Chūshingura and the Japanese studio system

Abstract

This article locates the Chūshingura narrative within the studio system as the story chosen for all-star studio celebration productions to mark special events (kinen eiga), and examines the narrative's relation to the studio star system. The main question addressed is: how have established narrative conventions of the drama been manipulated to remain fresh to each viewing generation? Here I take a structuralist approach which argues against the view that scarcity of historical information about the incident has ensured its malleability and therefore popularity. Instead, I argue that Chūshingura has become, in filmic discourse, a ‘memorial meta-text’. Repetition has ensured that, contained within the audience memory, there is a set of expectations and essential elements of predictability. Thus for any given film version of Chūshingura to be an economic success (i.e. be popular) there has to be a balance between novelty and repetition. I argue that this is achieved through the tension between a rigidly pre-prescribed plot structure and the similarly rigid dictates of star persona, and that it is this dynamic that produces the vitality of film productions and ensures the continued popularity of the drama. This leads to such further questions as how does Chūshingura function politically within the Japanese studio star system and, relatedly, to what extent are character types within the drama dictated to by actors' star personas? And, finally, what is the relationship between star image and history?