Wei Changsheng

Also known as Zi Wanqing · Wei San

Wei Changsheng, courtesy name Wanqing and called Wei San as the third son, came from a poor family in Jintang, Sichuan, and went to Xi'an as a boy to learn qinqiang, specialising in female roles. In 1779 he came to Beijing with the Shuangqing troupe, and his coquettish role in Rolling in the Tower drew such crowds that, according to Wu Changyuan's Little Register of Swallows and Orchids, the six leading Kunqu companies were left almost empty. The rivalry came to be called the contest between the popular and the refined. Tradition credits him with spreading the pasted side-locks used in female-role make-up. He later performed in Yangzhou and Suzhou, and in 1802 he died backstage in Beijing after playing in Carrying the Child into the Mansion.