相声在天津重新兴起

In a teahouse in Tianjin, audiences applaud and cheer the performers of a crosstalk.

Although crosstalk first appeared in Beijing more than a century ago, the art form actually prospered in Tianjin—a city just one hour's train ride from Beijing. The optimism and humor of Tianjin residents are played up to the fullest in the teahouse performance.

Crosstalk, or "xiangsheng" in Chinese, is a traditional form of comic dialogue. It is usually performed by two people, but can also be performed by one person or even a group.

Crosstalk originally was performed at temple fairs and street markets, but made its way to teahouses in the 1930s and 1940s. It became more accessible with the popularity of radio and television, but the performance in its real sense has disappeared from public view. As the old generation of performers has passed away, the techniques of crosstalk have slowly died as well. This is why crosstalkers like Yin Xiaosheng have initiated an important practice—bringing crosstalk back to its roots.

"There are many reasons for the decline of crosstalk. If we are to rejuvenate this art form, we have to go back to the face-to-face experience between the performer and the audience and bring crosstalk back to the teahouses."

Yin has restored and rearranged many pieces in the traditional crosstalk repertoire. He and others who want to create a crosstalk revival have also recruited performers and written new scripts. Their hard work finally paid off around 2005 when teahouse crosstalk performances started getting popular once again.

"In the beginning, we had only five crosstalkers here, but it was really hilarious when we started to tell jokes in each others' faces. Now there are 32 of us, and we are still short of hands from time to time."

At present, there are nearly a dozen teahouses in Tianjin, which attract more than 400,000 visitors every year from all over China.

The crosstalk masters now in their 70s remain engaged in the preservation and promotion of this art form in hopes of passing on their passion for it in the teahouses of Tianjin.

For CRI, I'm Wu Jia.