People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh - a lifelong dedication to the stage and youth

After nearly 10 years of fighting against illness, People's Artist, director Pham Thi Thanh, one of the great names of Vietnamese theater, left us on September 3. Remembering her, we think of a great artist who devoted her whole life to the theater and to youth...

People's Artist, director Pham Thi Thanh during her lifetime. (Photo: DONG VU)

People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh was born on September 24, 1941 in the ancient capital of Hue. She is the youngest daughter of the Royal Office's Director Pham Khac Hoe, a high-ranking mandarin of King Bao Dai's dynasty under the French colonial rule. Mr. Pham Khac Hoe also had great contributions in mobilizing and directly writing the abdication proclamation for King Bao Dai in August 1945 during the August Revolution to seize power in Hue. After that, Mr. Pham Khac Hoe went to Viet Bac to participate in the resistance war against the returning French colonialists and was respected and trusted by President Ho Chi Minh .

At the age of 14, when she returned to Hanoi from the Viet Bac resistance base, due to her talent for performing arts, musicians Luu Huu Phuoc, Nguyen Xuan Khoat, and Dang Dinh Hung suggested that Pham Khac Hoe let his daughter Pham Thi Thanh join the Central Performing Arts Troupe that had just returned to Hanoi. Pham Thi Thanh later became a famous drama actress of the troupe, specializing in playing children's roles. From then on, it seemed that fate had tied her to the stage and youth for the rest of her life.

In 1970, Pham Thi Thanh was sent by the State to the Soviet Union to study stage directing. After seven years of study, she returned home and female director Ha Nhan invited her to write a project to establish a theater dedicated to youth and teenagers called the Youth Theater. Pham Thi Thanh immediately agreed and used all her knowledge to complete the project and it was approved by the Ministry of Culture and Information (now the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism).

In 1987, the Youth Theatre was established. Ms. Ha Nhan was the Director, and Pham Thi Thanh was the Deputy Director in charge of art. People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh was in charge of recruiting and directly training the first generation of actors of the Youth Theatre, including many talented actors later on such as: Le Khanh, Lan Huong, Minh Hang, Anh Tu, Chi Trung...

During her time working as an art manager at the Youth Theatre, People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh discovered the playwright Luu Quang Vu's talent as a reporter for the Stage Magazine. She commissioned Luu Quang Vu to write his first play about Hero Ly Tu Trong, "Song Mai Tua 17" and directly staged it with great success.

After that, People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh continued to commission Luu Quang Vu to compose a series of new scripts. From then on, the "perfect pair" Luu Quang Vu-Pham Thi Thanh joined hands to create 25 famous plays for the Youth Theater and many other theater units across the country in the 80s, 90s of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st century such as: "The 9th Oath", "The Last Summer", "Innocent Heart", "The King Turns into a Tiger", "The Case of 2,000 Days", "The Good Man in House No. 5", "If You Don't Light a Fire" ...

The leadership position of the Youth Theatre helped Pham Thi Thanh become a member of the Executive Committee of the International Theatre Association for Children and Youth (ASSITEJ) and President of the Vietnam ASSITEJ Association. She has traveled to many places around the world, studying and learning about theatre arts for children and youth, making many contributions, contributing to building a solid foundation for the Youth Theatre to exist and develop into one of the leading performing arts units in the country today and always being loyal to theatre for young people.

Later, when she became Deputy Director of the Department of Performing Arts, her love for theater and youth made People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh think about bringing theater to high schools. She was not only the one who conceived and wrote the project "School Theater" but also personally mobilized and sought funding from the Ford Foundation to implement it in 2005-2006.

Later, when she became Deputy Director of the Center for Research on Preservation and Promotion of National Culture, she and Professor Hoang Chuong continued to present the “School Stage” project to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, the Ministry of Education and Training and the Government. The project was approved by the Government, allowing it to be implemented for many years and was not completed until 2015.

The project built a stage performance team in many primary schools in three regions of the country. Initially, it was planned to perform only tuong and cheo, then, due to the practical needs and wishes of the schools, it was expanded to three other traditional stage subjects: Nghe Tinh folk songs, Hue folk songs and cai luong. To carry out the project, each school was fully equipped with microphones, lights, stages, backdrops, and costumes.

There have been very successful reporting performances. People's Artist Le Tien Tho, when he was Deputy Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism, together with People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh and Professor Hoang Chuong, watched high school students perform Tuong and could not contain his emotions and exclaimed: "The future of Tuong is here, not anywhere else"...

After 2015, the project "School Stage" has continued to be implemented in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City and several other localities, contributing significantly to helping high school students understand, love and come to traditional national stage.

During her career, People's Artist and director Pham Thi Thanh has made great contributions to Vietnamese theater by staging more than 200 plays, of which about 20 won Gold Medals and several won Silver Medals at national theater festivals and performances. Ms. Pham Thi Thanh was awarded the title of People's Artist in 1997 and received the State Prize for Literature and Arts in 2012.

During her career, People's Artist and director Pham Thi Thanh has made great contributions to Vietnamese theater by staging more than 200 plays, of which about 20 won Gold Medals and several won Silver Medals at national theater festivals and performances. Ms. Pham Thi Thanh was awarded the title of People's Artist in 1997 and received the State Prize for Literature and Arts in 2012.

What is admirable is that despite being busy with staging programs and stage plays, the talented director spent a lot of time working on the "School Stage" project, spreading the love of national stage to regions and localities across the country for 10 years, ignoring many invitations to stage programs and plays with remunerations of hundreds of millions of dong to wholeheartedly devote himself to public stage projects where the performers had almost no income, sometimes even using his own money to pay for schools and student actors or buying more costumes so that the project could be implemented as desired.

As a close friend, I remember People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh once confided that she devoted so much heart and effort to the "School Stage" projects because "Simply because I love the stage and the youth are the future of the stage, sir".

In the past 10 years, when People's Artist Pham Thi Thanh was sick and her memory was somewhat impaired, every time I visited and talked to her, she still mentioned a lot about the Youth Theater, about her once famous stage friends like Luu Quang Vu or artists Le Khanh, Chi Trung, Lan Huong, Anh Tu... and especially about working on "School Theater" with "children".

I understand that this great artist and talented director of Vietnamese theater has devoted all his talent and passion to the theater and the youth...

NGUYEN THE KHOA

Source: https://nhandan.vn/nghe-si-nhan-dan-pham-thi-thanh-tron-doi-cong-hien-cho-san-khau-va-tuoi-tre-post906288.html