Performance Review Essay

8/13/2019 Performance Review Essay

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Asian Theatre Journal,vol. 26, no. 1 (Spring 2009). 2009 by University of Hawaii Press. All rights reserved.

reviews

Performance Review Essay:Japanese Theatre in Los Angeles

SHOCHIKU GRAND KABUKICHIKAMATSU-ZA.By Chikamatsu Monzae-mon. Directed by Nakamura Ganjiro III. Cerritos Center for the PerformingArts, Los Angeles. 22 June 2005.

BLOOD! LOVE! MADNESS!By Nakamura Kichizo, Kikuchi Kan, and Shi-

mizu Kunio. Directed by Brent Hinkley. Ivy Substation, The Actors Gang, LosAngeles. 14 October 2005.

HIROSHIMA MAIDEN.Created by Dan Hurlin. REDCAT (Roy and EdnaDisney/CalArts Theatre), Los Angeles. 5 November 2005.

In Mark Jacobsons 1991 novel Gojiro,the eponymous lizard, clearly based onThs Gojira(Godzilla), decides to attack and destroy Los Angeles, only to bedefeated by the scope of the city: It was the sprawl that did it, that L.A. whizzingby: the overwhelming sameness, the diffuse repetition. It dulled all passion,doused every fire. Ever spreading, the city was an amorphous sweep without avital organ or center at which a determined Destroyer could aim . . . [I]n whatamounted to a perfect defense against exactly the attack the monster envi-sioned, the town had no cherished emblem of itself beyond its very vagueness(Jacobson 1991: 172). Unable to do to Los Angeles what it has done to Tokyocountless times, the monster instead capitulates to the seductions of the cityand becomes a movie star.

This scenario is a telling metaphor for many things Japanese thatenter the City of Angels: unable to remain as they are and change the city,they change themselves and become part of the culture already present, an


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160 Performance Review

assessment that holds true to varying degrees of three Japanese or Japanese-inspired productions in Los Angeles: one kabukifrom Japan, one an Ameri-can production of three shingekiclassics, and an American fusion production

utilizing bunraku-style manipulation and other forms of puppetry to tell thestory of one of the Hiroshima Maidens. As with Gojiro,the American locationin general, and the Southern California location in particular, transform theperformance experience, sometimes to the benefit of performance and audi-ence experience and sometimes to the detriment of both. (Interestingly, whenHollywood had the opportunity to remake the Godzilla story in its own imagein 1996, it was to New York to which the giant radioactive lizard went, regard-less that the West Coast was much closer to Godzillas Pacific origins. It wasapparently much easier to attack Manhattan, filled with recognizable symbols,than Los Angeles, even in an American film).

These productions are also unique in that they form a continuum ofconnection between East and West that require us to reevaluate what is meantby Asian theatre in general and Japanese theatre in particular, especiallywhen performed outside the culture that produced them. What is it thatmakes a particular theatre Asian? The ethnicity of the performers? The cul-ture of origin? The subject matter? The claims of the producers? If an Ameri-can company performs a play set in Japan, about Japan, written by a Japaneseplaywright, with a multiethnic company for a multiethnic audience, is it solelyan American play, or is the production inherently multicultural? The global-ization of culture allows for American theatre artists to seize upon elements ofboth traditional and modern Japanese theatre and present them in new Amer-

ican contexts while making claims of authentic Japaneseness. For the purposesof this review, I am interested in how this Japaneseness is made manifestwithin productions, how it is marketed to American (specifically SouthernCalifornian) audiences, and how, if at all, the stated authenticity is accurate.

As part of their 2005 tour of the United States and the twenty-fifthanniversary of the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center, theShichiku Grand Kabuki performed in Los Angeles at the Cerritos Center forthe Performing Arts. Living National Treasure Nakamura Ganjir IIIs Chika-matsu-za presented Boshibari(Tied to a Pole) and Sonezaki Shinj(Love Sui-cide at Sonezaki), the former being a dance play based on the kygenoriginal,

adapted for kabukiin 1916 and the latter being one of Chikamatsu Monzae-mons (Japans Greatest Playwright, proclaims the program) best-knownplays. Nakamura played the geisha heroine Ohatsu, a role he used to playopposite his father Nakamura Ganjir IIs Tokubei, her lover, beginning in1953 and now plays opposite his son, Nakamura Kanjaku V. The Shochikutour of Chikamatsu-zas Grand Kabuki also performed in Seattle and Berkeley.On some nights, instead of Boshibari, Ayatsuri Sambaso (Marionette Sambaso)was performed as the first play.

The opportunity to see kabuki in the United States is indeed a rareone; the opportunity to see a Living National Treasure in a role for which heis famous is especially unique. Nakamura is committed to reviving kabukias a

world theatre, and as such has undertaken many international tours, includ-


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in Los Angeles, Blood! Love! Madness! at the Actors Gang, Tim Robbinss the-atre best known for political drama such as Embeddedand Robbinss adapta-tion of Orwells 1984.The show was a revival of a production first staged in

1992. Three Japanese one-actsThe Razor by Nakamura Kichizo, The Madmanon the Roofby Kikuchi Kan, and The Dressing Roomby Shimizu Kuniowerepresented in the revival, although in the original 1992 staging, the companypresented Mishima Yukios The Damask Drumas the final play, instead of theShimizu piece. The Razorwas written in 1914, The Madman on the Roofwas writ-ten in 1918, and The Dressing Roomin 1977. The first two were written as partof the shingeki(new, Western-influenced theatre) movement, in direct opposi-tion to kabuki.The last was written as part of the shogekijo-undo(little theatre)movement, and while Shimizu incorporates elements of traditional Japanesetheatre in other plays, The Dressing Room is an exploration of the history of

Shakespeare and Chekhov in Japan, involving the ghosts of dead actressescomparing famous translations of the plays of these Western playwrights thatprofoundly influence the shingekimovement.

Given that all three plays are part of the modern, Western-shaped the-atre of twentieth-century Japan, it is odd that the Actors Gang chose to stagethe plays using the visual elements of traditional Japanese theatre, weddingkabukiand kygenstagings to modern Japanese plays, to the detriment of bothtradition and modernity. Director Brent Hinkley, who was the originator anddirector of both the original 1992 production and the current incarnationdiscussed here, was the impetus behind the selection of modern Japaneseplays at the Actors Gang. Hinkley, who believed the scripts were unknown by

American audiences and thus allowed the company to utilize commediastyleperformance techniques while keeping the plays Asian, was motivated tostage three Japanese one-acts, collaborating with designers who wanted toemphasize the fact that they were performing Asian drama. I did a lot ofresearch about modern Japanese theater as well as the traditional styles ofnohand kabuki, noted set designer Sibyl Wickersheimer. I wanted to keepthe style clean and simple. It suggests an Asian style. (quoted in Favre 2005).What is suggested by these comments, however, is that traditional Japanesetheatre is a style to be imposed upon contemporary American performanceof modern Japanese plays.

What is interesting is that the audience was encouraged to believe thatthey were experiencing a fusion production in which actors were using Japa-nese techniques to present modern Japanese plays. No performer biographieswere included in the program, but the Actors Gang makes clear they special-ize in a highly theatrical American style of acting rooted in commedia dellartetraining. The actors (six of them) wore kumadori, moved stylistically, andrecited their lines in an unrealistic (although kabuki-like) fashion in The Razor.Before slitting the throat of Noguchi (Chris Schultz), Tamekichi (Silas WeirMitchell) seemed to strike a mie pose. The second play, referred to in public-ity materials as serving as the evenings kygen,a Japanese term for the comicinterlude between two serious works, The Madman on the Roof,was presented


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Performance Review 163

in a pseudo-kygenstyle, involving commedia dellarte masks and techniques aswell. The actors wore the commediamasks specific to their characters, so Father(Steven M. Porter) wears the mask of a Dottore, Servant (Nathan Kornelis)

wears the mask of Pedrolino, and the Madman (Sienna McCandles) wears themask of Arlecchino. The actors also moved as commediaperformers, not kygenperformers (see Fig. 1).

While the production was very interesting in demonstrating the strongsimilarities between the two forms and in the two dramatic canons, the ActorsGang substituted commedia for kygen, claiming in the program that kygenpieces bear little or no resemblance to their surrounding tragedies. Histori-cally, performances were mostly improvisational so little remains of scripts orauthorship. This description is closer to commedia than kygen, and yet theaudience seemed to believe they were seeing a fusion incorporating both

forms. In short, the company performed a modern Japanese play using tradi-tional Italian techniques while claiming to also be using traditional Japanesetechniques.

The Dressing Room blended these approaches using stylized costumes,makeup, and performances. In Shimizus play, four actresses sit in a dressingroom arguing over roles, acting, and life. As the play progresses, the audiencerealizes two of the actresses are actually ghosts whom the other two cannot see

Figure1. The Madman on the Roofat Actors Gang Theatre blends visual andperformative elements of kygenand commedia dellarte in a modern, naturalisticJapanese play. (Photo: Ray Mickshaw/Wireimage and Sibyl Wickersheimer.)


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or hear. When one of the living actresses kills the other, the newly dead actressjoins the two ghosts, who are delighted that they can now perform The ThreeSistersand leave the dressing room for the stage. What makes Shimizus play

particularly Japanese is that the actresses recite from various translations ofShakespeares plays, recognizable to the original Japanese audiences as beingfrom different periods. In this version, the Japanese translations of Shake-speare were reverse translated into the original Shakespeare, which obscuredthe differences between the actresses speeches. What in Japan is a comparisonof translations became an acting contest in America. The play is Shimizus lovesong to the history of shingeki.All four actresses in the Actors Gang (LindsleyAllen, Angela Berliner, Vanessa Mizzone, and Beth Tapper) wore kumadorimakeup and often dropped into a highly stylized manner of recitation of linesthat in the original Japanese are meant to be naturalistic.

In other words, the Actors Gang took three plays that have nothingto do with traditional Japanese theatre (in fact, that were written to not belike traditional Japanese theatre) and traditionalized them. In Japan it wouldhave been a unique experiment; in Los Angeles, where all three plays arevirtually unknown to the general theatergoing public, to do so is to conflateall things Japanese, making all Asian theatre into traditional theatre and sat-isfying orientalist expectation. While it is a delight to see these plays, so rarelypresented even in Japan, let alone in the United States, this production did adisservice to the dramas by making them kabukior kygen.It is difficult enoughto teach students that there is theatre in Asia other than traditional theatre,and certainly in the popular American imagination kabuki is conflated with

and serves as synecdoche for Japanno theatre resembling modern dramaexists. I have argued elsewhere that Japan in the popular American imagina-tion does not exist in the presentonly in the past (kabukiand samurai) orthe future (robots, manga, and anime). This production perpetuates this myth,converting contemporary Japanese theatre into traditional Japanese theatre,with local reviewers calling the production a satisfying cross-cultural coupborrowing from Japanese theatrical conventions, but find[ing] universal-ity in these three 20th century Japanese plays (Nichols 2005: E30; Margolies2005: 12). To the knowledgeable few in the audience, however, it mixed mod-ern scripts with a surface-level understanding of traditional Japanese perfor-

mance and appropriated visual elements and performative elements out oftheir traditional contexts solely to give the audience something exotic andmulticultural, but in no way authentically Japanese.

Hiroshima Maidenin one sense was the least Japanese of these produc-tions. While the subject matter concerns the young girls who are victims of theatomic bomb brought to the United States from Japan after the war, and somebunraku techniques are employed to present the story, neither the writer/director nor the majority of performers were Japanese (two of nine perform-ers are from Japan but are now based in New York) and no representation ofJapanese culture was claimed, as it was with Blood! Love! Madness! Instead, DanHurlin, the writer and director of the piece, sits to one side of the stage like a

gidayuchanter or tayustoryteller and narrates the action and provides all dia-


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logue for the ninety-minute puppet show. Hurlin is an award-winning designerwho also works in puppetry and toy theatre, teaching the practice at numerousAmerican universities such as Bowdoin, Princeton, and Sarah Lawrence. He is

also the codirector of the Puppet Lab at Arts at St. Anns in New York, havingcreated several puppet pieces for the past two decades. He, however, does nothave any formal training in bunraku.The play presented parallel stories of theyoung American boy (most often represented by a marionette, but also repre-sented by a number of varying sized shadow puppets), perhaps a stand-in forHurlin, and the girl (also represented by a combination of shadow puppetsand a bunraku-style puppet), a hibakushawho becomes one of the HiroshimaMaidens, a group of twenty-five Japanese girls brought to the United States in1955 for reconstructive plastic surgery through the efforts of Methodist minis-ter Kiyoshi Tanimoto.

The play dramatized the series of events that leads up to the droppingof the bomb on Hiroshima, comparing the mornings on 6 August 1945 ofthe unnamed girl who will become the Hiroshima Maiden and the pilot ofthe Enola Gay. The attack on Japan was compared with the young Americanboy burning ants with a magnifying glass through a series of shadow puppetrydisplays, in which events taking place simultaneously in Japan and the UnitedStates are presented in side by side shadow displays, followed by individualmoments with the bunrakuboy and girl puppets. The girl eventually is broughtto America for surgery. The boy later sees the girl on television on This Is YourLife.At the end of the play the boy and the girl finally meet in person.

The image of viewing runs through the entire play. From the magni-

fying glass that also serves as a weapon, to the microscopes, bomb bay view-scopes, shadow boxes, and televisions, Hurlin presents a world in which theobjects through which one views are both weapons and a means to understandthe reality and the context of the situation. The puppeteers rely upon bothshadow puppetry and bunraku-style puppets to simulate what is seen throughthe viewing medium. As the boy bunrakupuppet raises the magnifying glass,for example, another puppeteer uses strings to literally draw lines in the airto a shadow puppet display of a large magnifying glass looking at ants. We seeboth the viewer and the object he is viewing simultaneously and the literallines connecting them. In the postwar period, the US government banned

images of atomic bomb survivors from the media in Japan and worked to keepthem out of American media as well. As David Serlin, listed as the historicalconsultant observes in the program notes, Americans love nostalgia but theyhate history (Serlin 2005: n.p.).

Hiroshima Maiden uses the imagery of looking closely to move past thenostalgia for childhood innocence and instead see the ugly reality of history,of how an action like burning ants with a magnifying glass is not an innocentone. This idea is brilliantly expressed when puppeteers presenting large-scaleevents repeatedly use dotted string to draw lines, as in a textbook, to movefrom the large picture to a much more complex presentation of a small detail.The effect is stunning theatrically, presenting both the large scale of history as

well as the individuals experience of it.


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The production used live and recorded music, nine puppeteers (threeof whom were Japanese), and Hurlin himself narrating (identified in the pro-gram as tayu) and featured several different puppetry styles (including bun-

raku,from the all-black costumes of the puppeteers to the puppets themselves)to tell a story about the relationship between Japan and the United States, onboth an individual and a historic level. Wartime and postwar Japanese culturewere embraced and presented, not uncritically, but through the perception ofthe young girl. The overall effect of the show was simultaneously stunninglycomplex and simple, and suggestive of bunrakuwithout claiming to be it. Asnoted above, of the three productions reviewed here, Hurlins work is notreally Japanese in that it is an American production of an American play, andyet engages the relationship between Japan and the United States and theirintertwined history during the twentieth century in a manner much more effec-

tive than the Actors Gang and much more accessible to the Los Angeles audi-ence than the Chikimatsu-za Grand Kabuki. In a sense, although one couldmake the charge of cultural appropriation against Hurlin, his production wasa successful fusion piece of American theatre that knowingly used elementsof Japanese theatre in a manner that the Actors Gang did not. Hurlin usedJapanese technique to tell an American story about Japan without claimingto be authentically Japanese. American reviewers and audiences consumedthe Chikamatsu-zas performance as an example of Japanese traditionalismand difference. The Actors Gang filtered modern Japanese dramas ratherarbitrarily through American, Italian, and traditional Japanese techniques,claiming Japanese authenticity but not achieving it. By contrast, the Japan of

Hurlins play is one that is both recognizable and yet does not fulfill orientalistexpectation. The America of this play is forced to place nostalgia under themagnifying glass and see what is really there. Gojira would be proud.

Kevin Wetmore Jr.

Loyola Marymount University

REFERENCES

Favre, Jeff. 2005.

East Meets West at Actors Gang Ventura County Star, 1 September.Also available at http://www.theactorsgang.com/news/news34.htm,accessed September 2008.

Jacobson, Marc. 1991. Gojiro. New York: Grove Press.Kominz, Laurence. 2006. The New Sakata Tjrs Grand KabukiShow and the Rebirth of Kami-

gata (Kansai) Kabuki. Asian Theatre Journal 23 (2): 396400.Margolies, Dany. 2005. Blood! Love! Madness!at the Ivy Substation. Backstage West,15 Septem-

ber: 1213.


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Nichols, David C. 2005. Blood! Love! Madness! Is Freshly Reconceived. Los Angeles Times,

16 September: E30.

Segal, Lewis. 2005. Love and Death Conquer All. Los Angeles Times,23 June: E6.Serlin, David. 2005. Program Notes, Dan Hurlin: Hiroshima Maiden. REDCAT Theatre,

Los Angeles, 36 November.Wallace, Bruce. 2005 73, But the Heart of a Teenager. Los Angeles Times, 21 June: E1, 11.

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