New forms of communication such as short videos and live broadcasts are bringing new vitality to traditional opera culture.
On the afternoon of April 14, at the Meilanfang Grand Theater in Beijing, Douyin Live announced the launch of the "DOU has a good show" plan.
The plan will help the opera industry in an all-round way and inherit and carry forward the traditional opera culture by optimizing product capabilities, strengthening traffic support, creating online programs, and providing professional training.
Han Shangyou, vice president of Douyin, said that Douyin Live hopes to help at least 10 academies and 1,000 professional opera actors build a second online theater in the next year.
On the same day, Zhang Yao, vice president of the Chinese Academy of Opera, Wang Kui, president of the Chinese Opera Society, and Lin Lin, vice president of the National Peking Opera Company, also attended the event and delivered speeches.
At the same time, the Chinese Opera Society, the Chinese Opera Academy, and the Mei Lanfang Grand Theater joined the "DOU Has a Good Show" program as art direction units.
800,000 opera performances a year, Douyin live broadcast into a new stage
Repeated epidemics have impacted the offline performance market, and more and more offline performances, including opera, have begun to explore "cloud models" such as online live broadcasts.
According to media reports, online performances by young actors at the Tianjin People's Art Theater provide the audience with cultural food; the well-known play "Dragon and Phoenix" by the National Peking Opera Company has also tried online paid live broadcasts for two consecutive years.
Data shows that in 2021, Douyin's traditional culture live broadcasts will increase by 1 million over the previous year.
Take the most popular traditional opera as an example. In the past year, more than 800,000 opera live broadcasts were broadcast, with an average of more than 3,200 viewers per show.
Every live opera is equivalent to a medium-sized performance.
Han Shangyou, vice president of Douyin, said that due to the rapid growth of traditional culture-related live broadcasts, more and more young people are participating in them, and the online popularity has begun to feed back offline theaters. Douyin Live Broadcasting hopes to set up a stage for more people to approach and feel Performance art.
"Due to the artistic accumulation and development potential of opera, we decided to choose opera performance as a priority support area." Han Shangyou believes that Douyin live broadcast can bring new stages, new income and new exchanges to the traditional opera industry.
"First of all, live broadcast can overcome the limitation of space and create a new stage, allowing more people and more convenient access to good opera content; secondly, live broadcast gifts, paid performances and other forms can bring benefits to opera actors who shoulder the mission of inheriting traditional culture. New income; finally, fans and actors who love opera can communicate with each other in the live broadcast room through Lianmai and other methods, and learn and progress together." Han Shangyou said.
(On the afternoon of April 14, Han Shangyou, vice president of Douyin, released the "DOU has a good show" plan)
Li Shujian, president of Henan Henan Opera House, also affirmed the new value that live broadcast brought to the opera industry during the epidemic.
He said that in the past two years, due to the epidemic, the offline performances of various troupes have decreased, and it is difficult to guarantee their income.
Many opera actors from grassroots troupes have low incomes, and the rewards they receive live on video platforms such as Douyin are netizens' recognition of the actors, which not only supplements their income, but also helps to inherit opera.
"Roughly two-fifths of the folk opera actors I know are doing Douyin live broadcasts. It is conceivable that the platform has provided many 're-employment' positions for our 'forced laid-off' private actors." Chen Yu, a Yue Opera actor from Xiangshan, Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, said.
In 2020, due to the impact of the epidemic, the number of offline performances decreased, so she tried to sing Yue Opera live on Douyin.
Now, the income from the live broadcast room has become the source of her livelihood.
"DOU has a good show" plan to help the opera industry in an all-round way
At the meeting, Song Ying, the director of the "DOU has a good show" program, introduced that Douyin Live will support the opera industry in three directions in the future:
First of all, Douyin Live will optimize product capabilities, open paid performances and multi-camera synchronous live broadcast functions for actors and academies in need and with professional performance capabilities, provide exclusive gifts for fans of the live broadcast room, and create an online and offline integrated performance experience.
Secondly, in order to solve the problem of insufficient exposure of opera anchors, Douyin has invested more than 100 million traffic resources in the first phase of the live broadcast, and launched various operational activities such as "DOU to sing a good show".
At the same time, the platform will also cooperate with famous opera masters to create a column of "Famous Actor DOU Comes to Sing", and cooperate with the ace opera IP "Liyuanchun" to create online programs to jointly promote the art of opera.
Finally, Douyin invited professional teachers from the China Academy of Chinese Opera as consultants to provide training guidance to help drama anchors improve their professional standards; at the same time, Douyin will also provide official operation docking, live broadcast training and other operational services for Chinese opera troupes and opera actors.
It is worth noting that the above support policies will favor the troupes and actors of endangered operas.
Relying on the above plan, Douyin Live launched recruitment for national opera troupes and professional opera actors, hoping to help at least 10 academies and 1,000 professional opera actors build a second theater in the next year.
At present, troupes/actors who meet the registration conditions can search for "DOU has a good show" or "DOU to sing a good show" on Douyin to find relevant topics to participate in the registration.
(Text/Wang Lei)