4. Arson at the Avatar/Old Omashu Opera House - coming on the heels of the premiere of a new play by a Northern playwright that flatters the Ba Sing Se government. Is it a coincidence or is someone making a political statement? The official police are making no headway in their investigation and the mayor is demanding the assistance of the tangs in figuring it out, lest the provincial governor become involved.

Background

The date is Fall of 93 AG, 93-10-28. / 永無17年10月28日 - About two weeks after the last Beigang one-off.

The Old Omashu Opera House (奥瑪舒老劇院)

This grand play house is located in the heart of downtown of Beigang, and it's the preeminent cultural attraction of the city. It's a large, roughly pyramid-shaped building which is clad in sandstone to resemble the buildings of Omashu. The building, which is 425 years old and dates to the era of the water Avatar Kuruk, is decorated with ornate carvings of traditional Omashu opera scenes. However, many years of freeze-thaw cycles (not so much of a problem in Omashu) have taken their toll and the sandstone has been weathered enough that many of the figures are unrecognizable. Those near the entrance are kept up better.

The opera house was a gift of the King of Omashu to the people of Beigang, in gratitude for the rescue of his son by an earthbender in Omashu whose ancestral home was there. It was badly damaged when the armies of Chin the Conqueror and a warlord supporting the Hao-Ting dynasty in Ba Sing Se clashed, but by that time it had become a beloved cultural institution of the city and was renovated and expanded when Beigang was rebuilt.

The character of Omashu Opera (the art form itself) is something similar to Sichuan Opera.

Two Omashu opera companies, the Agate Boat Opera Company and the Mysterious Mountain Opera Company, share the opera house for their productions. The Agate Boat is the original one sent by the King of Omashu centuries ago, the Mysterious Mountain split off from it over a hundred years ago. They are nowadays on good terms and sometimes even give joint productions. Both include descendants of the original actors sent by the king from Omashu.

Besides the two Omashu opera companies that jointly own the opera house (along with the government of Beigang), other actors and troupes use the venue, sharing a cut of the profits with the owners.

Surroundings

The opera house's adjacent area includes the Omashu village, which is where the King of Omashu who donated the opera house had an Omashu-style residential area built for the actors and craftspeople he sent to Beigang. Because it ended up being in a very valuable downtown area, the Opera House eventually sold most of this property and it was redeveloped. (By that point, most of the opera company members were native-born Beigangers and didn't particularly care to live in Omashu-style houses.) However, a few of the buildings were kept for ancillary purposes, storage, and cultural interest, including a bathhouse and an inn, which sells Omashu-style cuisine to this day.

Elsewhere on the street are largely uninteresting trading houses.

What happened

The Seventh Month Literary Society

Witnesses

Other characters