Helping Grand Opera Land in Shanghai

SHANGHAI —  Bringing international productions to Shanghai’s new Grand Theater is an art in itself. As the government backs away from its old role as organizer, promoter and gatekeeper, arranging this season’s best acts seems to be a one-man show.

That man is Bonko Chan, the vice president of the largest state-owned air-cargo company in China, who produces operas in his spare time.

“I was sitting with a friend,” he said, perched atilt in a broken office chair, “and we were a little bit bored. I said, ‘Let’s do something a little impossible. Let’s bring an opera to Shanghai.’ We had a bet for $100, but I ended up spending a half-million. But I did it.”

That opera was “Romeo and Juliet,” with a half-international cast, and Shanghai was hungry for it. The performances sold out, Chan said, and suddenly the shipping boss with a taste for classical music was a de facto impresario.

“I had no experience in opera, so I ran it like a joint-venture company,” he said. “I have a little bit of experience in that. You have to market opera just like a product in China, research your audience, how to get the message across.”

The message he got back was, “Encore.”

Next came “Carmen” in a joint French-Chinese production, the ballet “Swan Lake,” and shows by tenor Jose Carreras. A production of “Aida,” from Florence, Italy, last month was his “masterpiece,” he said, with Shanghai acrobats, opera stars, symphony members and performers dressed as People’s Liberation Army soldiers playing the opera’s Egyptian warriors. This month, the French government will co-sponsor a production of “Faust.”

“Shanghai is a funny market,” Chan said. “With a population of 14 million people, it might be the biggest cultural market in the whole world, or it might be smaller than Cincinnati’s. The question behind why there is not more of an audience for arts and culture is whether we don’t have artists of quality, or whether they are just not very well marketed.”

He shifts in his tilting chair, takes a call on a cell phone, then his desk phone, arranges a driver’s license and shouts an order out the door. “The city is operating on the idea that ‘if you build it, they will come.’ But you must have well-trained cultural administrators, who know what is good, what is bad, and how to collaborate with artists from the rest of the world.”

Despite the political shoals that have snagged others’ efforts, Chan said the formidable Ma Bomin, the city’s top culture official, is an old friend who supports his endeavors. “The Culture Bureau has never said no to me. In fact, now they come to me and say, ‘What are you doing next year?’ ”

Chan is not only good at organizing collaborations with overseas art companies “who have something to teach us, something to leave behind,” he also has a knack for finding funding from foreign governments and institutions. The rest comes from the Chinese government, or from his shipping firm’s parent company, the Jinjiang Group. “The company is owned by the government too,” he said with a shrug. “It’s really all the same pocket.”

Bonko, as everyone calls him (“Every time I meet an English person, I think I’ve got to get another name”), is known around Shanghai as “a cultural mafioso,” and “the only one who can get things done.” He does have his own way of cutting through red tape.

His company contracted to ship the sets and costumes for a New York run of the opera “Peony Pavilion,” but when the negotiations stalled, he was stuck with six tons of crates taking up space in his warehouse. “I told them, make up your minds, or I’ll burn them,” he said, laughing. “The shipment went to New York the next day.”