Category Archives: Kabuki/Bunraku/Noh

Mitani Bunraku: Much Ado About Love Suicides (其礼成心中)

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  • 其礼成心中 (Much Ado About Love Suicides)

I see they’re bringing back the Bunraku puppet parody Much Ado About Love Suicides (Sore Nari Shinju) of 2012 by the prolific stage and film writer Mitani Koki. The show riffs on the popular double-suicide (shinju) puppet dramas of the early 1700s by Chikamatsu Monzaemon, Japan’s most famous playwright. The highly conservative Bunraku world, unlike Kabuki, has made little attempt to innovate or attract new audiences and has struggled as a result. It has been left to individuals such as Mitani and the renowned photographer Sugimoto Hiroshi to take up the mantle. Mitani is primarily known as a comedy writer (Warai no Daigaku; Welcome Back, Mr. McDonald), so expectations were generally along those lines. Here is a review of the 2013 Tokyo revival.

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Noh: Kagetsu, Fujidaiko, Dai-e (花月、富士太鼓、大会)

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  • Noh: 花月、富士太鼓、大会  (Kagetsu, Fujidaiko, Dai-e)

6/17/18 (Sun), Umewaka Noh Theater, Tokyo

These pieces are not necessarily among the best known Noh dramas, so I was surprised to see the theater 85-90% full, a huge contrast from the many empty seats last time. Then I looked at the program: the Kyogen comic interlude (not described here) featured the TV and movie heartthrob Nomura Mansai. I guess Noh audiences are as star-struck as anyone. But it was heartening that nearly all remained for the last two pieces even after the Kyogen finished. Continue reading →

Kabuki: Money Talks (人間万事金世中)

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  • 人間万事金世中 (Money Talks)

5/13/18 (Sun), Tokyo National Theater (Zenshinza)

A rare full-length production of the 1879 Kabuki adaptation of Bulwer Lytton’s 1840 comedy Money by the prolific Kawatake Mokuami, who reset the piece in modern-day Yokohama. Between those years, Japan had undergone a momentous change from centuries of military rule to parliamentary rule (constitutional monarchy) in 1868, and the wrenching effects this had on society were ongoing as Mokuami took up his pen (or brush).

Mokuami learned of the play second-hand (I doubt he spoke English or actually read the script) and follows the broad outline, such as names reminiscent of the original, e.g. the strange Efu Rinnosuke – Efurin for short – for Evelyn. But he reworked the show seamlessly for a Japanese setting. His career spanned the Edo and Meiji Eras, and he was a sharp observer of the changes in the transformation from feudal society, where position was determined largely by birth, to a money-driven capitalist ethic. This play is a so-called zangiri (cropped hair) drama depicting characters in modern hairstyles and occasional Western dress, a performance style that never really caught on – audiences remained enamored of Edo, and the Western experiment (including the brief use of actresses) was eventually dropped. Still, this show stands as a valuable portrait of its times.

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Kabuki: Kumagai’s Battle Camp, Kojo, Gion Ichiriki Teahouse (熊谷陣屋、祇園一力茶屋)

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  • Kabuki: 熊谷陣屋 (Kumagai’s Battle Camp)、木挽町芝居前（口上） (Kojo Name-Announcing Ceremony)、忠臣蔵七段目（祇園一力茶屋）(Gion Ichiriki Teahouse)

2/16/18 (Fri), Tokyo

A friend was suddenly unable to attend and asked me to escort his date. It didn’t take much to convince me: this was the second month of a two-month name-taking celebration for three generations in the Matsumoto acting family, the first such occurrence in 37 years, and tickets had been sold out well before the show opened. The atmosphere was electric. Koshiro has taken the name Hakuo, Somegoro has become Koshiro, and Somegoro’s 12-year-old son Kintaro is now Somegoro. It’s going to take a while to get used to that.

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Bunraku: Shinju Yoi Goshin, Gappo’s Daughter Tsuji (心中宵庚申, 摂州合邦辻)

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Bunraku

  • 心中宵庚申 (Shinju Yoi Goshin), 2/12/18 (Sun), Tokyo
  • 摂州合邦辻 (Gappo’s Daughter Tsuji), 2/13/18 (Mon), Tokyo

Shinju Yoi Goshin (Double-Suicide on Koshin Eve): The penultimate show in the great Chikamatsu Monzaemon’s long career and his final sewamono (home drama), staged in 1722. It was based on an actual double-suicide that occurred, according to one source, only two weeks (!) earlier, though as usual interpreted creatively by the author. It apparently competed with another show staged simultaneously by his erstwhile rival Ki no Kaion on the same theme – they worked fast in those days. (Another source puts the actual suicide in the previous year, which would make more sense.) The production today didn’t include the curious first act, where Hanbei chooses a suitor for his younger brother – all males lusting after a male companion with surprising words of passion. The suitors point out that the castle town in the play doesn’t have any laws against this as exist elsewhere, and neither brother seems to have a problem with the boy becoming effectively a male wife. Hanbei chooses one who is willing to make a noble sacrifice. An interesting footnote in gay Japanese theater, if such a genre exists.

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Noh: Tamura, Hyakuman (田村、百万)

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  • Noh: 田村、百万 (Tamura, Hyakuman)

4/16/17 (Sun), Umewaka Noh Theater, Tokyo

This was a nice pairing of shows since both, in a seasonal touch, were set in the cherry blossoms. They were also both explicitly religious and offered fast-paced kakeri (described somewhere as “anguish dances”).

I was particularly interested in Tamura since, unlike the typical laments by felled soldiers, it’s one of only three warrior pieces in Noh that are about winners. (I saw another, Yashima, just a few months earlier.) This play is also unusual among the warrior shows in that it is not about one of the 12th-century Heike battles but an event that comes several hundred years earlier. Continue reading →

Noh: Youchi Soga (夜討曽我 )

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  • Noh （夜桜能）: 夜討曽我 (Youchi Soga)

4/5/17 (Wed), Yasukuni Shrine

The cherry blossoms were in full glorious bloom for Yasukuni Shrine’s annual outdoor Noh series this year, so the setting was magnificent. Gensho, a National Living Treasure, had played the previous night in the wonderful Saigyozakura (西行桜), but I opted for tonight since it was a play I hadn’t seen. My friend was late, so I missed the torch lighting and had to watch the opening dance from the back. Grr.

The Noh piece, Youchi Soga, has an unusual pedigree. The author Miyamasu is a contemporary of the pioneering Zeami, but while the latter went all aristocratic once the shogun took him in, the former continued to write common man’s Noh – not a genre I was even aware of. His plays apparently are nearly all genzai plays featuring living people as opposed to ghosts, with actual plots and lots of characters. A good number are about the Soga brother vendetta that also features so prominently in Kabuki.

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Kabuki: The Cuckoo…, Murder of a Foreign Envoy (沓手鳥孤城落月, 漢人韓文手管始)

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  • Kabuki: 沓手鳥孤城落月, 漢人韓文手管始  (The Cuckoo, the Solitary Castle and the Sinking Moon; Murder of a Foreign Envoy)

10/17/17 (Tues), Tokyo Kabukiza

The Cuckoo, the Solitary Castle and the Sinking Moon is a piece in the modern Shin Kabuki (New Kabuki) genre by the 20th-century playwright Tsubouchi Shoyo surrounding the historic destruction of Osaka Castle in 1615. Hideyori was supposed to have inherited the mantle of leader after his father’s death but was outwitted by the wily Ieyasu, who is now moving in for the coup de grâce. With the enemy outside the gates, Hideyori’s family and forces debate whether to go down with dignity or run for their lives. The one ace they have is Ieyasu’s granddaughter Princess Sen, who is in a political marriage with Hideyori. They hope that her presence will help waylay an outright massacre by her grandfather. Ieyasu has sent a spy to kidnap her back, but she is being watched vigilantly by Hideyori’s suspicious mother Yodo. The drama concentrates on the emotional toll that the pressure takes on the characters in the besieged castle, most notably a descent by the frantic mother into madness.

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Kabuki: Hade Kurabe Ise Monogatari (競伊勢物語)

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  • Kabuki: 競伊勢物語 (Hade Kurabe Ise Monogatari)

9/15/15 (Tues), Kabukiza

Hade Kurabe Ise Monogatari (A Colorful Rivalry: Tales of Ise) is another convoluted but entertaining piece by Nagawa Kamesuke, the same guy who wrote the classic Meiboku Sendai Hagi (which is playing in the afternoon). The program noted that this is the 1,200th anniversary of the birth of one of the show’s main characters, Ki no Aritsune.

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