Mei Lanfang
1 min readA Famous Actor:Mei Lanfang
In the course of the development of Beijing Opera，a number of talented actors created highly distinctive singing and acting techniques，adapting the traditional skills learned from their masters to take advantage of their own abilities and giving rise to different schools.The very influential Mei School，for instance，was founded by the most famous Beijing Opera actor of modern times，Mei Lanfang，who made continuous improvement tosinging，movements，recitative，music，costumes and make-up in the course of many years of stage performance.His repertoire included A Woman Feigning Madness，The Drunken Beauty and The King Bids Farewell to His Concubine.
The Bridge of Drama Built by Mei Lanfang
The success of Mei Lanfang’s overseas performance was attributed to his long-cherished determination to reform the old Chinese drama，especially，after he had been given strong support by the Beiling Chinese Dramatic Institute.And he had also made clear his ambition of promoting international cultural exchange through the performance of Chinese dramatic art.
This was indicated in his farewell speech in Shanghai before his departure for the United States，“I realize the wide cultural gap existing between China and America；however，it is my ambition to make the best of this op-portunity to build a bridge over such a gap through the exchange of dramatic art.And that is why I am travelling to America with my troupe，which should serve as an essential introduction of Chinese culture.”
