Civilized drama refers to a new form of drama with words and actions as the main means of expression under the slogan of "re-learning the new school", also known as new drama, China's early drama, which was popular in Shanghai at the beginning of last century. There is no formal script during the performance, and the screen system is adopted, which can be improvised.

Civilized drama originated in the late 1930s, and evolved from ten kinds of acrobatics staged in Tianjin Qutan. The content includes not only drums and cross talk, but also acrobatics, tricks and magic.

"Civilized Opera" is an early reform of Beijing Opera. The scripts of civilized dramas are all adapted from the current affairs stories circulated by the people in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China. Such as official tide, fisherman's daughter, sawing bowls. Most of the plots are about suppressing evil and promoting good. Good people are rewarded and bad people are rewarded.

The civilized drama is matched with the Beijing Opera Civil and Military Field, singing in Beijing, and the dialogue in Beijing is blank. Sing with Bai Sanqi and develop in the direction of drama. There are not many scenes in civilized dramas, only a dozen or so.

But each play is divided into several episodes, and only one episode is performed every day, so it will not be repeated for a month. In order to make the play lasting violence, there are many jokes in the play, which look similar to the current comedy sketches.

The influence of civilized drama

Civilized drama not only influenced China's later dramas, but also influenced the development of China's films, Yue Opera and Pingju Opera.

Keisuke Shirai, a professor at Wenjing University in Japan, in his book The Blending of Film and Drama-On How Ming Opera Performances Inflow into Early Films, from the textual research of China's film history, demonstrates that China Film and Drama Research Association is the first film production institution in China's film history, which was founded by Chen Shouzhi, Shi and others.

The film Yan, which is based on 1920 Shanghai murder case, is related to the origin of the new civilized drama staged on the stage. This paper also discusses that China's early films (silent films) were influenced by civilized dramas in performance methods (such as "exaggerated stage performances"), such as "Love of Labor" and "The Orphan Save the Ancestor".

Zhongshan Wen, a professor at Kobe College University, discussed the influence of civilized opera on the development and performance of Yue Opera through his contribution to the development, creation and performance of Yue Opera by Fan Dimin, a civilized opera actor.