• Noh: 通小町 (Kayoi Komachi)

10/17/21 (Sun), Umewaka Noh Theater (Tokyo)

Talk about determination. Ono no Komachi, the legendary beauty, is stalked by a nobleman not just to the grave but beyond. As the story opens, a woman has been quietly leaving food for a monk every day during his seclusion. He comes to realize that this woman is the ghost of Komachi and goes to pray for her. The ghost reappears, joyful that she will finally achieve salvation, but is suddenly blocked by a mysterious figure. That turns out to be the ghost of the nobleman. It seems that she had promised her hand if he would visit her every night for 100 nights, which he dutifully obeyed. When they were about to drink their wedding sake, however, he realized that drinking would go against Buddhist precepts and refuses. Since Komachi could not marry him, she reasonably dumped him. Now, he wants to destroy her and threatens to curse the monk if the latter should grant her salvation, even after the monk says he will bless both of them. In the end, they are reconciled and are both able to receive the monk’s prayers.

This was a consistently entertaining show, especially in the dance-off between the two main characters in the second half. I’ve never seen so much movement by Komachi, who is usually portrayed in Noh as an aged woman bemoaning her lost youth. The nobleman’s ghost makes a memorable entrance, bent over and holding a large cloth over his head, then dramatically dropping the cloth to reveal a devil’s mask. (There is a variation in which he delivers his initial lines from offstage to suggest more clearly that he is calling from the grave, then enters with mask exposed. But the old version is more theatrical.) The story doesn’t quite make sense since he was after all the one to back away from the wedding, and it was surprising to see him turn down the priest’s offer of a blessing in a single-minded desire to bring Komachi down; it reminded me of Palestinian politics. But it was nice to see two people ultimately achieving salvation in a single show. The monk had a resonant voice that worked beautifully here, and both ghosts were superb. A thoroughly enjoyable piece.