JAPAN FOUNDATION WORLDWIDE

In autumn 2010, two Japanese plays were performed at the Patravadi Theatre in Bangkok, one of the most prominent contemporary theatres in Thailand.

* Five Days in March by chelfitsch (November 11 (Thu) and 12 (Fri), 2010) Directed and written by the award-winning writer Toshiki Okada. Five Days in March is the winner of the Kishida Kunio Drama Award in 2005 and has been performed in over 20 cities around the world including New York and Paris, to great acclaim. This was the first performance in Thailand.		* Melody Cup by Tadasu Takamine (November 5 (Fri) and 6 (Sat), 2010) The collaborative stage featured Thai and Japanese performers, led by the cutting-edge Japanese visual artist Tadasu Takamine. The premier was in 2009 at the AI Hall, Hyogo, Japan, and the original stage was recreated for the performances in Thailand.

Both Five Days in March and Melody Cup were highly acclaimed in Japan and abroad, so with both plays’ reputations preceding them, people involved in Thai contemporary theater and theater-goers were looking forward to seeing them. Tickets for four stages in total, two for each play, were completely sold out.

The mission of the Japan Foundation, Bangkok is to promote people-to-people exchange between Thailand and Japan at multiple levels by organizing a variety of projects.

By bringing these two stages to Bangkok, we tried not only to showcase the “very contemporary” theater productions, but also to nurture lasting relationships between the two countries’ artists for future projects. The cooperation we received from our wonderful co-organizers in Bangkok, Patravadi Theatre and Chulalongkorn University, was critical in fostering those exchanges and in bridging the two different cultures.

Here are some more detailed reports on the two performances:

* Five Days in March by chelfitsch
The company name ‘chelfitsch’ was coined by the award-wining writer-director Toshiki Okada. It represents the baby-like disarticulation of the English word “selfish”, and is intending to evoke the social and cultural characteristics of contemporary Japan.

Five Days in March is set in the evening before the U.S. declaration of the war on Iraq in 2003, when the encounter of two Japanese hipsters at a rock concert turns into five days of continuous sex. The piece unfolds as actors slip in and out of characters while casually narrating and playing out scenes. Characterized by the very colloquial dialogue and exaggerated choreography, chelfitsch’s Five Days in March perfectly captures the irony and impotence felt by the new generation in Japan today.

Apart from the performance and post-show discussion, Mr. Okada shared his thoughts and directorial style with eleven leading artists and directors of Thai theaters at a workshop at Chulalongkorn University on 12th of November. Coordinated by Professor Pawit Mahasarinand of the University, the participants experienced the unique disconnection between words(scripts) and movement in the play. The coordinator and participants reflected afterwards that Mr. Okada’s style was totally different from what they had been taught in acting classes, and yet it all worked very impressively. Mr. Okada also said that he was very impressed to see the improvisatory reactions of the Thai participants, and he hoped for a chance to collaborate with them in the future.

* Melody Cup by Tadasu Takamine
Melody Cup is a groundbreaking stage production directed by visual artist Tadasu Takamine. The performance in Thailand was a reproduction of the stage which premiered at AI Hall, Hyogo in 2009.
Mr, Takamine is known for his use of various media, including performance, film, installation, to sublimate the processes of communication into a new relationship between the self and society.
In Melody Cup, half of the stage was turned into seats for the audience, to let them experience the intimate sight and sounds of the actors. The mix of visual effects, sounds and performers, gave members of the audience the feeling that they had been in and part of a gigantic installation for two hours! The audience from both the fields of visual and performing arts responded favorably to this experimental and exciting dramatic work.

Created as part of “Project for the Future – Thailand + Japan,” eleven young artists and performers both from Japan and Thailand were cast for this unique event. Mr. Takamine and his members took up residence at Patravadi Theater for ten days prior to the performance to re-create the stage with Thai artists. In spite of the language barrier, Japanese and Thai artists developed a strong and long-lasting bond between them, with Mr. Takamine at the center, directing and supervising.

This performance is scheduled to be staged again in Yokohama in February 2011. We hope that the artists from both countries will further refine their performance, strengthen their friendships, and return to Thailand in the future.

Photo by Hiroto Takezaki

Photo: Hagino Miho

In November 2010, a group of shaven-head people arrived in Sao Paulo. In this multi-ethnic city, people are usually hard to surprise with one’s appearance, but many people turned to look at this group as they passed. They are members of Dairakudakan Temputenshiki, a Butoh dance company led by Akaji Maro, a leading Butoh dancer and actor.

The Japan Foundation, Sao Paulo invited Dairakudakan Temputenshiki members to have three performances in two cities in Brazil: on November 3 and 4 in Sao Paulo and on November 6 in Santos.

Entitled “Segredos da Humanidade (Secrets of Mankind)”, this program was based on the theme: “A dazzling tower / persons shivering in exaltation / every boundary has vanished / there is no life or death / only lights, lights, lights are dancing wildly / Finally, the secret of mankind manifests itself / in the dark tower.” 22 dancers led by Akaji Maro performed 10 scenes including Evil Spirits and Children’s Make Believe of Shamans for over 100 minutes.

Butoh dance is quite popular in Brazil where many Butoh companies had visited for performances, but it was the very first opportunity for the Japan Foundation, Sao Paulo to introduce Dairakudakan Temputenshiki to the audience in Brazil.

Photo: Hagino Miho

Brazilians give unstinting applause to a performance they love, but they leave their seats in the middle of performance without hesitation when they do not like it. This tendency made us anxious about whether the audience would enjoy the dance company or not. It turned out, however, that we were overanxious; the overwhelming power of their dance received standing ovation. The audience was mesmerized by the dancers and thrown into an illusory world where they were swallowed up in the dark. The thunderous applause, whistling, and shouts of “Bravo!” are still ringing in our ears.

Dairakudakan’s performances evoked many responses from the audience. The comment sheets were filled with remarks from excited audience; for example, “It was marvelous! I was lost for words and I’m still thrilled.” We also received some comments from the audience via emails to our office, such as “It was wonderful, very sensitive and filled with respect for art. Congratulations on a superb performance!”

Dairakudakan Temputenshiki revealed the new world of Japanese Butoh to those living on the opposite side of the globe.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki are well-known cities of Japan even in Egypt. Unfortunately, however, few people in this country know exactly what had happened in these cities during World War II. Today, there is a growing trend towards denuclearization of the world. To contribute to build the peaceful world that is free of nuclear weapons by sharing Japan’s experience with people in Egypt as the only nation to have ever suffered from nuclear bombs, the Japan Foundation, Cairo organized the Japanese film festival entitled “Hiroshima” in October 2010, the 65th year of the atomic bombing in the city. From the Japan Foundation’s collection, films related to the atomic bombing including Black Rain; Yunagi City, Sakura Country; and Children of the Atomic Bomb were featured. On the opening day of the festival, Dr. Muhammad El-Makhzangi, an Egyptian writer who covered the Chernobel’s nuclear plant fire, delivered a special lecture.

Prior to the film festival, we hosted a film screening and lecture by Mr. Masaaki Tanabe, a filmmaker from Hiroshima. He created the computer graphic images of the Hiroshima City hypocenter prior to the bombing and produced a film to depict what was lost in the atomic bombing by combining the CG images and interviews with atomic bomb survivors. Mr. Watanabe was born in the house next to the Hiroshima Prefecture Industrial Promotion Hall (its ruins are now called the Hiroshima Peace Memorial) and he stepped into ground zero immediately after the bomb hit the city. With a solemn vow “No More Hiroshima”, he spent 13 years to complete the re-creation of hypocenter with computer graphics. Mr. Tanabe visited Egypt as one of Special Ambassadors for Denuclearization appointed by the Japanese government.

On the day of the lecture, we had to add seats to accommodate the audience of over 200 people. It must have been the very first time for most of the audience to hear what a survivor of the atomic bomb had seen and experienced. Each one of them listened intently to Mr. Tanabe’s message that made them think what they could do to prevent such a tragedy from occurring again.

We hope that this film festival gave the audience to think about again the peaceful world without nuclear weapons, and we would like to keep offering such occasions in the future.