Yao Yao Jiang: How Much Longer Can Guo Degang and Deyunshe Last?
This article explores the political censorship, multiple public opinion storms, and commercial tour obstacles faced by Deyunshe and Guo Degang in recent years. It analyzes the domestication and crisis faced by the satirical ability of impromptu banter in their wild xiangsheng under the tightening political and cultural environment, and deduces the future survival destiny of Deyunshe.
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Hello everyone, I am a thinker who values logic.
On July 24, 2026, at the Wuhan Zhongnan Theater. Guo Degang, dressed as Jigong, sang My Beloved Earth Pipa and casually changed Weishan Lake in the lyrics to the Forbidden City. As soon as the laughter from the audience subsided after discussing fundraising and singing red songs, the report video was already uploaded online. Eighteen days later, the Wuhan Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau filed a case; on September 7, the organizer had their illegal gains confiscated and was fined over 480,000 yuan, and the theater was also penalized. Guo Degang's subsequent multiple performances were canceled, and Deyunshe's social media stopped updating. Over the years, Guo Degang has scolded associations, satirized the Spring Festival Gala, and poked fun at the propaganda department's anti-vulgarity campaigns. Every time he was criticized, his popularity actually rose instead. Why this time did the hot-tempered Guo Degang not talk back like before? Not long ago, we discussed who Zhao Benshan actually offended. As an emerging art form after the rise of television galas, sketches, which inherently possess a satirical nature, have been castrated. Stand-up comedy, which suddenly became popular in recent years, has also had its nature of criticizing current social ills almost completely castrated due to a certain inscription by Chairman Xi. Entering the new era, looking back, a new Cultural Revolution of our time has truly been quietly underway for about a decade now. Today, wild xiangsheng represented by Guo Degang has also experienced this overhaul, and what will the consequences be? In other words, how much longer can Guo Degang perform xiangsheng? And what will the future of Deyunshe be? Today, let's deduce this.
People on stage all say ten minutes is enough, but you insist on doing forty minutes and expect better effects than others; if you don't want to offend anyone, why don't you just do ten minutes too? Yet you don't want to do it that way.
In 1995, 22-year-old Guo Degang went to Beijing to seek his fortune. He had no formal affiliation with any arts organization, nor did he have the connections to arrange performances for him. He performed crosstalk in teahouses and played bit parts for film crews; sometimes there were only a few audience members in the seats. This is not a simple story of talent going unrecognized. What Guo Degang actually collided with was a crosstalk system that had been operating for decades. After 1949, crosstalk was incorporated into the state-run arts system. In 1950, the Beijing Crosstalk Improvement Group was established to clean up the dirty jokes, ethical offenses, and so-called backward content in traditional crosstalk. Crosstalk could still be satirical, but who to satirize, how far to take the satire, and what conclusion to reach were increasingly determined by political needs. The deepest change brought by the crosstalk improvement was not the reduction of dirty jokes, but the change in who fed the performers. In the old days, artists stood on the Tianqiao overpass; if the audience didn't laugh, they didn't eat. After entering state-run troupes, the performers' salaries, professional titles, and stages came from their units. The audience was still important, but they were no longer the sole judges. Whether the leadership was satisfied, whether the program could pass censorship, and whether the political direction was correct determined whether a performer could continue to stand on the big stage. This also changed the direction of crosstalk satire. One could criticize a salesperson for a bad attitude or criticize a cadre for bureaucracy, but it was difficult to ask why bureaucracy always exists. One could satirize the Gang of Four because the Party had already declared them enemies of the people; but one could not point out who stood behind the Gang of Four, nor could one point out the truth to the audience before the highest power had defined it. Crosstalk was originally an art form that gained laughter through offense; after entering the CCP's arts system, who could be the object of offense was no longer decided by the performers themselves.
After the Cultural Revolution ended, crosstalk ushered in a brief golden age. Performers could satirize bureaucracy, nepotism, and social misconduct, but this satire still had a premise: it criticized individual bad cadres and individual backward phenomena; it could not make the audience doubt the entire system.
"Fake cigarettes and fake alcohol are repeatedly banned, especially fake medicine, which harms lives. May I ask Mr. Feng if you have any ideas to turn this around?" "Using my idea is very easy, just say it right out. You didn't say that fake medicine, right? Progress only harms people, that's right. I'll give you four words: you said it right, B-group No. 95." Television began to become popular, and the Spring Festival Gala became the biggest stage. Crosstalk performers had to rely on cultural troupes, television stations, the Quyi Artists Association, professional titles, and awards. Whoever could get on TV was a famous master; whoever could get on the Spring Festival Gala was considered a national performer. As for whether the people in the audience were laughing, that was secondary. Guo Degang was not qualified to enter this distribution system and had to find his own audience. In 1996, he organized the Beijing Crosstalk Assembly, later renamed Deyunshe. At the most difficult time, a ticket sold for only two yuan, there were only three or five people in the audience, and the performers had to stand outside the door to solicit customers. When early Deyunshe performers stood on stage, the audience's laughter decided on the spot whether the punchline landed or not. Guo Degang later called himself a "non-famous crosstalk performer." This title was self-deprecating on the surface, but in reality, it was a challenge to the entire crosstalk world within the system: "You have titles, associations, and galas, I don't; but when you perform crosstalk, no one listens, while I have people buying tickets. What does the loss of over a billion audience members count for?"
"Your position is very gentle." "I don't even know where I'm standing." "I must be elegant." "He doesn't want to listen? Then don't listen! Serves him right!"
In October 2004, Hou Yaowen officially accepted Guo Degang as his apprentice. Hou Yaowen was not only the son of Hou Baolin but also served as the deputy head of the China Railway Art Troupe and vice chairman of the Quyi Artists Association. This apprenticeship gave Guo Degang the lineage status he had been missing, but it did not send him directly to the mainstream stage. That same month, Beijing Radio host Da Peng went to the Tianqiao Le Teahouse to record a Deyunshe performance; this was their first entry into broadcast media. Around 2005, these crosstalk recordings spread through the internet and pirated CDs, and "The Current Situation of Fifty Years of Crosstalk" became one of Guo Degang's signature works. This piece of crosstalk did not tell a complete story but listed a series of absurd phenomena in Chinese society: people with knowledge don't necessarily write books, and people who write books don't necessarily have real knowledge; unit leaders aren't necessarily competent, and those who are removed aren't necessarily bad people; pharmacies don't necessarily just sell medicine, and people who go to karaoke halls aren't necessarily there to sing. The last sentence landed on the crosstalk world—crosstalk stars don't necessarily know how to perform. If you only listen to the last sentence, it is scolding peers; if you connect it to the preceding setup, it is scolding a common set of rules in Chinese society: ability has nothing to do with position, professionalism has nothing to do with power, and what is written on the sign has nothing to do with what is actually sold inside. Guo Degang did not point out any specific leader, nor did he accuse any specific unit; he only placed the absurd results caused by the system on the table. Everyone could fill in the blanks with the section chiefs, experts, professors, and famous actors they had seen. Just because some things aren't said on TV doesn't mean the common people can't see them.
His comic dialogue "I Want to Have a Scandal" turned this set of rules into a street scene. Guo Degang went to the gate of a film and television school to wait for a girl and found that all the cars parked there were expensive luxury cars: major entrepreneurs from Beijing were all hanging out there. When the school bell rang, the girls came out and got into their respective cars. Because these flashy men had improved something in art and expressed it, please respect yourselves, we only sell depth and artistry, not ourselves. Without naming specific schools or bosses, the audience already understood; he was talking about the entertainment industry, but the audience thought of official circles, hospitals, and their own work units. Positions and opportunities are often not distributed according to ability.
Guo Degang also liked to adapt the so-called red culture familiar to the audience. His comic dialogue "Lenin in 1918" borrowed characters and plots from classic Soviet films and interspersed them with Pingju, Jingyun Dagu, and Hebei Bangzi.
Lenin, don't worry, 11 because at this time I asked my driver Vasily. Lenin was no longer the revolutionary mentor who had to be looked up to in political textbooks, but became a character on the variety stage who could be imitated, displaced, and ridiculed. Looking back today, this piece of work was very important. Guo Degang did not suddenly touch upon revolutionary themes in 2026; he had long been accustomed to taking solemn figures and melodies from official culture and polishing them into punchlines in his comic dialogues. Guo Degang's anti-establishment stance back then was not against the Chinese Communist Party, nor did he want to be a political dissident, but rather against the monopoly of qualifications, fame, and the stage by the literary and art circles inside the system. He believed that box office revenue beats professional titles, audiences beat associations, and live performance effects beat leaders' opinions. The problem is that China's literary and art system has never been just a trade association; behind it are television stations, propaganda departments, and political discipline. The more Guo Degang proved that audiences could bypass this system, the more the system had to answer one question: who on earth is qualified to decide what constitutes a good comic dialogue?
The first label the system slapped on the non-famous comic actor Guo Degang was vulgarity.
Must be elegant and have good taste last time. Guo Degang never shied away from vulgarity in his comic dialogues; he talked about bathhouses, karaoke bars, clients, and mistresses, and also made jokes about Yu Qian's father, wife, and children. It was precisely these punchlines that provided the critics within the system with the handiest weapons. As long as a few ethical punchlines were clipped from his works, Guo Degang as a whole could be labeled as vulgar, without having to answer his satire of the association's monopoly, bureaucratic hypocrisy, and the language of political movements.
I am firmly against the traditional collection of fees in small theaters, but I hope he himself realizes the vulgar and low-class things and quickly changes his appearance. An aesthetic debate was thus transformed into a qualification review; whoever has the power to define elegance has the power to decide who deserves to stay on stage. The very title of the comic dialogue "You Must Be Elegant" was a retort in itself. Others demanded that Guo Degang be elegant, but he deliberately used homophones such as blogs, clients, clicks, and prostitutes to make the whole comic dialogue even more vulgar.
Playing and liking to play good guys, all kinds of animals are not spared. What does it mean that none are spared? It means raising those small animals, raising all kinds of things, small dogs, pigs, pheasants, and so on. He was also scared to start.
Why did the audience laugh? Because those sanctimonious people on stage were full of civilized language in their mouths, but behind the scenes they were familiar with all the rules of erotic establishments. Guo Degang's logic was very direct: society is not clean to begin with, so why demand that comic dialogues pretend to be clean? Officials can keep mistresses, bosses can keep female students, and bathhouses and KTVs can hang regular signs while running a different set of business, yet when an actor points it out, it becomes vulgar.
Another comic dialogue, "I Want to Fight the Three Vulgarities," went a step further. Guo Degang fabricated an anti-three-vulgarities association in his work. The members of the association were full of lofty words, claiming to be people detached from low tastes, yet their actions were inseparable from tasks, quotas, and targets. They ran to a bathhouse hiding special services to execute their mission, and finally, under the pretext of completing the mission of fighting the three vulgarities, accepted the very services they were supposed to combat.
What are comic dialogues used for? You say they are for educating people? Is this calling your name?
He imitated not only the comic dialogue community, but also the language model of Chinese Communist Party political movements. From the Three-Anti and Five-Anti campaigns and the Anti-Rightist Campaign to the Cultural Revolution, every movement had slogans, organizations, targets, and people who needed to be ferreted out. Guo Degang brought the language of this political movement into the bathhouse, and the target of satire was thus exposed: a group of hypocrites waving the banner of morality while doing deeds to satisfy their own selfish desires. People off the stage did not need to study political history to understand the satire within. Chinese people are all too familiar with this scene: the people who shout the loudest at meetings act the most ruthlessly after the meeting disperses; the ones who investigate others are the biggest beneficiaries of the rules themselves. In July 2010, Hu Jintao proposed that the cultural field should resist vulgarity, kitsh, and pleasing the public, and the propaganda system subsequently launched propaganda against the three vulgarities. The moral criticism that originally existed in the literary and art circles was elevated by the top leadership into a cultural movement. The slogans, tasks, and rectifications that Guo Degang used to ridicule on stage began to target him personally in reality.
Guo Degang and Beijing Television were not enemies originally. After rising to fame in 2005, Beijing Television once strongly promoted Guo Degang and even created "Star Night Story Show" for him, putting a...
Except for taking a photo in this skirt, you are the beacon lighting my way in my heart, you are my goddess! But are you really only eighteen years old?
Guo Degang used Beijing TV to expand his influence, and Beijing TV used his fame to boost ratings. The two sides truly fell out one month after Hu Jintao issued the call to "oppose the three vulgarities" (vulgar, low-brow, and kitschy). At the time, someone reported that Guo Degang's villa was encroaching on public green space. Reporters from Beijing TV's "Daily Entertainment Report" rushed to the vicinity of Guo's residence to film, leading to a conflict with Guo's disciple, Li Hebiao, who struck a reporter. Guo Degang believed Beijing TV's report.
After going to investigate, Guo Degang's apprentice Li He had a physical altercation with the reporter. Subsequently, the reporter claimed to have been beaten and rolled down the stairs, meeting the cameraman Zhou Wangfu who had been beaten. Then this person, this headquarters, the injuries including my shoulder, it was his knee, on that knee, it was all, all twisted facts. Instead of distancing himself from his disciple, he publicly retorted, claiming the reporter was not even as good as a prostitute. Former partners who once leveraged each other thus became openly warring enemies.
Li Hebiao, he is just an ordinary person doing odd jobs. That was a bad idea.
However, what the propaganda system handled next was neither a single physical altercation nor a harsh word, but rather used this dispute to settle scores for Guo Degang's years of satire against associations, TV stations, and the "anti-three-vulgarities" movement. At the beginning of the month, CCTV News Channel aired a commentary that, while not naming him directly, criticized a public figure using terms like "vulgar," "low-brow," and "kitsch." Bookstores and audio-visual shops in Beijing began removing Guo Degang's products, local TV stations pulled programs he participated in, and Deyunshe announced a suspension of performances for internal rectification. A conflict that occurred at the entrance of a residence was thus packed into the political pocket of "opposing the three vulgarities." By the time the public began to argue about whether Guo Degang was vulgar or lacked morality, the fact that associations monopolized the stage and propaganda departments decided who could speak was instead obscured.
This siege was massive, but it did not truly block Guo Degang. In 2010, Guo Degang still had two cards in his hand. The first was the small theater. TV programs could be pulled, and audio-visual products could be removed, but as long as Deyunshe reopened, the audience could still buy tickets. The second was the newly emerging internet. Guo Degang's recordings had already been copied onto countless computers and mobile phones. The propaganda department could order shops to remove them, but it was difficult to make everyone forget those sketches. The more the authorities called him vulgar, the more the audience felt he was simply exposing the ugliness of those "elegant" people. Deyunshe reopened shortly after stopping performances for rectification. Guo Degang was not driven off the stage; instead, he completed a dangerous upgrade, transforming from a folk performer shunned by his peers into a cultural symbol who dared to talk back to TV stations, associations, and propaganda slogans. This survival gave Guo Degang a judgment: the mainstream could scold him and dislike him, but it could not cut off his relationship with the audience. Years later, that same mainstream that had scolded him for years personally invited him to take the stage.
Actress, in order to get a role, they all sleep with the director.
Is there such a realistic situation? It's none of my business, right? I'm very angry, there are too few female directors with a sense of justice! In the crosstalk "I Want to Go to the Spring Festival Gala," Guo Degang told of an unspoken rule in the entertainment industry: if you want to get a role, you have to sleep with the director. To get an opportunity to perform, he also decided to "sacrifice for art." He found a female director, and after showering and changing clothes, he went to knock on her door. Unexpectedly, when the door opened, a male producer was already lying in the room. The punchline revealed not just the unspoken rules between men and women, but a power chain that goes up layer by layer. The actor thought the director could decide the role, but only upon reaching the door did he realize that the director herself also had to please the producer who controlled the projects and funds.
In the apartment, there was a play where I encountered a female director, and you happened to run into her. That year she was thirty-six, not too old, and I was twenty-three. It was about the same. I thought, for the sake of art, I will sacrifice myself. Actors look for directors, directors look for producers; every layer has to trade with those who control resources. As for who actually has the ability to perform, that is not important. This is the true irony of the name "I Want to Go to the Spring Festival Gala." The Spring Festival Gala is the highest stage that all actors in the country want to enter, but it is not decided by who the audience buys tickets for. Actors have to go through layers of directors, censorship departments, and TV stations. The bigger the stage, the fewer people control the entrance. Guo Degang's rebellion back then lay exactly here. Actors within the system had to enter the Spring Festival Gala through layers of connections, but he bypassed this door and relied directly on small theaters and the internet to let the national audience hear him. Without going on the Spring Festival Gala, he could still become popular; the Spring Festival Gala did not acknowledge him, but the audience already had.
However, in 2013, Guo Degang went anyway. That year, he and Yu Qian made their first appearance on the CCTV Spring Festival Gala, performing the crosstalk routine "The Spendthrift: Thank You, Thank You, the Two Hosts Just Now Were Also Pretty Good, Li Yong and Zhu Jun, Two Girls." For Guo Degang, this was undoubtedly a victory. A man who once could not even enter an official Beijing arts troupe finally stood on China's biggest official stage. Those who used to say he was not mainstream could no longer pretend he did not exist. But an interview on CCTV's "Face to Face" left the other half of the story. Guo Degang said that the program was not finalized until close to the live broadcast, and he had to finish within a little over ten minutes when he went on stage. Someone in the front row kept holding up signs to remind them to perform for ten minutes, twelve minutes, fourteen minutes. For small-theater actors, crosstalk should adjust its rhythm according to the audience's reaction; if a joke lands well, you can milk it a bit longer, and if the crowd is cold, you can temporarily change a line. Rigidly fixing the time was destroying the performance rules of crosstalk. But at the Spring Festival Gala, he accepted director Ha Wen's more direct statement. It was understandable that the audience liked those things Guo Degang did in small theaters, but the Spring Festival Gala was watched by multiple generations of a family together, so not everything could be said, and it had to be measured.
This was not an ordinary requirement for duration and family viewership. CCTV's conditions for acceptance were very clear: Guo Degang could go on stage, but the on-the-spot satire that Guo Degang made his name on had to stay off the stage. Guo Degang also knew this trade-off. In the small theaters, he satirized the Spring Festival Gala; on the Spring Festival Gala stage, he followed the rules of the Spring Festival Gala. Standing up there meant that his market victory finally received official authorization. Putting away a part of his edge on the Spring Festival Gala stage was the price of this authorization. This cannot be explained by a simple sentence like "Guo Degang surrendered." For Deyunshe to expand, Guo Degang had to cooperate with television stations, local governments, theaters, and commercial platforms. The real reversal also happened here. In his early days, he relied on the audience to break free from the mainstream, but after achieving success, there were more and more things that needed mainstream approval.
That same year, Beijing TV Station President Wang Xiaodong passed away, and Guo Degang published a doggerel poem that was interpreted as gloating. The China Radio and Television Association immediately called on television institutions nationwide to boycott him. This boycott still did not make him disappear. Deyunshe already had its own theaters, tours, and fans; if the television system did not invite him, he could still sell tickets. Success after success in breaking through allowed Guo Degang and his audience to accumulate an experience: as long as the box office remained, administrative boycotts could not crush Deyunshe. Over the next decade, Deyunshe transformed from a crosstalk tea house into a national entertainment brand. Actors like Yue Yunpeng, Zhang Yunlei, and Guo Qilin entered variety shows, movies, and commercial performances, and Deyunshe's national tours grew larger and larger. This folk troupe, which started on master-apprentice relationships, finally built its own system for actors, training, theater management, and commercial distribution.
Guo Degang relied on the market to build an entity strong enough to rival the association. The larger this organization became, the more inseparable it was from the approval, theaters, and communication channels controlled by the government. In 2024, Guo Degang was appointed as the vice chairman of the China Culture Promotion Society and also hired as the honorary president of the Tianjin Pingju Opera Theater. Moving from a "non-famous crosstalk actor" to these positions showed that the system did not intend to simply drive him away; it needed Guo Degang's fame for reviving traditional performing arts, and also tried to lock him into a safe representative figure of traditional culture. This is also a frequently overlooked contradiction in Xi Jinping's cultural policy. The official side needs Peking opera, crosstalk, calligraphy, and traditional Chinese studies to prove so-called cultural confidence, but what it needs is traditional culture that can be displayed, performed, and praised. When Guo Degang sings Taiping lyrics, teaches young people to learn counting rhymes, and learns traditional routines, he is a contributor to traditional culture; once traditional forms are used to satirize today's power, they immediately turn from cultural heritage into ideological risks. At this time, another set of regulatory rules has already reached into his small theater.
The biggest difference in performance style between Guo Degang and mainstream crosstalk actors is the on-the-spot ad-libbing (xian gua). Ad-libbing is not just an actor casually adding a line after forgetting their words, but the most important live performance skill in crosstalk. Depending on the performance city, the day's news, the audience in the seats, and the partner's reaction, content is temporarily added or changed. The same program can produce different effects in Beijing, Wuhan, and Xi'an. Audiences who pay money to go to the venue are precisely there to hear those few lines that are not in the recordings. Guo Degang and many actors rely more on ad-libbing. He will make jokes about the news happening on the day, and will also deliberately push his partner until they cannot catch the line, and then find new jokes from the live reaction. Jokes and surprises can appear in every show, which is precisely what makes Deyunshe's live performances and online recordings the most attractive. The television station's way of dealing with surprises is recording in advance, rehearsals, and editing. The value of the small theater lies precisely in being free from the control of these procedures.
In September 2020, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism issued a notice on the management of the performance market. The document, while claiming to promote market prosperity, simultaneously demanded that the bottom line of "ideological security" be upheld. It explicitly stated that content involving major revolutionary and historical themes, major decisions of the Party and the state, and heroes and martyrs must be subject to key review. For language-based programs in small theaters such as stand-up comedy, crosstalk, and avant-garde plays, content review and on-site supervision must be strengthened. It was no coincidence that this document singled out small theaters. Movies have scripts, TV dramas can be edited, and televised galas can be rehearsed repeatedly, but live language-based performances can always have an extra sentence added at any moment. What the regulatory authorities are truly worried about is not the program list submitted for approval, but that one sentence an actor might improvise after seeing the audience's reaction.
The Regulations on the Administration of Commercial Performances require that programs be submitted when applying for a performance. If the main content of the program changes, it must be re-submitted for approval. If organizers and venue operators discover prohibited content during a performance, they must not only stop it immediately but also report it to the cultural and public security departments. The public can report such incidents, and verified reports can even lead to rewards. The penalties are not merely symbolic. Failing to re-submit programs for approval, or if a performance contains content deemed to endanger social morality or damage national interests, can result in the confiscation of illegal gains and fines of up to ten times the amount; in serious cases, the performance license may be revoked. In 2023, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the Ministry of Public Security issued further requirements for large-scale commercial performances with audiences of over 5,000 people, stating that "whoever hosts is responsible." Organizers must submit safety and public opinion risk assessments when applying, and the performance site must verify the actors and program content, with no unauthorized changes allowed. While the document mainly targets large-scale performances, it pushes a clearer logic of accountability onto the entire industry: artists generate box office revenue, while organizers bear the risks.
On the surface, this is called "solidifying corporate responsibility." In reality, it outsources censorship to those most afraid of losses. Regulatory authorities do not need to send people to follow Guo Degang and write every line of his script; as long as they make everyone in the performance chain bear joint liability, they will proactively demand that actors say less. After all, an actor can finish a show and leave, but the theater's license must continue to be used—who would want to take a risk for an unpredictable ad-lib? The stand-up comedians of 2023 have already shown the entire comedy industry this pattern of punishment. A live metaphor was recorded and reported, and the heavy penalties fell not only on the actor but also on the company behind them and the entire performance series. Since then, whether for stand-up or crosstalk, organizers know that "actor improvisation" is no longer a bonus; it sometimes means incalculable operational risk.
In 2005, when crosstalk actors within the system criticized him for being vulgar, he could say that as long as the audience likes it, that's all that matters. In 2010, when CCTV criticized him for being vulgar, he could reopen the doors of Deyunshe and let the audience vote with their ticket purchases. But when the target of punishment becomes the organizers and the theaters, even if the audience likes it, they cannot save their licenses. Guo Degang is still on stage, and the microphone has not been taken away. But the narrow space of the small theater that protected him for years is being eroded.
On November 26, 2025, Guo Degang and Yu Qian performed "Artistic Skill Makes One Timid" at the Beijing Exhibition Center Theater. This crosstalk piece lasted about 33 minutes, and what really caused trouble was not a few dirty jokes, but a segment satirizing state-run art troupes. "When the troupe holds a meeting, it's really lively, isn't it? The troupe leaders sit in a row, then the business directors, art critics, and theorists sit in a few more rows, and then they know the actors have four roles, let them pretend, they made one of our troupe's artists, the only artist... the original electrician later switched to become an artist." Why do these punchlines land? Because the audience knows that what Guo Degang is describing is not just one art troupe, but a common scene in units within the Chinese system: more leaders than workers, laymen deciding the fate of experts, and snitching being more important than professional work.
On December 2, someone filed a complaint about this show through the Beijing 12345 hotline, accusing the performance of featuring vulgar humor, shit-and-piss jokes, and off-color remarks, while specifically adding: Guo Degang "spread rumors and smeared state-owned performance troupes." A screenshot of the 12345 response circulating online showed that the Xicheng District Culture and Tourism Bureau subsequently interviewed the organizers and performers, demanding a script revision and prohibiting the reuse of lines that could easily trigger negative public opinion. The association also publicly stated that it was monitoring the matter and would uphold a "clean and upright industry ecosystem." After the controversy fermented, a video of Guo Degang went viral online. On stage, he said: "I am just a maggot that has been sleeping for a thousand years, how should I put it? One day if I wake up, I will definitely disgust the whole world." Many interpreted this as an insinuation against the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). However, it remains unconfirmed whether this quote actually came from the show "Art High, Courage Small" at the Beijing Exhibition Center. "Art High, Courage Small" served as the prelude, and eight months later, the same reporting mechanism pursued him to Wuhan. This time, what awaited Guo Degang was no longer just a warning and script revision, but a formal case filing, confiscation of illegal gains, and a tenfold fine. On the evening of July 24, 2026, Guo Degang performed the eighth volume of "Ji Gong Living Buddha" in Wuhan. Playing Ji Gong, he wore a ragged hat and held an old fan, presenting an image where any rule could be made the butt of a joke. During a musical segment, he sang "Play My Beloved Tuba." This song comes from the 1956 film "Railway Guerrillas," which tells the story of anti-Japanese guerrillas fighting on Weishan Lake. In 2019, departments including the CCP Central Committee Propaganda Department included it in the 100 outstanding songs celebrating the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. It is long no longer just an old movie interludes, but an officially certified revolutionary memory. Guo Degang changed the place names in it to the "Forbidden City" and followed up with a few playful phrases with Buddhist connotations. The entire process lasted only a short while, the audience laughed, and the performance continued. If this were Deyun Society twenty years ago, it probably would have been just an extra gift for that day's audience. Yet today, every audience member holds a smartphone. After the video was uploaded, someone reported Guo Degang to the Wuhan Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau, accusing him of distorting and mocking revolutionary songs. On August 11, the Wuhan Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau officially filed a case. The facts provided by the investigation were crucial: the entire performance had obtained a permit, but the impromptu adapted lines sung by Guo Degang did not appear in the submitted approval materials. On September 7, the penalty results were announced. Authorities determined that Guo Degang had "distorted and tampered with famous songs depicting the War of Resistance," causing a severe negative social impact. The sponsoring company was warned, its illegal gains of 687.4 RMB were confiscated, and it was further fined 486,874 RMB. Wuhan Zhongnan Theater, which provided the venue, was also penalized. Why was the organizer fined with such precision? Because the fine was exactly ten times the illegal gains. Whatever the performance earned, the penalty decision multiplied it directly according to the regulations. After the incident fermented, a self-media author with the online moniker "I'm Just a Word-Slinger" entered the public eye. In this public opinion campaign surrounding Guo Degang, he was not a temporary onlooker, but one of those who long stood at the forefront searching for issues, compiling materials, and pushing for reports. His Toutiao account has over 100,000 followers, and his public profile lists him as a "member of the China Association of Literary and Art Critics." In recent years, his content has focused heavily on Guo Degang and Deyun Society, with titles such as "Exposing Crosstalk Star Guo Degang: He Has Always Been a 'Subpar Idol'," "If Guo Degang 'Disappears', He Will Soon Be Forgotten by the Audience," and "Zeroing Out: All of Guo Degang's Commercial Performance Sessions Canceled"... From these titles alone, it is evident that what he cares about is no longer just whether a particular crosstalk bit is funny, but whether Guo Degang should continue to appear on the public stage.
According to the account "Wo Jiushi Ge Mazide" (I'm Just a Word-Smith) himself, in 2025, Beijing Deyun Culture filed complaints against several of his videos in the company's name. When he discussed Hou Baolin and "anti-vulgarity" on a livestream, he was also reported, resulting in a three-day ban by the platform. Later, when he criticized "Yi Gao Ren Dan Xiao" (High Skill, Low Courage), the relevant content received continuous complaints. He interpreted these actions as Deyun She using capital and fan power to suppress critics. However, when it became Guo Degang's turn to be the one reported, his explanation changed immediately: Deyun She's complaint against him was capital suppressing a small self-media creator. In reality, it is the same weapon; both sides simply place themselves on the side of justice. What is truly worth noting is not which side struck first, but the new role represented by "Wo Jiushi Ge Mazide." He is familiar with platform rules and official language. He knows how to take a joke from a stage performance out of context and translate it into an issue that administrative departments can handle. Implying state-run troupes, damaging the industry image, spreading vulgar content, distorting literary and artistic policies, hurting national sentiments, and tampering with red classics. Guo Degang tells jokes, while he is responsible for organizing those jokes into reporting materials; what the audience hears are punchlines, but what he looks for are entry points for reporting. The satire of state-run troupes in "Yi Gao Ren Dan Xiao" can be interpreted as "smearing state-owned literary and artistic units"; a line in an overseas performance, "Let a hundred flowers bloom, fart," can be dismantled as disrespect for the Party's literary and artistic guidelines; in Wuhan, the "Weishan Lake" in "Playing My Beloved Earthly Pipa" was changed to "Forbidden City," which was then escalated to distorting anti-Japanese war songs and hurting revolutionary memories. This is the change Guo Degang is facing today. In the past, his opponents were the mainstream crosstalk circle, television stations, and the Quyi Association. Although the two sides were irreconcilable, it was still a clash between peers. Now, he is facing a set of procedures that are more decentralized and harder to guard against. Positive-energy bloggers dismantle lines, online public opinion amplifies charges, the public reports through platforms and hotlines, and finally, the culture and tourism departments initiate cases and impose penalties. Why can a movie interlude trigger this chain? Because in the Xi Jinping era, anti-Japanese war movies, heroic figures, martyr stories, and red songs have all been incorporated into the same set of constantly reinforced red revolutionary memories. The authorities can remake, adapt, and repackage them, or assign them new meanings according to today's political needs. Private creators, however, do not have equal interpretive power.
Luo Changping is a ready example. He is not an ordinary netizen, but a once-prominent investigative journalist who served as the editor-in-chief of the depth reporting department of The Beijing News and deputy editor-in-chief of Caijing magazine, and once caused a sensation by reporting the director of the National Energy Administration, Liu Tienan, under his real name. In 2021, he used homophones on Weibo to mock the "ice sculptures" in the movie "The Battle at Lake Changjin" and was subsequently sentenced to seven months in prison for the crime of infringing on the reputation and honor of heroes and martyrs, and was ordered to apologize publicly. An investigative journalist who had exposed issues of high-ranking officials ended up in prison for a sarcastic remark on Weibo. This signal is clear enough: once red memory is incorporated into legal and political protection, satire is no longer just satire, and jokes can be redefined as crimes.
Yet on the other side, works that truly turned the history of the War of Resistance into a spectacle were once able to pass censorship and enter television stations openly. The "tearing apart Japanese soldiers by hand" in "Anti-Japanese Miracle Heroes" was broadcast during prime time on satellite channels in Shandong, Heilongjiang, Jiangxi, and Henan; the "crotch" scene in "Fighting the Japanese Together" also obtained a distribution license and entered local television stations in Sichuan. One went to satellite TV, the other to a local station; neither were online short dramas secretly uploaded by netizens. These works filmed war as vulgar entertainment, death as juggling, and history as a physiological spectacle. It was not until the scenes became so absurd that they became a national joke that the relevant departments began to criticize "anti-Japanese fantasy dramas." But before the criticism, what should have been filmed was filmed, what should have been reviewed was reviewed, and what should have been broadcast was broadcast. This is the most absurd part: as long as the political direction is correct, history can be contrary to common sense; once the power of interpretation is uncontrolled, a punchline or a homophone can become evidence of a crime. The problem has never been about who respects history more, but about who possesses the power to interpret history. What is truly dangerous about Guo Degang is not how sharp a certain sentence is, but that he can always drag the solemn symbols of the temple back to the folk, allowing them to become things that can be imitated, displaced, and joked about again. In the past, this ability helped him break through the blockade of the mainstream crosstalk circle. Today, the same ability has become his political burden. Guo Degang's subsequent performances in Xi'an and other places were cancelled or postponed. The organizers gave reasons including "venue issues," but the ticketing platforms not only refunded tickets but also covered part of the travel and accommodation losses. Deyun She's social media stopped updating, and Guo Degang did not publish articles to fight back as he did in the past. The three characters "Forbidden City" added another layer of political association to the incident. It is a symbol of imperial power, and it is also easy to think of the highly concentrated supreme power today. But whether Guo Degang was subjectively implying Xi Jinping is no longer important. The CCP does not need to prove who he really wanted to satirize; as long as this adaptation was not approved and it encountered a protected revolutionary narrative, the punishment machine could be started.
The danger lies right here. If an actor publicly criticizes a certain official, at least everyone can still discuss whether what they said is right or wrong. If the reason for punishment is 'changing the show without prior approval,' discussing whether the content is right or wrong loses all meaning. Improvised comedy in crosstalk was never meant to be fully approved in advance, otherwise, it would no longer be improvised. In 2010, when officials called him vulgar, he could counter-ask what elegance actually meant; when peers said he was ruining crosstalk, he could let the ticket-buying audience judge. In 2026, the punishment decision does not argue with him about art; it simply states that this segment was not in the approval materials, the organizer failed to stop it, and the theater failed in its responsibility. If he continues to hurl insults back, the ones taking the punishment for him will not be CCTV commentators, but the companies and theaters willing to host the next stop of the tour. In 2005, amateur recordings and online audio carried Guo Degang from small theaters to the entire country. In 2026, the live videos on audience mobile phones sent him back into the files of the culture and tourism bureau. Technology has not changed; the way power uses technology has changed. A month ago, he was still a name on tour posters that guaranteed box office revenue. A month later, that same name became a variable that organizers had to write into risk assessments. This is the true crisis for Deyun Society. It is not that Guo Degang cannot afford a fine of hundreds of thousands of yuan, but how many theaters will be willing to believe in the future that once he steps on stage, he will only say what is on the approval materials? Then, how much longer can Deyun Society survive? If 'survival' is understood as the company continuing to operate, disciples continuing to perform, and theaters continuing to sell tickets, Deyun Society will not collapse overnight just because of a single fine from Wuhan. It has a mature team of performers, a loyal audience, brand-name theaters, and overseas markets. What is truly entering a countdown is the most vibrant part of Guo Degang-style crosstalk.
Guo Degang today has three identities. The first is that of a traditional folk art master. He can tell storytelling, sing Taiping lyrics, and is familiar with Peking Opera, Pingju, and Hebei Bangzi. The CCP emphasizes cultural confidence and needs people like this who can bring young audiences back to folk art venues. This Guo Degang can not only exist, but may also continue to receive titles from folk associations and theater troupes. The second is that of a commercial brand owner. As long as Deyun Society sticks to approved content, manages its performers, and minimizes accidents, local governments have no reason to voluntarily give up box office revenue, tourism, and consumption. This Guo Degang also has room to continue surviving. The most dangerous identity is the third one: the person who temporarily changes lines based on the day's news, turning associations, TV stations, officials, and political slogans all into comedic fodder. Guo Degang was best at utilizing gray areas in the past. He never stood on stage to deliver political declarations, but rather said something ambiguous, letting the audience fill in the blanks themselves. Yet today's censorship no longer waits for him to spell out the meaning. As long as someone can make sensitive associations, as long as a video might generate public opinion, ambiguity itself therefore becomes... His most likely political fate is not being suddenly arrested, nor is Deyun Society being completely banned by an administrative order; what is more likely to happen is a slow process of domestication. Completely banning Guo Degang may not be the best choice for the CCP either. He has too many audiences, and Deyun Society indeed allowed a declining traditional folk art to regain a young market. Driving such a person away completely would make 'cultural confidence' look awkward, and could also turn an administrative punishment into an even larger political event. Allowing him to resume his past performance style is equally impossible. Wuhan has already openly filed a case and issued a punishment, and if the next tour features sensitive improvised lines again, local culture and tourism departments and theaters will have no way to explain why they failed to prevent it in advance. The remaining path is to separate the usable parts of Guo Degang from the dangerous parts. The Guo Degang who can perform traditional folk art, train disciples, and attract young people can exist; the Guo Degang who satirizes reality and adapts red political symbols at a moment's notice must be locked into an increasingly narrow scope. He will perform again, but new performances will be subject to increased censorship; he can still tell traditional routines, but improvised lines involving practical politics will decrease. Deyun Society will still cultivate stars, but what they learn first may no longer be how to capture the day's social sentiment, but how to avoid an expanding sensitive list. The sign remains, but that thorn most easily pricking power is pulled out little by little, though the audience may not necessarily stay.
At the beginning, we said that a Cultural Revolution of the new era has been going on for more than a decade. Guo Degang and others may seem to have had different experiences, but in the end, they are heading toward the same result. After Zhao Benshan, sketches did not disappear, but the sketches on gala shows became increasingly afraid to touch upon real-world power, and their appeal to the audience gradually dropped to zero. After the incident, talk shows restarted, but the entire industry first learned what could not be said; after Wuhan, crosstalk might retain all its forms, but it loses the ability to improvise jokes based on the day's news, the live audience, and social sentiment. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) does not need to eliminate these arts; it only needs to remove the function of satirizing reality. If there are fewer and fewer improvisations and satire becomes more and more distant, and all programs are performed strictly according to the approved materials, why would the audience spend hundreds or thousands of yuan on tickets to go to the venue specifically to listen to a crosstalk performance that is no different from a video recording or a gala show? Relying on Yue Yunpeng, Guo Qilin, and a group of star actors, Deyunshe can still maintain itself for a while; relying on the fan economy, variety shows, and the signboard of traditional culture, it will not collapse immediately. But stars will age, fans will change, and the popularity of variety shows will pass. What truly makes the audience buy tickets show after show is always the possibility of accidents happening on stage, and the possibility that Guo Degang and his apprentices might say something unexpected in the next second. Now, what the punishment in Wuhan has taken away is precisely this kind of accident. This puts Guo Degang in an unsolvable dilemma: continuing to be Guo Degang may mean losing the theater and the organizers; being transformed into mainstream crosstalk means losing the audience and the business. Thirty years ago, he used a few tables, a teahouse, and the laughter of the audience to revive an art form that had been killed off by mainstream galas. Thirty years later, the CCP did not move his tables or take away his microphone; it just forced him to become more and more like those mainstream actors he once criticized. Deyunshe may not die, but the crosstalk that was revived by Guo Degang may have to die once again. That is all for today. If this episode is valuable to you, please like, turn on the notification bell, and share it. You are also welcome to subscribe to this channel. Friends who are able to can join as members to support our small channel. This is the logic-focused Yaoyao Jiang, see you in the next episode.