Cry to Heaven: a Play to Celebrate One Hundred Years of Chinese Spoken Drama by Nick Rongjun Yu

Abstract

Yutian (Cry to Heaven) is the third Chinese stage adaptation of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin between 1907 and 2007. The first, Heinu yutian lu (Black Slave’s Cry to Heaven) by Zeng Xiaogu, was staged by Chinese students in Tokyo in 1907; the second, Heinu hen (Regret of the Black Slaves) by Ouyang Yuqian, was mounted as part of the fiftieth anniversary of the first production; and the third, Yutian (Cry to Heaven), commemorated the hundredth anniversary of Chinese spoken drama (huaju) in 2007. Each adaptation has a different focus that reflects the social, political, and cultural conditions of its time, and together the works provide a historical view of the development of Chinese spoken drama. The most recent production, by Nick Rongjun Yu, juxtaposes one hundred years of dramatic history with scenes from Uncle Tom’s Cabin, making the American slaves’ struggle to gain freedom a metaphor for Chinese dramatists’ efforts to achieve their own.