Kyoto performance reviews

Staging tradition: The Nomura Festival Hall kyogen performance Osaka Festival Hall April 26 2019 “This is the biggest kyogen performance in the world,” declared Mansai Nomura, famed scion of the Nomura family of the Izumi school. It wasn’t a joke: he was introducing the all-kyogen production at the Festival Hall, Osaka. At a capacity   of 2700, and towering up three large, circular rings, the Asahi Shinbun owned hall is the well-attended center of Osaka cultural life. It hosts international and local ballet and orchestra companies, including the Osaka Symphony. The audience were dressier, younger, and less chatty than typical kyogen performances: this was a grand event, with tickets accordingly priced towards the 10,000 yen level (not quite the 20,000 yen and up level of the Bologna opera, but airfare for 50 doesn’t compare with bullet-train for 10. Another unusual feature of the production were the careful program notes. In addition to the

http://hirotafutakuchi.blog.jp Futaguchi Daigaku and Hirota Yuumi are the Richard Burton/Elizabeth Taylor of the Kyoto shogekijo movement. Appearing together in Chekhov’s The Bear and Kishida Kunio and Betsuyaku Minoru’s short plays, they perform couples in distress as a subtle dance of sidelong looks, pauses, confrontations, and hesitating backtracks. The empty space is instantly transformed into a time-machine ride to a believable tale, which frequently grows increasingly absurd, terrifying and comic in turns.  What an asset to Kyoto! Futakuchi’s range is wide: on his own in others’ productions he plays it straight, with a formidable physical dexterity and dancerly presence. He has performed in Noho Theatre Group productions I’ve directed for over twenty years, always bringing a fresh, professional attitude to the roles. On the other hand, every time I see Hirota—who teaches at my university alongside Futakuchi--she seems to be playing some sort of hysteric woman, y