Peking Opera Nan Dan Star Yang Lei

Yang Lei is totally dedicated to Peking Opera and does not have a part-time job. The truth is, whenever he is not on the stage, he is practicing for when he will be. He really value keeping his spare time free for opera and although some other people do take parttime jobs to make ends meet, he personally don’t.

On average Yang Lei practices a couple of hours a day, but it’s not a fixed amount. His body needs to be kept in shape so he always do exercise, and then his voice also needs work. In his spare time he goes to the park and sing out loud.

Yang Lei was originally working as a makeup artist backstage when his teacher-to-be noticed him. Pretty quickly he decided that Nan Dan was the right role for him. For Yang Lei's height is a little taller than some of the male stars, when they are all on stage, he has to bend his knees a little so as not to embarrass them.

When Yang Lei forgot his line once and no one could help, it is the most embarrassing moment on stage. All he could do was repeating the previous one and quickly skip to the next - hopes no one noticed.

Although Peking Opera isn’t as popular as it used to be, things will change soon. The government is trying to reinvigorate support for Peking Opera by getting it into universities and colleges. Yang Lei think they will succeed because of the nature of the art. People don’t need to understand it and enjoy it. Just being there in the audience is a wonderful experience.

Yang Lei has never performed a foreign opera, but he love to watch it. He tries to study and learn from foreign operas, to see if he can incorporate a bit into his own performance.

Yang Lei does not think Peking Opera could be translated into English and performed like that. "One of the main points about Peking Opera is the language; it all rests on it. If you lose the language, you lose its personality. "