学进去

For Wang Pengfei and Tian Xiaowei, Central Academy of Drama graduates, William Shakespeare’s works were a must-read during their college days. After graduation, they have been working together on Chinese plays with Wang as a producer and Tian as a director.

In 2020, after the coronavirus pandemic(疫情) hit, Tian considered creating a play. Since most of his works were based on classic works, Tian decided to write an original play. This turned out to be a three-hour-long play, titled Will, exploring the life story of Shakespeare.

“When we researched Shakespeare’s own life story, we found that we shared lots of experiences and emotions with him.” says Wang when asked about the inspiration. Tian agrees: “We share the passion for theater. We face problems after we left school, such as looking for job opportunities to make ends meet, and struggling between reality and dreams. We see ourselves through this play, Will.”

With four actors and actresses playing more than 30 roles, the play follows the man, Will, who, at the age of 5, entered the theater of Stratford City Hall by accident and became attached to it. Before adulthood, he went to London to seek his theater dream and launched his career, which brought him fortune and fame(名声). Then in his later years, he returned to Stratford, his hometown and stayed there until his death.

Premiered(首映) on July 22, the play was staged in Beijing and Shenzhen and was warmly received by both audiences and critics. In 2022, it will start a new round of shows in Beijing in April and July and is expected to be watched by about 13,000.

When asked about the feeling, Wang says, “Both Tian and I felt like returning to our school days when we fully devoted into creating plays and were not distracted. It felt great.”