Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Early on in Shanghai Dolls, two impoverished young actresses swear by “Marx and Lenin” and by “Chekhov and Ibsen” to “make revolution through theatre and to save women from men”. This is 1930s China. They are burning with ambition. But their hopes will soon come up hard against grim realities, while the relationship between art and politics will prove to be deadly.Amy Ng’s fascinating but frustrating new play traces the intertwined lives of two enormously significant Chinese women, Jiang Qing and Sun Weishi, mixing fact with imagination. In her account, the two women meet in 1935 in a Shanghai theatre, where Jiang Qing (known at this time by the stage name Lan Ping) is auditioning to play Nora in Ibsen’s A Doll’s House — a role that will propel her to fame — while Sun Weishi is a 14-year-old Communist party member seeking sanctuary from the turmoil outside. They bond, in a fervour of artistic hope. “It will be us against the world,” cries Jiang.But Jiang will move on from heartfelt conversations about artistic freedom and female emancipation to marry Mao Zedong and become Madame Mao, a driving force behind China’s brutal Cultural Revolution. Sun, meanwhile, will be adopted by Mao’s number two, Zhou Enlai. She will also end up tortured to death at the behest of her former friend. The question threading through Ng’s play is why? How did Jiang, so passionate about artistic liberty and overthrowing the patriarchy, become the oppressor? Weaving through the drama are huge questions about freedom, art, compromise and female agency. Dolls become a leitmotif, beginning with that opening reference to A Doll’s House. The women’s stories roll out in short, splintered scenes against the turbulent backdrop and seismic political shifts of the mid-20th century (Jean Chan’s design sends archive photos and video footage scrolling across a huge screen).But while you can see why Ng might have wanted to keep a tight focus on the two women, tackling so much material in an 80-minute two-hander creates problems. Decades of history are compressed into bite-sized scenes, political intrigues have to be explained, significant figures are mentioned with footnotes. At one point Jiang shuts down Sun’s attempts to stage a play based on true experiences of the devastating famine that killed tens of millions: that scene in itself could be the basis for a richer, longer drama.Character development is similarly sketchy. Ng suggests that Jiang’s tough, impoverished childhood and outsider status might have contributed to her ruthless determination. Even so, there’s little nuance to the depiction. Gabby Wong (Jiang) and Millicent Wong (Sun), both vivid, bold and sympathetic performers, create a believable bond in Katie Posner’s staging (a co-production with Paines Plough). But it’s hard for them to find subtlety in their characters when they have to switchback through such a complex story and deliver so much exposition. It’s a cracking idea for a play, but sadly the execution doesn’t meet the potential. ★★★☆☆To May 10, kilntheatre.com
