Convicted Spy's Affair Inspired 'M. Butterfly'
By T. Rees Shapiro
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, July 3, 2009
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/02/AR2009070203691.html (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/02/AR2009070203691.html)
Shi Pei Pu, a Chinese operatic soprano who along with his French lover was convicted of espionage and whose complicated affair inspired the Tony Award-winning Broadway play "M. Butterfly" and movie of the same title, died June 30 in Paris. An aide confirmed Mr. Shi's death to Agence France-Presse and said he was 70.
Mr. Shi had been working as a librettist and soprano for the Beijing Opera and taught Chinese to diplomat families when he met Bernard Boursicot in 1964 during a Christmas party at the home of a mutual associate. Boursicot, then a 20-year-old clerk working for the French Embassy in Beijing, later said the relationship started platonically, out of interest in forging "a good friendship with a Chinese person."