A documentary about the daily life for the few hundred students studying for a career there in the art of Chinese opera.
For the first time in its history, The Beijing Opera School, the largest of the 270 Chinese schools for the arts, agreed to open its doors to a film crew.
Structured around a typical day for some of these children and their teachers, we follow them from dawn to dusk in all their activities.
With morning acrobatics, martial arts, acting classes, make-up sessions, academic lessons, rehearsals and performances, we are plunged into the activities of an institution which in many respects has the discipline of a military academy.
Don Kent's spectacular images portray the daily reality of the demanding lessons. It is these very high standards that make Beijing Opera School students attain excellence in their disciplines.
In a country with a population of one billion, 300 million people, competition is fierce and only a handful of the opera school students will become stars. .
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