"Communities didn't have any fixed scope back in the old days. It all depended on the territory belonging to a prominent person like a mayor, a temple head or a landowner," explains Yu Yuan-keng, executive director of the Little Theater Workshop. In general, however, before the introduction of Western culture and architecture, communities in Taiwan's rural villages consisted of little neighborhoods marked off by bamboo fences. Villagers congregated at a temple gate, by an intersection or under a shade tree to chat and exchange news and information. When a play or an opera was going to be put on, posters weren't needed--news got around by word of mouth. The theater was a regular part of daily life and an occasion for social intercourse.

Since the advent of television, theater in Taiwan has become a one-way mode of communication, where people in the audience watch the show on their own and no longer interact. The outdoor stages of an earlier day have given way to vulgar, flashy song-and-dance shows and decorated electronic sound trucks, which are growing in exponential proportions.

Making it new: Can traditional folk theater be combined with modern concepts and techniques to once again attract the attention of the public and reenter the life of the people?

The Little Theater Workshop, formed under the auspices of the Ilan County Cultural Center with the support of the Council for Cultural Planning and Development, was born out of just this spirit of exploration. The president and executive director, Chiu Kun-liang and Yu Yuan-keng, a drama teacher and student from the National Institutes of the Arts who are both from Ilan themselves, hope the workshop can bring in talented local performers and create a "community culture" with a local humanistic background.

During the yearlong program, which started in March of last year, the apprentice members, who ranged in background from truck drivers to elementary school pupils, studied traditional forms of Chinese opera such as Taiwanese opera, Pei Kuanopera and Ssu Ping opera and received training in Western directing, acting and stage techniques.

The midterm and final report cards they handed over were Komalan Opera, a Taiwanese opera that tells the story of how the Han Chinese and the Pingpu aborigines a century ago changed from opposition to mutual acceptance, and Walking Theater, a stage play that centers around the life of a veteran Pei Kuan opera performer and thus contains a large amount of traditional singing, reciting and acting.

Walking Theater opens with a traditional Pei Kuan hsieh-tou (fight with weapons) and shows the fate of the genre under various eras of government rule before finally relating the origin of the play's name: Following the construction of the Taipei-Ilan freeway and the corresponding influx of sex merchants who bought up traditional theaters to ply their trade, veteran Pei Kuan performers came up with the clever idea of putting a theater on wheels so it could "walk" and be taken to various localities. The play itself was taken on a tour of several towns and temples in Ilan County, providing an eye opening new experience for older people--outdoor theater with a difference.

Ilan author Li Tung writes feelingly: "Their acting may still be a bit raw and unpolished, and there are flaws in the continuity, but compared with the lackadaisical performance of some professional troupes that are stuck in a rut and never try anything new, their sincerity and concentration are all the more fresh and moving."

When Walking Theater completed its run, the yearlong plan was over. But the workshop's management didn't "take a walk" along with it. Instead, they have thrown themselves into another even bigger project--setting up an Ilan Theater Company under the Ilan County Cultural Center. The company has obtained the support of the county government and is set to become the first county level professional theater troupe in the Taiwan area.

The home of Taiwanese opera: Ilan has long been known as the home of Taiwanese opera, and the new company will focus on that, although it will also feature Pei Kuan, Ssu Ping and Tiao Chung Kuei opera. The company is built around the Hanyang Taiwan Opera Troupe, but it is hoped that the career security it will provide as a professional troupe will attract younger performers as well. Some veteran artists and National Heritage Award winners have been engaged to pass on their skills.

Training will proceed along two lines: on the one hand, carrying on the traditional heritage and polishing skills through constant performance to ensure that the fruits of that heritage are preserved; and on the other, seeking creativity and innovation by bringing in workers from contemporary theater and stimulating older and younger artists to create new methods of acting and new plays that reflect local life.

So will the original members of the Little Theater Workshop be able to stage their new pieces again? And will they continue to pursue the path that they have tentatively begun to explore? Yu Yuan-keng confesses that he is currently so wrapped up in forming the new company that he won't be able to create new works until that is finished. Much as he loves traditional outdoor theater, he is planning appropriate ways to educate audiences intheater-going: by setting up a circus tent, for instance, and charging a fee for refreshments, so that audiences will treat the theater as something more special than they had in the past.

At the same time that he is busy forming the new company, Yu continues to engage in field work, searching for veteran artists and arranging for joint performances and master classes. He also visits temples and makes suggestions on how arts workers can help in temple fairs, by making slight adjustments to processions, for instance, so that they are more interesting to watch or by providing explanations of colorful local details at rest stops along the way, forming a kind of mobile classroom.

"The cultural ecology has to develop at various levels," Yu says, "just like the biosphere. Uniformity spells death. We have so many artistic resources available now--like abundant water resources--all we need to do is channel them properly, and we'll reap enormous rewards."

The pride of Ilan theater lies just here: being blessed with abundant traditional resources and a group of sons and daughters dedicated to carrying on the heritage and creating anew.

[Picture Caption]

The Little Theater Workshop performed in open-air theaters, hoping to revive Taiwan's tradition of community theater. (photo by Huang Li-li)

Walking Theater is a moving tale about the life of a Pei Kuan performer. (photo courtesy of the Little Theater Workshop)

Walking Theater is a moving tale about the life of a Pei Kuan performer. （photo courtesy of the Little Theater Workshop）