Chinese puppet theatre company based in Yangzhou (Jiangsu Province). Founded in 1957 as the Puppet Troupe of Taixing County, the Yangzhou Puppet Troupe took its current name in 1983. Yangzhou Puppet Troupe has inherited a long tradition. With over a hundred performers and staff members, the company, which plays for family audiences, has ten major productions and forty medium and short plays in its repertoire. Complex behaviour and subtle expression mark the company style. Yangzhou puppetry is listed in the National Intangible Cultural Heritage safeguarding register.

Yangzhou Puppet Troupe’s The Fringed Iris Fairy won multiple prizes from the Ministry of Culture, including the Wenhua new play, best director, best performance, and music awards, and was cited as an excellent production in the Sixth Chinese Arts Festival. Snow White won the First Prize for Excellent Production in the Fifth Theatre Festival, as well as provincial awards and the Gold Prize in the third Golden Lion Award National Shadow Puppetry Competition. The troupe collaborated with Japan’s Kageboshi Company to perform the epic saga Tale of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguo zhi) which combined Japanese and Chinese puppet techniques and toured the United States with the show in 2000.

Yangzhou Puppet Troupe has been sent by the Ministry of Culture to over forty countries in Asia, Europe, and Latin America to promote international good will.

(See China.)