MINNEAPOLIS—The audience of Minneapolis' debut performance of Divine Performing Arts' Chinese New Year Spectacular had warm words of praise for the performances they had seen so far when they got out for intermission.
Steve Johnson, a manager for a computer programming company, attended the Spectacular with his wife and daughter.
"I think its very colorful," he said. "It's like nothing I've ever seen before."
Johnson said he heard about the show through the Chinese immersion school his child attends.
"I think we like the drummers the most," he said. His daughter Maya said she also liked the drummers.
Johnson's wife of Chinese heritage, Mary Anne Choy said her favorite dance so far was the Mongolian Bowl Dance in which female dancers whirl around the stage with a stack of bowls balanced delicately on their heads.
"It's many bowls, not just one. That was fun," she said.
She also said she was impressed with the first half of the show overall.
"It's very pretty. Beautiful, beautiful."
Choy said she liked hearing the Chinese spoken language, which she is trying to learn but can't speak yet.
"I like to listen to the spoken language so I can be more familiar with it."
"I just love the costumes, they're beautiful," she added before returning to see the second half.
Elizabeth Steblay, who works at the University of Minnesota Law School heard about the show on television.
"I'm loving it," she said.
"They're all wonderful," Steblay said of the dances she had seen so far. She said she was impressed with the shows more serious dances that dealt with current events in China.
"They are speaking about the conditions of China and the Falun Gong people being tortured and so forth. They're really putting it out there," she said. "It's wonderful."
Steblay, who is a student of Qigong and Tai Chi, said she is familiar with the persecution of Falun Gong in China.
"You don't talk this way in China, I know that," she said referring to the show.
Steblay was also aware that the Chinese Communist Party, China's ruling regime, would make efforts to try to suppress the Spectacular from showing in the United States and other places around the world.
Numerous elected officials across the country received letters from Chinese consulates and embassies asking that the officials not go to the show, not send congratulations, or recommend it to others.
New York Assemblyman Michael Benjamin was one such official.
"The CCP [Chinese Communist Party] insists to the world that there is only one China," he told the Epoch Times in a previously published email. "They seek to drown out alternative voices.
The Spectacular will continue on to the United States before continuing its global tour through Asia, Europe, and Oceania.
In total it will stage 220 shows in over 60 cities and 14 countries, reaching a total live audience of about 650,000.
The Chinese New Year Spectacular will also be at San Francisco's Orpheum Theater, at 2:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m., and the Arie Crown Theater in Chicago Jan. 25-26.
Beginning on Jan. 30, the NTDTV Chinese New Year Splendor will play for 15 shows at Radio City Music Hall in New York City.
The Epoch Times is a proud sponsor of Divine Performing Arts performances. For dates and times of their world tour visit: http://www.divineperformingarts.com/sy/ticket_info.
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