LIFESTYLE :: People
Malaysian audiences were mesmerised by Hongkong musical Snow.Wolf.Lake, reports Peter Yap
There was no screaming and whistle-blowing at the Putra Indoor Stadium in Bukit Jalil last Friday as it wasn't a concert.
Instead, the crowd was mostly silent, focused completely on the debut of the longawaited Hongkong Chinese musical, Snow.Wolf.Lake starring the God of Song, Jacky Cheung. Although the original Snow.Wolf.Lake conceived by Cheung in 1997 was in Cantonese, the Mandarin version was staged to reach out to Mandarin-speaking audiences in China, Taiwan as well as Southeast Asian countries. Still Malaysians are grateful they finally got to watch the Mandarin version after an eight-year wait.
Snow.Wolf.Lake tells the tragic love story of a poor gardener Wolf (played by Cheung), who falls in love with Snow (Taiwanese singer Evonne Hsu), who is from a rich family. Unknown to them, Snow's sister, Phoenix (Hongkong actress Nadia Chan) is also in love with Wolf. However, their plans to share a life together is shattered by the deceptive Liang Jik, who wants to make Snow his own.
On the first night of the two night run, 7,000 people turned up in full force to watch the musical and Cheung in particular. Luckily there was no screams of "Jacky" and "Hokyau" as it wasn't a one-man show although Cheung, who was also artistic director, was the lead actor and has the best singing voice on stage.
The audience was enthralled by the music and the story, the spectacular set and elaborate costumes. Scenes changed with ease with the fully-auto mated stage that went from being a mansion to a rundown church and a marketplace. There was even a boat where Wolf and Snow first declared their love for one another.
Still, the success of the musical would not be complete without the songs. The Mando-pop songs were mostly moving ballads such as Snow Loves Wolf, Wonderful Lovers' Festival, Simply Put It's Love and Love is Eternal, delivered with such depth of feeling by Cheung.
The sweet and beautiful Hsu also rose to the occasion and the ever reliable Chan was outstanding, her voice just soared into the night. Even the choruses gave memorable performances, although one just couldn't make out the faces on stage when they were "a mile away".
Despite being the star of the show, Cheung blended in with the extras and there was that sense of camaraderie between them; this partnership added to the magic of the whole musical.
Bravo to the leads and the supporting cast who gave dazzling performances as they won the audience's approval.
At the end of the close to three hours musical and 30 songs later, the audience, many of whom were in tears, stood up to give the cast and crew of Snow.Wolf.Lake a standing ovation.
Snow.Wolf.Lake was presented by DiGi and organised by Galaxy Production.
Updated: 08:51AM Wed, 30 Nov 2005
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