burmese opera

anyone ever encounter any pwe --- burmese opera? just reading an old nytimes article where the writer attends a street performance in mandalay.

any info in general on performance in myanmar (apart from the moustache brothers) would be appreciated....

A pwe is usually something of a combined show these days, often seen at large pagoda festivals. There may be concerts with Burmese TV stars, electric guitars and Burmese versions of every western pop song ever written. There will also be a classic performance with traditional musicians, dancers, comedians, the old-style pwe. These tend to start late in the evening, 9pm or so, and may go until dawn. The comedy is usually so broad that even the non-Burmese speaker can find it quite entertaining. Audiences are very casual, and tend to drift in and out of the show, rather than arrive at the start and stay until the end.

We had one just down the street form our hotel in Nyaung Oo (Bagan). It lasted three nights, starting around 4-5 pm each night and went non-stop until around 6-7 am. We got little sleep since everything was broadcast at high volume through loudspeakers. We attended one night and it seemed to be mostly Burmese pop singers and bands until after midnight when it went over to comedy acts and some dance groups. Although it was entertaining at times, most of what we saw was a bit tiring and at times boring (especially a lot of the pop music). Since we are not Burmese speakers, a lot of the comedy was lost on us and the humor that was obvious was along the classic slapstick lines. The locals, on the other hand, were greatly entertained and people watching was probably more fun for us than the performances. It was obviously a very large Pwe and we saw no examples of the more unusual aspects like the Shaman-like men dressed as women or people dancing with meat on their heads that I've read about. For us it was very entertaining for about 2 hours and then became tiring. But, that was our take and others my love staying all night. After being kept awake all night for three days we were happy to see it end and so was everyone else where we were staying, including the hotel staff. The staff complained more about it than we did.