Tianjin is the cradle of North China modern drama, and the birthplace of Li Shutong (Rabbi Hongyi), the one who laid the foundation of Chinese modern drama. In 1908, the forerunners of Chinese modern drama, Wang Zhongsheng and Liu Yizhou, led "Chunyang Troupe" from Shanghai to perform in Tianjin. This was the earliest modern drama performed here. The center of early Chinese modern drama activity was Tianjin Nankai Middle School. Then Yan Fansun and Zhang Boling both advocated modern drama and set up "Nankai New Troupe". Zhou Enlai was a cadreman there. He has joined in the writing, directing, playing of modern drama, and has published related theoretical articles. Many talented people emerged due to the active modern drama activity there. Cao Yu, Huang Zuolin, Xie Tian, Shi Hui, etc. All have benefited from the nurturing of Tianjin modern drama activity. In 1930's and 1940's, many troupes came to perform and made Tianjin modern drama stage prosperous again. After the victory of the war against Japanese, some troupes with progressive tendencies often came to Tianjin to perform progressive modern dramas, such as "Kong Que Dan" and "Hu Fu" written by Guo Moruo, "Wen Tianxiang" Written by Wu Zuguang, "Sheng Guan Tu" written by Chen Baichen, etc.
After 1949, some theatre troupes brought new theatrical performance, they put on operas like "Our Own Army and the Civilians", Which brought new tendencies to the stage. In the 1950's and 1960's, Tianjin modern drama became more flourishing. In 1951, the people's Arts Theatre of Tianjin was set up, writers and artists of this arts theatre wrote and performed a lot of excellent plays, such as "Family", "Thunderstorm", "Chai Tou Feng", "Flying Snowflakes Welcome the Spring", etc. And they also cultivated a lot of good actors. After the 1980's, the People's Arts Theatre of Tianjin again wrote and performed some influencing plays, which was contributive to the flourishing modern drama stage and movie and TV screen of Tianjin.
