Slam Dunking Stereotypes: The Unstoppable Female Basketball Legend Who’s Smashing Her Way to the Top
Crossing the Mountains and Seas: A Story of Women’s Empowerment
The nine-person drama “Crossing the Mountains and Seas” crew spent the first half of the year not only in the rehearsal room, but also on the basketball court. In order to tell the story of the first women’s basketball team in Chinese history a hundred years ago, the play’s screenwriter and director Zhu Hongxuan led all the actors to practice physical fitness and play basketball before rehearsing the play every day, and went through more than six months of physical training.
A Breakthrough in Storytelling
“Crossing Mountains and Seas” breaks through the existing vision of the intellectual group in the past. It chooses sports themes that are not easy to express on the stage of drama, and uses various techniques such as stage design, lighting, and animation to tell the story of those women who may not be knowledgeable and wise enough, but who also yearn for freedom and power, climbing over the mountains of prejudice, crossing the sea of discrimination, and opening up a vast world of their own.
A Story Set in History
The story of “Flipping Mountains and Seas” is set in Guangdong Sanshan Girls’ School during the Republic of China period, a stage full of historical sense and characteristics of the times. The ”Sanshan” in the play is not fictional, but a clever combination of three real girls’ schools – Liangjiang Women’s Normal School, Jinling Women’s University and Guangdong Xiangshan County Women’s Normal School.
Empowerment Through Basketball
“If people can dribble, they can dribble their lives.” The female basketball players in the play, whether it is the rich daughter Ruan Fengzhu, the runaway transfer student Zhou Tai, the good girl Xie Baohua, or the myopic Su Min, are not athletes in the traditional sense, and even the reasons for joining the team are outrageous. But it is this group of seemingly inconspicuous women who, under the leadership of the principal and the coach, step by step gathered, shoulder to shoulder, broke through, and leaped towards freedom.
A Stage Full of Oriental Charm
The stage design of ”Crossing Mountains and Seas” has been carefully designed and is full of oriental charm. The Sanshan school building, which is very characteristic of Guangdong Diaolou in the Republic of China, is reflected by the beautiful clouds that rise and fall on the stage sky curtain; the clever use of lighting and imaging technology vividly presents the scenes of campus, court, mountains and sea on the stage; the animation visual elements and real-time photography clips enhance the audience’s sense of immersion and make the whole stage full of vitality.
A Passionate Drama
Such a passionate drama presents a female legend that spans the times, allowing people to see the indomitable spirit and tenacity in the torrent of history, and to feel the power of dreams and beliefs, inspiring more people to persist in themselves in difficult situations, cross mountains and seas, work together, and bravely pursue their dreams.