CLEVELAND—David Fien, CIO of an IT company, and Mona Harper, paralegal, saw Shen Yun Performing Arts’ opening performance at The State Theatre at Playhouse Square, where the classical Chinese dance company will be performing three shows over the weekend.
“I'll use two words [to summarize]: absolutely fantastic,” said Mr. Fien after the Feb. 4 matinee.
“Magical and beautiful,” Ms. Harper added.
“History is very important. You need to know where you came from to know where you’re going, So very important,” he said. “I love learning all about different cultures and different beliefs.”
“That’s probably my favorite piece so far. It’s a shame that that still goes on today. You can’t practice your beliefs and there’s somebody looking over your shoulder and want to take that away,” he commented. “It’s very important, you have to let people know when there’s injustice and persecution going on in the world, so it’s very good.”
Mr. Fien said he got a lot out of the experience, and would definitely recommend it to friends.
Gina Mazzone, mental health therapist, and Beau Phillips, real estate agent and business owner, had a great first experience with Shen Yun as well, and much to share after the performance.
“I think it’s beautiful. It’s wonderful. It’s vibrant. It’s thrilling. It’s engaging. And it seems to be steeped in traditional Chinese movements,” Mr. Phillips said. “It’s very impressive. And the talent is throughout the entire cast.”
“It’s beautiful. The amount of activity that’s going on throughout in the storyline, you must stay very focused to follow all the movements and everything to not miss anything. It’s very fast-paced at times, but also—fluent, very fluent,” he added.
Ms. Mazzone said it was “beautiful. The dancing is just so elegant and they’re just so talented.”
“I think it’s wonderful because I think that Westerners don’t necessarily always know so much about Chinese history, so to kind of bring that inside of something that brings people to the theater and puts them in that place for education is wonderful,” Mr. Phillips said.
“The way that they present it is very wonderful and engaging again to the audience. And I think that it adds another little bit of the mystique in introducing the culture,” he said.