Guo Degang and Ma Shuchun at the Tianjin Celebrity Tea House
Around 2005, Guo Degang Deyun Society became popular throughout the country, which to a certain extent made tianjin's tea houses stained. But at that time, the popularity of The Tianjin Tea House Crosstalk was not because of Guo Degang, in 2003, the Tea House Crosstalk Conference in Tianjin was already on fire, when Guo Degang often listened to crosstalk in Tianjin and also performed on stage, "Yang Guang's Happy Life" also specially played the plot of Yang Guang and Tiaozi to listen to the crosstalk at the celebrity tea house. It can be said that the celebrity tea house witnessed the change process of Tianjin qu art and cross-talk in that period.
On June 18, 1993, the "Celebrity Tea House" opened on the second floor of the Peace And Cultural Palace on Xinhua Road, with an area of 170 square meters, the gate is on the right side of the upper staircase, facing a semi-circular small stage, with private rooms and pool seats, which can accommodate 150 spectators, providing a good place to entertain themselves and enjoy opera and opera, adding another scene to Tianjin.
Many people may not know that the initiator of the celebrity tea house is Tian Chunjie, manager of the installation company of Tianjin Zhongjian Sixth Bureau. At the beginning, Yin Shengxi, the person in charge of the Beijing Laoshe Tea House, intended to ask Tian Chunjie to open the Tianjin branch of the Laoshe Tea House in Tianjin. Tian Chunjie thought: Tianjin Wei is the hometown of opera and qu art, to run a tea house, you should run a Tianjin people's own tea house, many opera and qu art masters are famous in Tianjin, simply called "celebrity tea house"!
Jiang Kun at a celebrity teahouse
Mr. Ma Sanli inscription
Tian Chunjie approached the Tianjin Municipal Arts Advisory Committee, and one of the leaders, the dramatist Ma Chao, praised his idea. The consultant sent people to accompany Tian Chunjie to Nanshi and Qiandezhuang's early tea houses and tea gardens to investigate, and many opera fans were very happy to learn that the old tea houses were to be restored, saying that the establishment of the tea house itself was the inheritance of Tianjin Wei culture, and hoped to open as soon as possible. After that, Tian Chunjie visited Ma Sanli, Wang Zezhao, Zhao Huiqiu, Li Rongwei and other famous artists, and these "celebrities" who received applause from the audience on the stage also believed that the teahouse performance should be resumed. Ma Sanli wrote the four words "Celebrity Teahouse".
The decoration and layout of the celebrity tea house is modeled after the Lao She Tea House in Beijing. At the beginning of the opening, every morning it was sung by opera fans, accompanied by professional bands, and opera karaoke was also provided, similar to KTV. In the afternoon, it is a special performance of quyi, which is performed by professional music performers. In the evening, professional opera actors perform cappella, color singing, and opera fragments. In the celebrity tea house, you can also buy Tianjin special souvenirs and snacks such as kite wei, clay man Zhang, Yangliu youth painting, 18th Street twist flower, Zhengxingde tea, Ma Ji tea soup and so on.
However, half a year later, in December 1993, the operation of the celebrity tea house fell into difficulties and even ceased to operate for a while. The minimum ticket price of the tea house is ten yuan, the highest is forty yuan, although the melon seeds and small snacks are provided for free, but at that time, people's average monthly income was less than three hundred yuan, watching a movie was only two yuan, and the price of ten yuan was too high, let alone forty yuan? Therefore, there are few guests for a long time, and sometimes there are only seven or eight audiences in the evening opera performance.
"Yang Guang's Happy Life"
Yang Shaohua at a celebrity teahouse
Subsequently, celebrity tea houses changed their strategies: one is to contact travel agencies and invite foreign guests to watch plays in tea houses; second, tea houses to pick up and drop off suburban audiences for free, which attracts many suburban farmers. The performance lineup has also gradually strengthened, a group of small character actors graduated from the Northern Qu School, Wang Zhe, Zhang Kai, Chen Baoping, Meng Yan and others have taken the stage, Zhao Xueyi, Liu Chunai, Yuanwei, Zhang Qiuping and other daily performances of the Tianjin Qu Art Troupe, veteran artists Luo Yusheng, Ma Sanli, Hua Wubao, Wang Yubao, Wang Yuzhen, Xiaohua Yulan, foreign names Li Zhizhi and Wei Xikui have also come to perform. In order to thank the audience, the celebrity tea house also organized a volunteer play, the audience entered the tea and listened to the music for free, and the more than ten actors who participated in the performance did not charge labor fees.
At that time, the celebrity tea house once held a classic performance, inviting some old artists of Tianjin's music and art. Single-string performance artist Lian Yueru performed several pieces of brand songs, singing with emotion and body, telling wei miao wei xiao and saying that the human form and god are both; Liu Hongyuan de Xie (Rui Zhi) sent a single string true biography, he sang "Picking the Curtain tailoring" with mellow charm, although singing the story of "Water Margin", he can join the modern criticism of Yizhuang Yi harmony; Liu Zhiguang sang the White Pai Jingyun big drum "Tan Qingwen", Tianjin tune actor Zhu Fengxia's anti-string Peking Opera flower face singing section, as well as Liu Jinle, Ma Xiying, Liu Peilan's Jingdong big drum, Jingyun big drum, The plum blossom drum singing section has also won the high applause of music fans, and the atmosphere of the theater is hot.
The Palace of Peaceful Culture, where the celebrity tea house is located
After several years of hardship, the celebrity tea house ushered in a turnaround, and Yu Baolin advocated the restoration of the tea house cross-talk conference, bringing the celebrity tea house to the fire. In 1999, the "Haha Laugh" Cross-Talk Art Troupe sponsored by the Mass Art Museum was established, with Bai Quanfu's disciple and cross-talk writer Song Yong as the leader, the core figures were Yu Baolin, Zhang Kuiqing, Guo Shizhong, several old actors, and at the same time gathered a large number of cross-talk actors and cross-talk enthusiasts. They study cross-talk together three nights a week, and on Friday and Saturday nights, the Zhonghua Quyuan and celebrity teahouses have become their practice positions, with old actors "talking live" to young people, and young actors on small stages to "roll live", without interruption.
"Haha Laugh" restored the traditional cross-talk such as "Eight Fan Screen", "Article Meeting", "Menu Zi", "Catching and Releasing Cao", "Fighting Yellow Wolves", "Selling Five Instruments", "Trees Without Leaves", "Wife Sacrifice", "Sitting Tongue Twister", "Master's Sutra", "Fenhe Bay", "Selling Hanging Tickets", "White Affairs Meeting", "Great Trial Case" and other traditional cross-talk, and can also perform modern theme passages such as "Ten O'Clock Start" and "After the Famous Door", Tong Youwei and Ma Shuchun also created new cross-talk such as "I Want to Be Beautiful" and "Eat the Lord", which are crisp and popular.
Celebrity teahouse, the audience sat on the stage to watch the performance
At this time, Guo Degang was not yet red, and Tianjin successively appeared celebrity tea houses, Yanle Tea House, Qianxiang Yi Siping Tea Garden Tea Garden, Persuasion Field Tianlu Tea House, China Grand Theater Small Theater, Dajintai and other teahouse small theaters, and the Friends Cross-Talk Art Troupe, the Haha Laughing Cross-Talk Art Troupe, and the Jiuhe Cross-Talk Team took turns to perform. The teahouse is often overcrowded, and many spectators who have not booked tickets in advance can only add seats in the back row or on both sides of the aisle, and even the audience on both sides of the stage is full. There are only two lines in the teahouse for waiters to pour tea and pour water through the path. Cheering, answering the phone, bumping melon seeds, shouting waiters for tea, and the cries of children are constantly heard. But the actors on the stage still had the best time, shaking their bags from time to time to communicate with the audience.
In October 2004, Zhang Yongxi, an 84-year-old Nanjing cross-talk artist, came to Tianjin to watch the cross-talk conference of "friends" and "haha laughter" at the China Quyuan and Celebrity Tea House, and exchanged views with colleagues in tianjin cross-talk circles. Zhang Yongxi worked as an artist in Tianjin in his early years, and then went south to Nanjing, where he established a cross-talk circle, known as "Southern Zhangbei Hou (Baolin)". His singing and chanting are excellent. "I haven't heard of the classic art form of 'cross-talk' for 40 years," he said. Tianjin can perform cross-talk every day, which not only brings joy to the audience, but also gives cross-talk actors a good opportunity to communicate with each other. It can be seen that at that time, the Tianjin Tea House crosstalk was already on fire. (Text: He Yuxin)
Early celebrity teahouses were the most popular