Jottings from the Granite Studio

“Ann Condi” writes at Danwei about participating  in the CCTV gala Bai Nian Yuan Meng, “A One Hundred Year Dream.” Generally, speaking the author’s experience tends to confirm what I’ve always suspected in terms of the micromanagement and addled political thinking that goes into creating one of these spectacles.  Too many good parts to adequately quote, the whole piece needs to be read as a whole, but I did like this little bit which I think summarizes just how moronic CCTV can be when it comes to incorporating the ‘One World’ element into China’s ‘One Dream.’

It was interesting to see to what extent the Party officials micro-managed the details of the performance. Following the first shencha, a set of recommendations and corrections came down from the censors, including a request that we foreigners not wear the white Olympic T-shirts we had been issued, but rather come decked out in our “native dress”. (“Native dress”? What did they mean, exactly? For example, what was my Canadian friend supposed to wear? A lumberjack outfit?) None of the various mandated revisions were based upon artistic or commercial decisions on the part of television professionals, but rather on the esthetic and political whims of this small group of Party bureaucrats.

Other condescending touches were added. Appearing on the show was a phenomenally popular Russian singer named Vitas, whose claim to fame is an almost impossible castrato-style high-C range. Having quite a following in China, he is one of the foreign performers invited to perform at the opening Olympic ceremonies. At the end of his number, the singer was coached to say “Wo ai ni Beijing. Nimen zhen pang!”, the last intended word bang (“great/awesome”) being intentionally mispronounced as pang (“fat”) resulting in the meaning “I love you Beijing. You are all fat!” This lame joke evidently fulfilled the obligatory stereotype of the cute foreigner who actually tries to speak Chinese.

Well worth the read.