Becoming Madame Mao (8 page)

A public letter is issued by the troupe criticizing the government. Lan Ping's signature is on the top. With the same passion, with the same tone and voice which she uses on stage, she speaks on radio and at rallies. She passionately calls the government "Torvald."

***

It is a fateful evening that Tang Nah and I meet. It is the course we both are meant to be served.

I am on my way to the Shanghai Film Studio. Not too long ago the studio took a chance and signed me up. It is a small contract, and in business terms I am still on my own, but I feel better being under the studio's wing. The tiny roles I get I must earn. I am not sleeping around. In this business actresses are for sale. It's a tradition that certain men in town "take care of" the new girl on the block. These are powerful men. The money guys of the industry. They approach me for coffee and tea. You definitely have star potential, they say. Their breath stinks. Why don't you come with me to my place so that I can introduce you to ...

She has tea and coffee with powerful men. She puts on makeup for them. She always manages to walk out at the last minute. She knows many girls who didn't. They get shut behind the door and lose their souls for good. Lan Ping believes that she can ride the momentum of
A Doll's House.
But underneath her smile she is lonely and depressed. Her sweet voice is often out of place. It carries an edge of fear. She has nightmares about the ground splitting and silently swallowing her.

It is in fear she meets Tang Nah. He walks toward her on a noisy street at dusk. He smiles, stops, takes his cigarette from his lips and introduces himself.

The sun has just set. The sky is covered with red clouds. I am in a lousy mood. But the man in front of me is a well-known journalist. A staff member of a major newspaper,
Dagongbao.
I can't afford to be rude. I offer him my hand.

Sorry I can't quite recall ... Have we met?

Dan introduced us, remember?

Oh yes, that's right, now I remember. Mr. Tang Nah. I have read your reviews. They are excellent.

He nods. I miss Nora.

Thank you. For some reason my nose begins to tickle. I quickly look down at the pavement and say, It is very nice of you to say that.

No, please, he responds. I don't mean to just pay you a compliment. You are a very good actress.

He tells me that he has seen the show at least eight times. He mimics my stage moves, turns around and walks a couple of steps—it is my entrance scene.

He lifts my mood. I can't help laughing. He is funny.

Once your satin dress got caught on a prop, he says, hands animated. Remember? No? Anyway I got nervous for you. But you turned the accident into part of the plot. Oh, I was completely impressed. I have seen a lot of shows in my life and I have never seen anyone like you.

I find myself listening to him. I miss Nora too, I answer.

I've longed to meet you personally, he goes on. More than once I went to the backstage gate hoping to get a glimpse of you after the show.

Many years later Madame Mao visits the moment in her dreams. The lovers stand on a small street lit up by a line of food stands. Tofu soup, sweet and sour cabbage, water chestnuts, duck-blood soup with rice noodles. She remembers clearly that there was a boy selling gingko nuts at the corner. He roasts the nuts in a wok on top of a little portable stove. The flame is reflected on his chest. It looks like the boy is holding an armful of light.

***

This is how they begin. Just for a walk first. He picks her up and takes her to places she has never been. A cigarette held between his fingers, he displays his knowledge. On one hand, he is gentle, enthusiastic and modest, on the other hand, he is arrogant and opinionated—this is how he makes his name as a critic.

They are different, almost opposite in character. She finds Tang Nah stimulating. His English fascinates her. He is a new world she can't wait to discover. She is charmed by his liberal attitude. He is a very different man from Yu Qiwei. If Yu Qiwei brought her a sense of adventure, Tang Nah cultivates a sense of culture. If Yu Qiwei opened her character and shaped it, Tang Nah embraces her and loses himself in her role. If Yu Qiwei is a man of calm and determination, Tang Nah is a man of sensitivity and pure passion. To Yu Qiwei she was a star in his universe, to Tang Nah she
is
the universe.

Tang Nah is like an old horse who knows his way around Shanghai. In Tang Nah's circle everyone admires the West and everyone hates the Japanese. Often singing breaks out in the middle of one of Tang Nah's parties. People compete to sing the loudest. The composers write notes on napkins and musicians strike up the tune. The playwrights construct their scenes in between toasts and the actors play them out on the floor. A few days later the song will be on the radio or the scene in a movie.

I am getting to know Tang Nah's close friends, film director Junli and his wife Cheng, a writer. Junli is the most talented among his friends. He is in his late twenties and is becoming popular with his new movies. He is a peculiar-looking man with thin hair. He calls Tang Nah a pure romantic. Tang Nah's way of living gives me ideas for movies, he says. If I had known I wouldn't have taken Junli's words as a compliment. Tang Nah lives for drama and this gears him to disaster.

At the moment what friends say about Tang Nah impresses me. I never consider that Tang Nah's passion could be negative, or even harmful. Tang Nah's friends won't ever have to live with him so they don't know. I will discover that Tang Nah can't tell movies from reality and that he doesn't want to. But he is extraordinarily kind to his friends. He has done reviews for Junli's films and volunteers to be Junli's publicist.

I am not certain what Tang Nah tells Junli about me. Tang Nah says that it's a secret. Man to man. I am sure he tells Junli his opinion of me. And I am sure Junli has seen
A Doll's House.
But Junli never voices his impression of me. It seems that he is not sure about me or about Tang Nah's relationship with me. He observes and studies us like characters in his films. He probably thinks that I come on too strong with Tang Nah. He might have doubts about Tang Nah too. As a best friend he must know Tang Nah's way with women. He must have sensed that we will end up badly. But Junli never gives me any advice or warning. He cares about Tang Nah too much to betray him.

However, I sense it. The way things clicked between me and Zhang Min does not happen between me and Junli. It is a great pity. I can't force a director's affection. If I weren't Tang Nah's girlfriend, Junli might be able to look at me in a different light. But Tang Nah didn't make that possible. I couldn't meet Junli as anything else but Tang Nah's latest woman—the damage was already done.

Still, I continue to hope that with Tang Nah's help Junli will offer me a role in one of his movies. Or he can refer me as a talented actress to his colleagues. I am anxious to get my career going again. I am twenty-one years old already.

Tang Nah says, I am twenty-five years old. And I think enjoying life is more important than anything else.

But my question is, How can one enjoy life at its fullest when one is not doing what one wants to do?

Tang Nah believes that Lan Ping can be better than she is. He is confident about transforming her. He thinks that she can be a goddess.

Tang Nah tells Lan Ping the meaning of being a modern woman. It is her pursuit of culture. This is the difference between Shanghainese and other Chinese in general. This is where the Shanghai women's self-confidence and elegance come from.

Compared to the inlanders, Shanghainese have a much more balanced attitude toward life. For example, they admire the foreigners' culture but never fawn on them. Tang Nah points out to Lan Ping and asks her to observe that even the rickshawmen, the lowest class in Shanghai, are able to toss phrases of English into their dialect. It is the smoke that makes the ham tasty. See what I mean, Miss Lan Ping?

He leads and she follows. He teaches Lan Ping to read the English version of
A Doll's House.
Since she already knows the translation he thinks that this will make it easier and more interesting for her. She repeats after him. But she can't get rid of her accent. She has this Shan-dong tongue. Stiff. Tang Nah tries his best but she still pronounces X as
ai-co-sib
and V as
wei.
Tang Nah gets frustrated. He tries every way. She thinks he is very cute. He begs her to be serious. She tells him that he is teaching a dog to catch a mouse.

Every night she goes to his place to study English. He lives in a two-room apartment in a nice neighborhood. He is a neat fellow and grows plants by his windows. There is calligraphy in his room, all gifts from well-known masters. She is bored after a few lines and he kisses her and begs her to endure a little longer. She plays with him like a naughty girl. He loses his focus and quits. He gives her a spelling test. It always begins with L-O-V-E. And she always says L-O-Wei-E. He laughs and bites his lower lip to demonstrate the V sound. She bites her lower lip. But when the test begins, it is still L-O-Wei-E. He scratches his head, lies on top of her, puts his mouth between her lips and asks her to bite it when sounding V.

He is a good lover, not always in a hurry to possess her. He takes her out and tries to relax her. He takes her to galleries, antique shops, bookstores, concerts and poetry readings. They look at their reflections when passing the street windows. They are a handsome couple. Both tall and slim.

She appreciates it that he never makes fun of her mistakes. She knows that sometimes she overplays her cleverness. She appreciates it when he goes out of his way to ignore it when she lies out of embarrassment. Tang Nah is critical of others but never of Lan Ping. He never says, How terrible you don't even know who Su Dong-po is. He explains patiently that Su is a famous ancient poet and then reads her the work. Then he buys tickets to visit Su Dong-po's birthplace and gives her a lecture on the way.

The white-colored cliffs shoot out of the horizon while the Yangzi River rushes toward the east at its bottom. Around the cliffs there is a narrow path for climbing. The view steals my breath away. At the bottom, there is a little wooden boat and a fisherman for hiring. As we sit in the boat looking up, the cliffs seem to be pressing air back into my lungs. The sky is magnificently clear and blue. At noon we are on top of the cliff. As we look down from a bird's perspective, the boat is smaller than an ant. The comparison between greatness and smallness gives me a sense of life's range and depth.

This is how I fall in love with Tang Nah. I begin to see everything through his eyes. A new world that begins with the story of Su Dong-po. Tang Nah is comparing Su's encounter with the ancient court with our current government. The way
A Doll's House
was forced to shut down. The way my role was taken away from me.

A group of court officials made their dislike of the poet known to the emperor, Tang Nah explains. They reported that they had discovered in Su's verses disrespect and provocation. Playing on the emperor's doubts, Su was sentenced to a lifetime in exile. The poet must take leave of his family forever. He is dragged through his hometown to enter upon a long bitter journey toward the western desert. Imagine facing the endless interrogation and torture by local executioners. Imagine all his friends turning away from him in fear of the government.

No pain could ever be greater than the isolation and loneliness of the heart, Tang Nah continues. Yet, alone the poet was alive with his own spirit. It was then that the idea of the great verse
Writing on the Red Wall
was conceived. It was born in despair. It burst out in the middle of suicidal thoughts.

The girl looks up at Tang Nah in awe as he explains maturity.

It is like the radiance of the sun but not as bright and hurtful to the eyes. It is a sound that is pleasant and resonant but not sugar-filled. It is a kind of ease. It doesn't demand attention. There is no longer a need to please. It is the point at which one no longer begs for another's understanding. It is a smile that forgives all. It is one's peacefulness, one's remoteness toward the world of materials. It is a height that one doesn't have to climb to achieve. It is when the passion-dough is ready for steam, when the shrill sound of a mountain wind gives way to a gentle moan and the streams gather into a lake.

One evening we are strolling after dinner at a local restaurant. Suddenly there is noise. A block away, on the side street, someone is calling for help. As we get near we see a big-shouldered Russian hitting a thin rickshawman. The Russian complains that the man has asked for too much fare. There is a crowd but no one speaks for the rickshawman.

We watch for a while. Tang Nah becomes upset. Why don't you two talk and come up with a reasonable price? Tang Nah goes up to the Russian. He demands that he stop hitting the rickshawman.

The Russian says, Get out of my face!

No, replies Tang Nah. No paying no leaving.

I worry that the Russian will turn around and hit Tang Nah. It is what he will obviously do next. But Tang Nah stands firm. At that very moment I feel my love for him. A perfect hero.

The rickshawman is unable to speak clearly. His mouth is bleeding. The Russian speaks English. He insists on leaving without paying.

How about five yuan? Tang Nah pitches his voice. I know the area. The distance where the ride began and ended would cost at least eight yuan. Let's be fair.

One dime, the Russian offers insultingly. He throws a dime on the ground.

Suddenly the rickshawman rises and jumps on the Russian. With the help of the crowd, Tang Nah and I push both men to the nearest police station.

We assume that the rickshawman will get justice at the police station. But we are disappointed. Who gives you the right to violate a foreigner? the police chief yells at Tang Nah. He might be an investor and we can't do enough to make him feel at home.

Are you a Chinese? Tang Nah yells. It's your obligation to help another Chinese when he is mistreated! Tang Nah's whole frame shakes when the police chief frees the Russian and fines the rickshawman.