Kabuki from the Outside

Abstract

One recently published book on Kabuki is called Kabuki: The Popular Theatre. But today Kabuki supports its claim to popularity mainly with body counts: each year Kabuki audiences are six times larger than those for all modern theatre (Shingeki) productions combined. Kabuki's devotees claim that Kabuki audiences enjoy and appreciate what they see, while Shingeki's adherents are firmly convinced that they do not. Whatever the case, we can be sure that large numbers of people do not go spontaneously to a Kabuki theatre for a good night's entertainment, that Kabuki is not supported by revenue from individual ticket sales, and that the scions of Kabuki themselves are worried that their audiences do not understand what goes on onstage.In 1969 Tokyo's National Theatre raised the price of tickets sold at the box office from 1,800 yen ($5.00) to 2,000 yen ($5.56) while at the same time giving considerable discounts, sometimes more than fifty percent, to package audiences.