Blog - Kabuki
Kabuki
Yesterday we finally made it to see Kabuki at Kabuki-za (after much bad luck on our previous attempts)! :)
The play we saw was called Shunkan, which is the name of the main character. The story was about three men who are some kind of prisoners on a distant island, one of who has got married to a local.
One day a boat comes and the men are offered the chance to go back home, however the boat is only allowed to bring back three people, which means that all four of them (three men plus one's wife) can't board. First the married man gets ready to leave his wife, but then Shunkan (another of the three men) learns that his wife back home has been killed, so he decides to let the couple and the third man go, himself staying on the island forever.
The stage was beautiful, much more complex than I expected Kabuki to be. There were many props and also a hut and a boat moved on and off stage. Also I was surprised that the stage's center is able to spin!
We were seated in the cheapest seats (4th floor!) where you're not allowed to headphones with translation (seats on lower floors cost over twice the price).
I couldn't understand much at all of the old style Japanese, but Tomoko helped me by telling me the synopsis before the play and also kept giving me hints of what was happening, so I was able to enjoy it.
Posted on September 8, 2003 at 20:56 | Tweet
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Could you mail me and tell me about your experience watching this?
Posted by Gregory on October 16, 2012 at 10:53