SHEN YUN PERFORMING ARTS REVIEWS

Retired Judge Appreciates Shen Yun Bringing Literature to Life

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Moe McWhirter at the Shen Yun Performing Arts performance at Phoenix Orpheum on Feb. 21, 2023. Sherry Dong/The Epoch Times

PHOENIX—Although “Journey to the West” seems like a story of a monk and his three strange disciples on a journey to find Buddhist scriptures, it is also a story of the three characters bettering themselves while overcoming countless obstacles. Shen Yun Performing Arts is putting this classic novel from the Ming Dynasty on stages across the globe.

“I’ve really enjoyed the various different stories being told, the celestial stories and then the ones that everyone remembers, like a ‘Journey to the West.’ A lot of Western people know that story,“ said Moe McWhirter, who was a judge. Indeed, one of the four great classics of Chinese literature, ”Journey to the West” is also one of the best known tales across the East, and popular even in the West.
Shen Yun, the world’s premier classical Chinese dance company, is based in New York, with a mission to revive Chinese civilization. And with 5,000 years of Chinese history and mythology to draw from, Shen Yun may never run out of material to use.

“A lot of these stories are all about the battle between oppressive forces and those that are trying to escape from them or otherwise contest with them,” commented Mr. McWhirter.

Although Shen Yun focuses on ancient Chinese history, it also presents the truth of present day China. Due to this honest presentation, Shen Yun is unable to perform in China.

“The contemporary story too, I was a little surprised you were allowed to do that. I think it’s good that you do that. And in fact, when my wife got us tickets, I was under the impression that this was an organization coming from mainland China,” said Mr. McWhirter.

There are many dance troupes coming out of China who claim to be showing a true China, but Shen Yun’s performance is without a hint of censorship or propaganda from the Chinese communist regime.

“It wasn’t until I got here that I realized this. And I went, OK, this is going to be more interesting than I thought, because I was afraid we were going to just get the sanitized governmental version of what Chinese culture was all about,” commented Mr. McWhirter.

Mr. McWhirter enjoyed the learning experience, as did others in the audience from what he could see.

“I really like the idea about the people thinking that a lot of the movements during the dance came from gymnastics when it didn’t,” he said. In fact, as the emcees explain, the ancient dance form is full of tumbling techniques that acrobatics, gymnastics, and other dance forms have since borrowed. “It came from the type of Chinese dancing that originated thousands of years ago.”

Reporting by Sherry Dong and Maria Han.
The Epoch Times is a proud sponsor of Shen Yun Performing Arts. We have covered audience reactions since Shen Yun’s inception in 2006.
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