As early as the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, the Kunqu Opera class in the south of the Yangtze River began to train actors in small classes. Adult actors took care of young actors while acting, and the scale of personnel was usually small. Pan Zhiheng, a dramatist in the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, wrote "The History of Eternal Romance?" An example of "Hao Kecheng's Small Class" is recorded in Music Skills.
The rapid development of Peking Opera is the mature stage of Peking Opera, and Beijing Peking Opera training first appeared in Xianfeng period. According to Fang Wenxi's Liyuan Dialect, "There were many Foucault classes in the Qing Dynasty, and now Liao Ruochen is the star. That is to say, in a corner of Beijing, there were the earliest classes of Qing Sheng Ping and Qing He Cheng, and all of them were mainly Kunqu opera. Followed by Shuangqing, Shuangkui, Quanfu, Xiaofusheng, Xiaosongzhu, Sanqing and Sixi classes, about between Tongzhi and Guangxu; He is a little later, such as Xiao Rongchun, Fu Sheng, Yucheng, Xiao Hechun, and Shengdukui. Xiao Hongkui, Changchun and other shifts. "
The prosperity of Peking Opera art has greatly promoted the development of regular classes, and the learning skills of regular classes have increasingly become the mainstream of Beijing Opera successors' training. During this period, Coban's position was "the imperial examination like a scholar, which was the right way for a performer to be born".
Class is a social organization based on class club, and its teaching purpose is very clear, that is, to train young actors to take the stage as soon as possible and make profits for the troupe. All classes worship Tang as their ancestors and worship him every day. Everyone who enters the class must set up a written evidence, just like making a whoring contract, which not only means beating and cursing, but also means serving three years in prison after work. Therefore, in the old society, it was dubbed acting, and seven years in class was called seven years in prison. The students enrolled in the class are all between the ages of seven and eleven, and they have completed all subjects in seven years (that is, graduated). Students can enter the class for one year, at most two years, and then they can go on stage. After three years, talented children will have the ability to give up their seats, and the next four years will be the time for the monitor to earn money.
The class with the greatest influence and the longest running time is the rich (happy) class. Fu Liancheng, as the most successful class in the history of drama education, was first funded by businessman Niu Zihou, founded by Ye Chunshan and taught by Xiao Changhua. Established in 1904 and closed at 1948. In the past 44 years, * * * has trained more than 700 actors, which are divided into "Lian" and "Fu" according to the year of entry. Many of these actors later grew up to be excellent performing artists on the Peking Opera stage and made great contributions to the innovative development of Peking Opera art, so Fu Liancheng became the most successful class to train childhood actors. Many of its teaching and training ideas and methods have also had a great impact on contemporary drama education, and can still be used as a research model for today's drama education.