Call it comedy with Shanghainese characteristics.

Stand-up comedian Zhou Libo, with his slicked-back hair and bad boy demeanor, doesn’t hold back when he’s on stage.

He has lampooned celebrities, Chinese leaders and local politicians alike. He has pounced on the rivalry between his hometown Shanghai and northern provinces. He’s even imitated Premier Wen Jiabao dealing with the famous Cambridge University shoe-throwing incident.

Delivering his act in Shanghai dialect, Zhou – who drew sell-out crowds to his live shows at Shanghai’s Majestic Theatre earlier this year – does it all on his own, without anyone else in the spotlight.

“Performing solo brings me more space for my imagination,” Zhou says.

It’s a far cry from traditional Chinese comedy acts in the past. Xiangsheng, literally meaning ‘face and voice’, but usually referred to in English simply as ‘crosstalk’, has long been seen as the only equivalent to Western stand-up comedy.

“Performing solo brings me more space for my imagination.”

But the two styles couldn’t be more different. Stretching back to the Qing Dynasty, xiangsheng normally has at least two performers engaging in a rapid fire dialogue routine, premised on a joke involving some kind of misunderstanding.

“Crosstalk is comparable to classic American movie dialogue skits, like Abbot and Costello’s ‘Who’s on First?’ routine,” says David Moser, an academic director at CET Beijing Chinese Studies specialising in Chinese media and culture. “It’s basically a staged dialogue with a straight man and a funny man, and all kinds of illogic ensues.”

Today, Chinese comedians are taking laughter to a new level. With crosstalk dying a slow death, its popularity waning, solo comedic stars are filling the void and taking their turn in the humorous spotlight. Scrapping scripted routines from the country’s comedic past, more up-and-coming Chinese comedians are braving the stage independently, moving in new directions that have many in China in hysterics. 

Where it used to be commonplace in teahouses, theatres, television variety shows and the radio, Moser says the number of xiangsheng performances has dwindled noticeably over the years. Part of the reason for its fall in popularity, is that its repertoire of dialogues, rehearsed over and over by different actors, have become less relevant.

“The thing about xiangsheng is that it draws on standard, traditional pieces. It can’t make fun of politicians, talk about sex or talk freely about certain things,” Moser says.

Chinese stand-up has long been a memorised, somewhat stiff and staged, affair. Compared to Western-style stand-up comedy, routines are rarely spontaneous, personal or topical, making it difficult for audiences to really feel engaged and chuckle at xiangsheng’s punch lines.

 “Xiangsheng is a traditional Chinese folk art form, but it seems it has passed its peak era,” says 42 year old Zhou Libo.

Described in the Shanghai Daily as “the talk of the town, as trendy as LV bags and haute couture, with many of his catchphrases seeping into street lingo”, Zhou has risen from obscure comedian status to being called a savior of local Shanghai culture in the last two years.

He grabs giggles from jokes he comes up with on his own, usually derived from reading 14 newspapers every day. Talking about Shanghai and current affairs in his humourous point of view, Zhou’s shows are more in tune with Western stand-up comedy. It’s propped up by his personality, and telling jokes entirely in Shanghainese has added to his touch.

 “Art without regional culture is colourless,” Zhou tells TALK. “To me, Shanghai dialect speaks for Jiangnan (south of the Yangtze) culture.”