more than ten years ago, that while Taiwan was still a cultural wasteland, there were three large trees that continued to grow: Cloud Gate, Ya Yin, and Lan Ling. These trees grew taller and taller, but discovered that the nutrients in the soil below were inadequate, nor was there enough sunlight, so that the grass and the bushes below could not grow. So Lan Ling, as well as Cloud Gate, cut away their shade branches to keep from taking all of the nutrients and shading the sun. Today, what the great trees want is to permit the small ones to flourish and become a forest.

[Picture Caption]

Chin Shih-chieh (left) and Chuo Ming (right) have temporarily left the stage, but are still concerned about every new development in theater in Taiwan. (photos by Huang Lili)