Hard act to follow in staging a return

Twenty years after his play Three Sisters Waiting for Godot flopped, director Lin Zhaohua is seeking to revive his work for modern audiences. Chen Nan reports.

In 1998, one of the nation's most renowned theater directors, Lin Zhaohua, premiered his play, Three Sisters Waiting for Godot, in which he combined Russian playwright Anton Chekhov's Three Sisters with Irish playwright Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot.

The director put the two scripts together and explored topics like "endless waiting" and "the vision of a happy future". However, the reception of the play from audiences left him disappointed.

Half of the seats at Beijing's Capital Theater, where the play was staged, were empty. The play, which was scheduled to be staged over 30 shows, only ran for 12. Since he couldn't find investment, Lin and Yi Liming, the stage designer for the play, used their own money to produce Three Sisters Waiting for Godot. Regarding the play's commercial failure, both Lin and Yi bore the cost of the financial losses.

Nearly 20 years later, Lin has decided to revive Three Sisters Waiting for Godot. The play will be staged in Shanghai on Thursday and Friday, and will tour other cities in 2018, including Beijing, Chongqing and Wuhan.

"Success or failure, I don't really think about it. I cannot remember why I was so persistent about making this play back then when nobody wanted to invest in it. The play hasn't been staged for about two decades and I want audiences to see it again," says Lin, 81.

"Though the play is full of absurdity, it reflects reality. For example, the two people wait for someone named Godot. In real life, waiting is an everyday occurrence, like waiting for a bus or waiting for a show to start," Li adds.

In the latest version, audiences will see the stage design made by Yi in 1998, which has water flowing onstage resembling the image of a lonely island.

In the 1998 version, Three Sisters Waiting for Godot gathered veteran Chinese actors Pu Cunxin and Chen Jianbin to play the two men, Vladimir and Estragon, who wait for the arrival of Godot while joking around and arguing. Chinese actresses Gong Lijun, Chen Jin and Lin Cong played the three sisters Olga, Masha and Irina.

In the latest version, Lin invited young Chinese actors to take part, and among them is Zhang Ruojun, who plays the role of Vladimir. He says that he saw pictures of Zhang first and after talking to him, the young actor's voice impressed him.

The 30-year-old, who graduated from the Beijing Film Academy, is one of China's most successful young actors. Best known for playing heartthrob roles in movies and TV series, Zhang has about 15 million followers on his Sina Weibo account, a major microblog platform in China. Despite his tight schedule, Zhang gave the play the nod because he is a big fan of Lin.