RED BOAT TROUPES AND CANTONESE ... - University of Georgia

the sixth month of the year. 91 Numbers one to ten were performed often in the Red Boat era,
while number eleven to eighteen were seldom performed. 92
A pool of lai hei (common practice playlets), some lasting fewer than five minutes,
would be performed before and after the regular long plays. These were ritual plays composed
of stylistic movements and gestures with or without singing. Playlets were for troupes to display
the cast and costumes to attract the audience, and to create a welcoming atmosphere. The
following are the names of some playlets that are still performed at ritual shows:
1. Zae bak fu (Paying Tribute to the White Tiger)
2. Luk gwok daai fung seong (The Grand Six Countries Invest a Chancellor)
3. Baat sin hor sau (A Birthday Greeting from the Eight Immortals)
4. Tin Gei sung zi (The Heavenly Maiden Offers her Son)
5. Fung Toi (Sealing the Stage)
Depending on the occasions, consecutive mini shows created a bond between performers
and audience. If a troupe started to perform at a pang (makeshift performing hall), or a theatre
that had never hosted an opera production, the first show performed on stage was “Paying
Tribute to White Tiger.” 93 Two kungfu players, one supposed to be a tiger, and the other a hero
fighting the tiger, fought until the tiger lost the battle and left the stage (in Cantonese opera,
losers do not drop dead on stage—they leave it). “Paying Tribute to White Tiger” was not a
show for human audiences, but a tribute to a white tiger, who could bless the performance of a
new stage to be safe and smooth for the entire time the troupe was in town. Depending on the
size of the troupe, some playlets in Red Boat era required 65 to 70 people on stage.
91 An abnormal weather in the northern hemisphere; something ominous was happening in the warm sixth month of
the lunar calendar, around July in the Western calendar.
92 Interview with Wong Toa.
93 Sau Y Chan. Improvisation in a Ritual Context. Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press, 1991.
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