Two expats make up the first-ever English crosstalking duo (2)

A different kind of laughter

Traditionally, xiangsheng is a whimsical Chinese comedy act in the form of a conversation between two performers. Suggestive and rich in puns, crosstalk is executed in a quick-fire, teasing manner.

Today, xiangsheng remains a traditional art form with little direct or serious satire toward politics, instead incorporating topics dealing with daily life, such as skits about McDonald's or KFC, for example.

If your Chinese language skills have graduated to the point where you can understand the distinctive sound of crosstalk gushing out of a Beijing cabbie's radio, then you might have concluded that xiang­sheng is the comedy version of tantric sex; there isn't always a punch line to finish up a joke and the emphasis is instead on the setup to those punch lines.

"When people see xiangsheng for the first time, they say, 'Oh this is like Chinese standup, right? Then why aren't there a lot of punch lines?'" says Fulbright Scholar Appell, 22, a Brandeis University alumnus hailing from Boston.

Appell has focused his grant on learning Chinese culture through the performance art of xiangsheng, famously mastered by fellow North American Mark Rowswell, aka Dashan, a prominent celebrity in China after numerous CCTV Spring Festival Gala appearances starting in the late 1990s.

Dashan found xiangsheng's closest English equivalent to be Abbott and Costello's 1930s baseball wordplay masterpiece "Who's On First." The basic premise is that Costello enquires of Abbott who is on first base, to which Abbott replies, "Who is on first base," as if there was a person called Who. Get it? What is playing second base and I Don't Know is on third. Comical misunderstandings ensue, and so it goes with xiang­sheng.

"It's a different kind of laughter," says Angiers, 31, originally from Vancouver, Canada, who has been under the tutelage of famous crosstalk master and teacher Ding Guangquan for four years. With a goofy laugh, Angiers says that delivering xiangsheng in English shouldn't be a problem for people who don't know any Chinese or who aren't even in China.

"It should be clean and there should be culture in it and it should be funny," he says. "That's basically it. We want them to find it both interesting and funny."

Appell feels that in theory at least, the style of crosstalk performance shouldn't be too difficult to deliver in English "in terms of the actual performance aspect of it."

"It's very understandable [for the audience] to have two guys on stage doing their bit," continues Appell, who also studies under the guidance of Ding.

With Appell and Angiers, audience members don't need to have a masterful command of the Chinese language to understand the nuances of cross­talk dynamics. Though the pair still has some creases to iron out in their act.

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