Two Stage Sisters is a 1964 Chinese drama film produced by Shanghai Tianma Film Studio and directed by Xie Jin, starring Xie Fang and Cao Yindi. Made just before the Cultural Revolution, it tells the story of two female Yue opera practitioners from the same troupe who end up taking very different paths in their lives: "one succumbs to bourgeois affluence and privilege, while the other finds inspiration and fulfilment in the social commitment associated with the May Fourth movement and the thought of Lu Xun."Zheng, Aili. "The Realism of Compositional Documentary: Jia Zhangke's 'I Wish I Knew. Pacific Coast Philology 48, no. 1,2013, pp. 88–108. . Accessed 3 June 2020. The film documents their journey through abusive feudal conditions in the countryside before achieving success and prestige on the stage, meanwhile historically following Shanghai's experience under Japanese and KMT rule.
This original screenplay depicts the socio-political changes encompassing China from 1935 to 1950 (just after the founding of New China) through the theatrical world of Shaoxing, and accordingly mixes both a Chinese aesthetic with Hollywood and socialist realist forms.Marchetti, Gina (1989). "Two Stage Sisters: The Blossoming of a Revolutionary Aesthetic" in Celluloid China: Cinematic Encounters with Culture and Society, ed. by Harry H. Kuoshu, p. 33. Also published as The main protagonist (Zhu Chunhua) is said to be based on the life of Xie Jin's friend and opera-veteran Yuan Xuefen.
Plot In 1935, Zhu Chunhua, a young child-bride tongyangxi turned child-widow, takes refuge with an itinerant Yue Opera troupe (the Yangchun Theatre Troupe) performing in a Shaoxing village while fleeing her in-laws, who are actively attempting to sell her off for financial gain following her husband's death. As film scholar Gina Marchetti argues, this narrative catalyst highlights the brutal commodification of women within the traditional feudal patriarchal structure, establishing Chunhua's initial escape not merely as a flight from domestic hardship, but as a desperate bid for bodily autonomy. The head of the troupe, A'Xin, intends to send the girl away, but Yue Opera teacher Xing, seeing her potential, takes Chunhua in as a disciple and trains her. Chunhua signs a deal with the troupe and becomes the performing partner (in a dan role) to the teacher's daughter Yuehong, the latter performing as a xiaosheng.
A rich provincial landlord Ni invites Chunhua and Yuehong to sing at his house privately after the troupe reaches his province. He takes an interest in Yuehong; however, Yuehong and her father spurn his interest and as a result, Kuomintang cops forcibly seize Yuehong one day during a performance. Chunhua is also arrested and tied to a pillar for days as "public humiliation". The two are released after Xing and A'Xin send bribes to the KMT cops.
During the Second Sino-Japanese War, Yuehong, Chunhua and the troupe go through hard times. In 1941, Teacher Xing dies of an illness, and troupe master A'Xin sells his two best performers to Tang, a Shanghai opera theater manager, on a three-year contract. Yuehong and Chunhua, now sworn sisters, rapidly become Tang's biggest stars, causing Tang to forsake his aging star and former lover, Shang Shuihua.
Three years elapse. Yuehong and Chunhua are renowned in the city. Chunhua remains down-to-earth but Yuehong grows steadily more materialistic. Sick of having to sing opera for life, Yuehong rashly agrees to Tang's proposal, but Chunhua distrusts Tang and refuses to support Yuehong's marriage plans. Unbeknownst to Yuehong, Tang already has a wife, and is keeping her as a mistress.
One day faded ex-star Shang commits suicide by hanging herself. Chunhua is incensed that Tang, her former lover, attempts to shirk his responsibilities by claiming he has nothing to do with her death. Through this episode, Chunhua gets to know a "radical" lady journalist Jiang Bo (a female communist reporter investigating the death),Jenkins, Steve. "Wutai Jiemei (Two Stage Sisters)". Monthly Film Bulletin, January 1981, who advises her to become "progressive" to teach other Chinese to distinguish between truth and falsehood. She starts performing "progressive" operas like an adaptation of Lu Xun's "The New Year's Sacrifice" in an attempt to politicize the work of the troupe, whose production consequently gets banned.
Chunhua's works alert the KMT regime who gives Tang the task to ruin Chunhua's reputation. They get A'Xin to file a lawsuit against Chunhua and Manager Tang coerces Yuehong to testify against Chunhua, but at the crucial moment in the courtroom, Yuehong faints.
The film ends in 1950, one year after the establishment of the People's Republic of China. Chunhua prepares to perform The White-Haired Girl for country folks at Zhejiang. Tang has run off to Taiwan with the KMT cohort and Yuehong is quietly abandoned at Shaoxing province. Although Yuehong witnesses Chunhua's drama, she is too ashamed to face her sworn sister again. Near a quay later the day, however, the sisters manage a tearful reunion. On the boat the following day, Yuehong vows to learn her lesson and walk the "correct" path while Chunhua dedicates her entire life to performing revolutionary operas.
Cast
Xie Fang as Zhu Chunhua (竺春花), the main protagonist, a Yue Opera performer. Originally a tongyangxi, she is adopted and later excelled in the dan role. Chunhua's political awakening is influenced by journalist Jiang Bo. Shortly after their meeting, she begins staging politically conscious operas for rural audiences following the founding of the People's Republic of China. Cao Yindi as Xing Yuehong (邢月红), daughter of Teacher Xing. She plays the xiaosheng (male) parts. Enticed by Manager Tang to forsake her art, but is abused frequently until reunited with sworn sister, Chunhua. Feng Qi as Teacher Xing (邢师傅), father of Yuehong, a Yue Opera teacher. Gao Yuan-sheng as Jiang Bo (江波), a female reporter and member of the Chinese Communist Party. Shen Fengjuan as Xiaoxiang (小香), a former troupe performer who plays supporting roles. Later reunited with Chunhua. Xu Caigen as Jinshui (金水), Xiaoxiang's husband and former troupe member. Shangguan Yunzhu as Shang Shuihua (商水花), an aging former star in the Shanghai opera scene, a former mistress of Manager Tang who was jilted. She later hangs herself. Ma Ji as Qian Dakui (钱大奎), a Yue performer at the Shanghai theater Luo Jingyi as Yu Guiqing (俞桂卿), a Yue performer at the Shanghai theater Wu Bofang as Little Chunhua (小春花), a village tongyangxi who is Chunhua's namesake. Li Wei as Manager Tang (唐经理), the unscrupulous manager and theater owner who keeps Shang and Yuehong as his mistresses. Deng Nan as A'xin the "Monk" (和尚阿鑫), the former troupe owner, a not-so-educated boor who will do anything for money. Shen Hao as Mrs Shen (沈家姆妈), a wealthy heiress who tries to adopt Chunhua and has illicit dealings with Manager Tang. Dong Lin as Third Master Ni (倪三老爷), a provincial landlord who tries to take Yuehong for sexual favors. Ding Ran as Commissioner Pan (潘委员), a Kuomintang official intent on ruining Chunhua and her revolutionary opera troupe.
Background and cultural contexts
Cultural Revolution and censorship Xia Yan, Vice Minister of Culture when the film was made, had made script corrections and encouraged Xie Jin to shoot the film. Xia Yan was particularly disliked by Mao's wife, Jiang Qing, and thus Two Stage Sisters is argued to have stood out for censure due to its association with Yan.
The film was caught in the escalating ideological purges leading up to the Cultural Revolution. Jiang Qing, Mao Zedong's wife and a key architect of the Cultural Revolution, personally labeled *Two Stage Sisters* a "poisonous weed" (毒草). It was aggressively attacked by radical leftists and banned from public screens for fifteen years.
The primary ideological denunciation against the film was that it "advocated the reconciliation of social classes" (阶级调和论) rather than reflecting absolute class struggle. Critics argued that the film softened class conflict by portraying certain antagonistic or bourgeois characters with human complexity, which violated the rigid codes of socialist realism. Additionally, the film was condemned for portraying and condoning "bourgeois" values through Yuehong's succumbing to luxury in Shanghai, and Xie Jin was forced to alter parts of the script during production under intense political pressure before the film was ultimately withdrawn from circulation.
The narrative tracking of the protagonists' encounter with left-wing journalism mirrors the historical alignment of urban cultural workers with the Communist underground in 1940s Shanghai. In Xie's depiction, the communist state becomes the inheritor of the leftist realist tradition, but Xie Jin knew the reality was otherwise.Wicks, J. (2014). Transnational Representations: The State of Taiwan Film in the 1960s and 1970s. Hong Kong University Press. In other words, "drama and film could no longer remain truly realist under the communist regime."Wicks, J. (2009). Two Stage Brothers: Tracing a Common Heritage in Early Films by Xie Jin and Li Xing. Modern Chinese Literature and Culture, 21(1), 174–212. Accordingly, instead of having the two stage sisters reunite in the "new society" which would allow them to perform Opera with full devotion and creative freedom as Xie Jin wanted, he was forced to work within the restraints of the censorships of the time and instead have Chunhua encourage Yuehong to become a revolutionary and to perform revolutionary-focused plays.
Chinese opera Two Stage Sisters demonstrates director Xie's keen interest in traditional Chinese opera art, which he had studied during the Japanese Occupation at the Jiangen Drama Academy. He had then worked with well-known opera practitioners such as Huang Zuoling and Zhang Junxiang.
Regarding the stage sisters themselves, some forms of Chinese opera troupes during this time were made up of artists mostly in one gender only. This was due to the strict fengjian taboo which forbade men and women to appear together on stage as romantic leads. This norm is still the case in more traditional Chinese opera troupes performing in mainland China, Taiwan or Hong Kong. This phenomenon also explains why most huangmeidiao movies feature women in male roles (e.g. Ivy Ling Po).
Chinese opera is built around four fundamental role categories – the painted face, the clown, and the female and male roles – each with its own codified performance vocabulary. The film portrays Zhu Chunhua who performs in the dan role, representing the female lead, and Yuehong who performs in the xiaosheng (小生) role, representing the young male lead. In Yue opera, it is standard practice for women to perform xiaosheng roles. These roles typically encompass an actress flourishing large pheasant tail feathers on the headdress to communicate shifting emotional states, such as attentive listening or surprise. The pairing of Chunhua's dan with Yuehong's xiaosheng mirrors the complementary couple structure built into Chinese opera's role system.
Crucially, this enforced segregation inadvertently opened up a powerful arena for gender subversion. The all-female nature of mid-century Yue Opera troupes allowed these actresses to subvert traditional feudal patriarchal boundaries by having women control both the active male (Xiaosheng) and female (dan) subjectivities on stage. As Meenakshi S. Thambi argues in her analysis of the film's aesthetic reinvention, by including both halves of the theatrical romance, these performers reclaimed agency over how gender and authority were represented, transforming a restrictive feudal isolation into a space of female rights.
Symbolism
Setting