We have all seen the posters and videos—Shen Yun Performing Arts is coming to a city near you, a company that is known to be the best worldwide for traditional Chinese dance. But what we see on stage is a result of years of hard work. So what’s it really like behind the curtain? And what is life like as a Shen Yun dancer?
We have the pleasure of welcoming principal dancers Marilyn Yang and William Li to talk about this. What many don’t actually know is that they are siblings.
Evelyn: Welcome to both of you. So what is it like? What was your childhood essentially like? Because that involves a lot of hard training and work and discipline at such a young age.
William Li: Once you start dancing, it’s like you flip your world upside down. You’re training for hours every single day, so you have a lot of basic dance training. But on top of that, also rehearsals. Every year, we’re putting on a completely new performance. That means we’re on the road for six months, and also at the base in New York for six months. It’s just a lot of training, very physical, but also it’s very mental because learning movement is tiring, it’s hard, and you have to use your brain just as much as your body.
Evelyn: How did either of you get to start to be dancers in Shen Yun? How did this come about?
Mr. Li: It started with me first. My mom is a singer and my dad actually directs movies and produces movies. So pretty involved in the arts. My mom wanted me to try dancing when I was a young age. It seems like something that’s a little bit odd for a young boy to try, but once I got into it, I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed the history that comes along with learning traditional, classical Chinese dance, and also it’s actually very physical, so that was actually quite fun.
Evelyn: That’s nice. So then it was fun on top of all this hard work. And so and then you decided to, let’s say follow in his footsteps, right? Did he tell you about how much hard work that would be?
Marilyn Yang: He likes to say that I followed in his footsteps, but for me, I think it was more like—when I watched the show, naturally, I was really awestruck with the female dancers. So it was definitely more of that I was going for. I wanted to pursue that brilliance on stage. It’s just a really nice experience, even when I was a small kid. It was one of my deepest memories. I just kind of went blind into it. And of course, it was a shocking change in lifestyle and everything. But definitely I think he supported me coming and joining Shen Yun because he knew how much it benefited his life. And it really made I think a change for all of us.
Evelyn: When you went into it, when you found out what it actually involves, how was it like for you?
Ms. Yang: I think at first it was more like, “Oh, the show is so pretty.” And you just want to be on stage and just perform. But I think there’s a lot that came into it that changed me as a character. To be able to train and try to become professional at anything, and dance especially, you have to have a lot of self-discipline. And it’s a lot more than just the physical aspect, like you said. I think it’s a really humbling experience.
Evelyn: How was it for you? Was it difficult? I imagine as a 13-year-old boy, you also need to build up that discipline. Was that something difficult to do?
Mr. Li: Definitely very difficult. But it’s something you almost—you need to find what drives you to be a dancer. Just going into it because you like it, that’s how you start. But as you dance, or doing anything in life, you have to find, when things get tough, what really drives you. And for me, even though I was young at the time, the mission of Shen Yun is actually something that is really amazing: to revive a culture that was almost destroyed, to revive 5,000 years of traditional Chinese culture. And I think when you think about it, even when things get hard, that is actually something that’s very inspirational for a young person. It really drove me through some of the tougher times.
Evelyn: That is incredible that you understand this. How long have you been dancing now? And what keeps you going now?
Ms. Yang: I started dancing when I was 10 years old. I would say that there’s so many aspects to it. I definitely agree that it’s something so—it’s hard to wrap your mind around at first at such a young age that I’m going to be reviving traditional Chinese culture. But as I got more into it, I realized that it’s just something that’s so much bigger than myself. And it was a really special feeling to know that I’m part of something bigger and I’m part of a team.
Evelyn: What would you say is the hardest part and what’s your favorite part of being a dancer?
Ms. Yang: I would say the hardest part is just trying to become really skilled at something, it requires a lot of practice. And there’s always going to be times when you don’t want to get up in the morning to continue the same schedule. It requires a lot of self-discipline. And I think that’s something very challenging, because we always have those lazy days. And you want to always be better than the you you were yesterday. So if you want to keep on climbing up that hill, really, sometimes you just feel like you stay in the same place for a while, and you don’t really see much improvement. So it takes a lot of, I think, just the mental push to strive to become better and know that really, there’s no limit to how good you can get. So you got to keep pushing yourself. And I think that’s something that’s really challenging.
Evelyn: What about you?
Mr. Li: Something really hard is just the training can get very repetitive. It’s almost like going to the gym and working out, right? You have to do the same motion every time, the same amount of reps, and you have to keep building on top of that. And then maybe you recover a day, and the next day you want to go back, you’re still kind of sore, but you still have to go if you want to improve. So dancing is the same thing. The training is quite repetitive, but what we present on stage every year is still different. So there’s both sides of that coin, where it’s repetitive training but new performance for us every year.
Evelyn: What is your favorite part? Would that be your favorite part, to perform on stage?
Mr. Li: You know what’s really good about being a Shen Yun is that we perform all over the world. And I started young, but I’ve traveled to so many different countries over 100 different cities in the world performing and presenting classical Chinese dance on stage. It’s something that I’m quite proud of. But it’s just a really good experience for a young person.
Evelyn: That sounds awesome. You had mentioned before, which is the mission of Shen Yun. So tell me a little bit more about what the mission exactly is and why it resonated with you.
Mr. Li: The mission of Shen Yun is to revive authentic traditional Chinese culture. And why that’s important is because the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] that’s in China today, the communist regime tried to systematically destroy traditional Chinese culture when they took over China. So there was a Cultural Revolution, and they actually systematically tried to destroy Chinese culture. They said that everything that is old is bad, like faith and tradition—all of these things that Chinese people have resonated with and is really the backbone of Chinese civilization for over 5,000 years, they tried to get rid of that because when you’re spiritual, you have your own beliefs. But when the CCP came in, they don’t want people to have their own faith and be individuals. They want you to just follow what the CCP says. So really, they had all these different movements trying to destroy culture, and all of a sudden, Shen Yun comes in. And we’re trying to revive this tradition, revive this culture, which is the backbone of Chinese civilization—and they’re actually quite scared of that, so they’ve interfered with a lot of our performances all over the world.
Evelyn: They interfered, how so?
Mr. Li: When we tried to perform in some theaters, for example, in South Korea, in the Dominican Republic, and even in America, they would send letters to the theater managers, and they would try to convince them not to host Shen Yun.
Evelyn: I think that’s good to bring up because that’s a really dark part of history that I think people should be aware of. So why is that so valuable, this traditional Chinese culture that you want to share with the world?
Ms. Yang: I think that traditional Chinese culture, it’s so rich with so many virtues, and just so many characteristics on how to be a better person. And that’s really embedded in ancient Chinese civilization. Really, the culture is divinely inspired, and everything was very spiritually tied. So the history of ancient China was really all about how to become a better person, how to make society better, I think. And if we were to bring back those values today, that would definitely benefit our society nowadays. For us, when we do a lot of these ancient Chinese stories, these characters, we’re not necessarily just acting. It’s not just an act that we put up. But we really live in these virtues, and we’re always trying to cultivate these virtues in ourselves so that we embody them, truly. So when we portray them on stage, it’s really a realistic portrayal and it’s not something that we’re just trying to put on and put on an act for. It’s something I think, because it’s so true to ourselves, the audience can really feel it.
Mr. Li: It feels more genuine if you resonate with that character’s emotions, or what he’s portraying. For example, Mi Furen had to sacrifice for her baby. If you’re quite a selfish person, you might not resonate with those feelings or those virtues. And then what you portray on stage is not really going to connect with your character, and might not connect with your audience. So that’s why if you want to portray a character well, you really need to resonate with the values that they represent.
Evelyn: What exactly does that mean? How does that manifest in your life? When you say you live by those values, what kind of changes do you make to your life to achieve that?
Mr. Li: I think it’s a lot of the very small things. For example, Monkey King, he went from arrogant to humble. And that means that in your daily life, your actions and what you do should reflect humility, right? I can’t go around being like, “I’m the best, I can do all this.” You should know that there’s always someone better than you. And actually Chinese culture is believed to be divinely inspired. And for me, a lot of the skills and what I’ve learned in dance, I think is also given to me from the divine. It’s not just my own hard work, but that’s like, something that we believe, Chinese people believe. is from the gods. And even my skills and abilities, I think are also given to me from the divine as well.
There is a saying, “xue yi xian xue zuo ren,” [which means] “Before learning a skill, first learn to be a good person.” And that I think for a lot of dancers, I think it’s very important. Because if you’re a good person, you can better represent the values on stage. It’s like, for example, if I’m telling you, I like watermelon, something very simple, right? But if I really hated watermelon, I dislike it, but I told you I like watermelon, you would feel something’s a little bit off. But if I really like watermelon, and I’m telling you, “I love watermelon, you gotta believe me, you gotta try this watermelon,” you feel different. So the difference is, one is true, and one is false. But what I’m saying is the same thing.
Evelyn: That makes a lot of sense to me because when you say something that you don’t stand by, it definitely will feel different. It sounds like all of this is so much more for you guys than just entertaining the audience. So if the audience would watch the show and would leave the show with just one takeaway, what do you hope it would be?
Ms. Yang: I think we both agree that it would be hope. We want the audience to really have a sense of hope after watching our show. And I think that’s why it’s so meaningful to us to put on our performances. I think one way we would put it is, after a storm, there’s always a rainbow. And so we want to have our audience really get to experience that and have hope leaving our theater. And I think it really helps that in the sense that we’re not just an entertainment show. We don’t put it on so you can have just laughs or have a momentary piece of escape. It’s more like we really want you to be able to take away these values. Because I think in Shen Yun we have like 20 pieces in our whole program, and each story I think really has a deep moral or something you can learn from. And that really is why I think traditional Chinese culture is so important is because each story really has something that’s meaningful, it has a moral to the story.
Mr. Li: The story of Shen Yun is actually a story of hope. Chinese culture was almost destroyed because of the CCP, but Shen Yun was founded in America, where we were able to revive this traditional Chinese culture and share it with the world. And hope is something that is not a value that is only good for the Chinese people. Hope should be something that everyone all over the world— t’s something that everyone can resonate with the story, and it might just inspire you a little bit in your daily life as well. And along with it is the tradition and virtues of Chinese history and Chinese culture. It’s something that’s universal. Important parts of Chinese culture such as faith, compassion, and humility—these are all things that we can have a little bit more of in our daily lives.
Evelyn: I just mentioned in the beginning of this interview, you guys are almost off to the airport and you’re starting your tour. So where can people catch you guys on stage this season?
Mr. Li: So we have eight companies and we’re traveling all over the world, but check out ShenYun.com for specific cities.
This interview has been edited for clarity.
