Xiangsheng

What is Xiangsheng?

Xiangsheng, often translated as "crosstalk", is a traditional form of Chinese comic dialogue. The famous "Who's on First" routine by Abbot and Costello would be a close Western equivalent.

The term "xiangsheng" originally referred to the act of imitating someone's speech and actions. It rose to prominence as a performing act during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) through the early 20th century, when it was commonly performed by street buskers in the busy market areas of Beijing and Tianjin. Xiangsheng gained national prominence after 1949 as Mandarin Chinese was promoted as the standard, national language and xiangsheng became available to a mass audience through radio and, increasingly after the mid-1970s, on television.

Xiangsheng is revered in China as the "art of language", and as such is sometimes seen in the same light as other language arts like calligraphy and poetry. The language of xiangsheng is rich in puns and allusions and often delivered in a rapid style of tongue-twisting verbal gymnastics.. It's heavy reliance on double-meanings and other language-based and culture-specific humor makes most xiangsheng difficult if not impossible to translate.

Whereas Western standup comedy is usually composed of a string of one-liners that may jump from topic to topic, a xiangsheng piece consists of one cleary defined subject or a story that has a definite beginning, development and ending. Xiangsheng also tends to be more reserved and conservative than Western comedy, although xiangsheng has often been used for satire and social commentary. Unlike western standup, xiangsheng is most commonly performed as a two-man dialogue, sometimes by groups of three or more and only rarely as a comedic monologue.

First Foreign Performer

During one of his first appearances on television, in late 1988, Dashan was introduced to China's premier comedian, Jiang Kun. Jiang took Dashan under his wing and began to teach him xiangsheng. Later that year Jiang Kun formally accepted Dashan as his pupil in a public ceremony held at Beijing University. This was the first time a foreigner had ever been accepted into the formal xiangsheng hierarchy, as Dashan officially became a member of the 9th generation of xiangsheng performers.

Dashan was invited back on the CCTV New Years Eve Special in late 1989, this time appearing with Jiang Kun and partner Tang Jiezhong to perform a three-man xiangsheng. After a full year in China his language level had improved dramatically and this show was the first time such a large audience had ever seen a foreigner perform xiangsheng.

Due to its technical difficulty, xiangsheng is generally percieved as being beyond the ability of most native speakers of Chinese. The fact that a foreigner could perform xiangsheng left a deep impression on Chinese television audiences.

With xiangsheng Dashan gradually carved out a his own niche, evolving from overnight success story to a regular feature on national television, appearing with a number of prominent xiangsheng masters throughout the 1990s. Dashan has also dabbled with solo performances, considered to be the most difficult form of xiangsheng.