Shufeng Yayun Sichuan Opera (蜀风雅韵, Shǔfēng Yǎyùn)

Sichuan opera (川剧, Chuānjù) is loud, fast and wildly different from the stately Peking variety. The signature is bian lian (变脸, biàn liǎn) — face-changing — in which a performer flicks their head or sweeps a sleeve and a painted silk mask vanishes to reveal another beneath, then another, up to a dozen in under a minute. The technique is a state-protected secret and watching it live from six metres away, you still cannot see how it's done.

Shufeng Yayun, in a courtyard theatre inside Chengdu Culture Park, is the most established venue. The nightly 90-minute variety programme runs through folk music on the erhu and suona, a comic sketch, hand-shadow puppetry (surprisingly the crowd favourite), fire-spitting, a stick-puppet routine, and the face-changing finale.

Set your expectations correctly: this is a tourist show, packaged and paced for foreign and domestic visitors, with heavy amplification and English side-titles. It is not a serious night at the opera. But the performers are properly trained, the theatre itself is a beautiful old wood-and-lantern space, and the pre-show hour — tea in a bamboo chair while a makeup artist works in front of you — is half the value.

Seats are tiered: roughly ¥148 ($21) at the back, ¥190–220 ($27–31) mid, and ¥260–280 ($36–39) for front-row VIP with a snack platter. Mid-tier is plenty. Liyuan Theatre nearby offers a similar show at comparable prices if Shufeng Yayun is sold out.