Paul Vaughan visits Shanghai to report on the cultural life of this great city where ' all art is politics '.
Once described as ' The Paris of the Orient' in the days when Europeans ran it as a foreign settlement, Shanghai witnessed the birth of the Chinese Communist Party and was the centre of support for the recently discredited ' Gang of Four '.
I: is here that the most famous Peking Opera Troupe is based, and the School for Acrobats. Shanghai also boasts a conservatory for western music, a ballet school and the largest film studios in China.
How have the arts managed to survive the upheavals of the cultural revolution and the iron rule of Madame Mao ? Are there signs of a more liberal attitude by the authorities to theatre, music and literature?
Paul Vaughan attempts to find some of the answers. Producer BRIAN BARFIELD
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