NEW YORK CITY—When Levi Browde first heard about the bomb threats targeting a theater in Taiwan, worries whirled in his head.
His two sons were scheduled to perform there with Shen Yun Performing Arts.
Based in upstate New York, Shen Yun has performed for millions of audience members around the world over the past two decades, showcasing traditional Chinese culture under the banner “China before communism.”
And the Browde family has seen it firsthand.
The film premiered at the AMC Lincoln Square in Manhattan on the evening of March 24 to a full house.
The film crew did not know how far it would go with the project at the beginning. It started off with a special report, and evolved over time as more findings came to light, said executive producer Steve Lance.
As the team asked questions, followed the performers to different venues, and watched them train, the work took on a life of its own, he said.
On the one side, there has been a “very sophisticated, all-encompassing, full-spectrum influence campaign coming out of China, all to target this group,” he told The Epoch Times.
“Yet, here they are, 20 years later, unbroken,“ he said. ”That was sort of the conclusion that we came to.”
Lance recalled watching the performers set up the stage on the day of their performance at Lincoln Center in 2025. They were doing a warm-up routine.
“Next thing you know, all 10 or 12 dancers on stage in unison, their legs go straight up over their heads, and they hold them there,” he said. The level of focus and the passion he saw in their eyes, he said, made him see how this group is different.
“These aren’t people who are trying to make a name for themselves.”
At the premiere, New York City Council member Phil Wong brought two proclamations, one from him and another from his predecessor Robert Holden, who did not get to present it during his term. It is a double celebration for the art company’s 20th anniversary, he and his staffer said.
“They love what they do,” Wong said of Shen Yun, noting that the group has “done so much” to preserve an art form almost lost.
“The choreography is just perfect.”
At the red carpet, Shen Yun dancers showcased a rainbow of colorful handmade gowns that drew inspiration from ancient dynasties. Performers who spoke to The Epoch Times said they hoped to show the audience another side of Shen Yun not often seen.
‘Battle in Our Backyard’
The Browde family likened their experience to being on the front lines of a battle.“We all feel the pressure,” Browde told The Epoch Times.
The battle did not start in the United States. It began when the Chinese Communist Party launched a nationwide persecution against practitioners of Falun Gong, a meditation practice based on the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance.
The campaign was systematic, combining hate propaganda, financial pressure, mass arrests, and torture in an all-out effort to crush the practice. Untold numbers of practitioners have been killed, including through forced organ harvesting to fuel the regime’s lucrative transplantation industry.
From around the world, a group of artists came together in 2006 with the hope of shining a spotlight on the Chinese regime’s human rights abuses and reviving China’s cultural heritage, creating what became known as Shen Yun.
From the company’s inception, the regime has been determined to put it down, using diplomatic and financial levers in attempts to pressure hosting countries and theaters—sometimes successfully. However, over the past few years, Beijing’s efforts have escalated further.
Meanwhile, more than a dozen stories attacking Shen Yun and Falun Gong began appearing in The New York Times.
Browde, whose family has read The New York Times since the Eisenhower days, said he almost felt “betrayed” when he saw those stories.
“It is by far the best example in my own life of the failure of the Times to cover news properly,” he said.
“It’s sort of like there’s two theaters to this war,” he said.
Raising awareness about persecution in a far-off land is hard enough, he said, “but now we have to deal with the campaign that’s here in America trying to silence us, intimidate us, and, perhaps most importantly, convince other people they shouldn’t listen to us.”
It feels much more like “a battle in our backyard,” he said.
‘Fighting the Good Fight’
Many among the audience on March 24 professed shock after walking out from the screening.“Shen Yun is a portrait of an ancient society that has been dismantled and broken down by a regime that didn’t believe in freedom,” TV producer Maria Cavenaghi told The Epoch Times. “The first thing that the dictator does is to silence culture, to silence the voices of people.”
Actress and model Kimberly Magness described the documentary as “surreal.”
“The bomb threats, the tire slashing, the fact that there were all these attacks and Chinese spies—like I had no idea about any of this,” she told The Epoch Times. She said her favorite moment from the film was when one of the dancers said that the mind can be what holds one back, which she relates to as a performer, she said.
“The fact that they persevered through all of this, and they still perform, and they still make this magic happen, it says so much,” she said.
She said she hopes to meet the artists to show support. “They are such strong people, inside and out,” she said.
Actor Thomas Copeland, also based in New York City, likewise expressed admiration for the performers’ drive. He encouraged the artists to “keep fighting the good fight.”
“Everybody deserves freedom,” he said.
Difficult as it may be, the artists and their families said they are forging ahead.
“We’re giving a voice to ... peoples of belief in China who have no voice,” Browde’s elder son, Jesse Browde, told NTD ahead of the event.
It is “much bigger than myself,” he said.
