Great Actors Research Articles

Stars of the Tokyo Stage: Natori Shunsen’s Kabuki Actor Prints by Lucie Folan (review)

Reviewed by: Stars of the Tokyo Stage: Natori Shunsen’s Kabuki Actor Prints by Lucie Folan William Fleming Stars of the Tokyo Stage: Natori Shunsen’s Kabuki Actor Prints. By Lucie Folan et al. Exhibition catalog. Canberra: National Gallery of Australia, 2012. 144 pp. Color illustrations. Paperback, $39.95. The reader’s experience of this visually arresting volume begins with the close-up of a samurai’s scarred, scowling visage that occupies the entire front cover. At first blush, the choice seems somewhat incongruous. This is an actor print, to be sure, but it is not a kabuki actor print. Rather, it depicts the film star Ōkōchi Denjirō in his celebrated performance as the swordsman Tange Sazen, the hero of a series of popular films from the 1920s and 1930s. Yet as one opens the volume and delves more deeply into the visual world of Natori Shunsen (1886–1960), the choice comes to seem both revealing and appropriate. Shunsen, one of the last great kabuki printmakers, produced his work in an age when kabuki competed with new forms of entertainment such as film and shingeki realist theater, when technologies of photoreproduction increasingly displaced the woodblock print, and when Japanese artists actively experimented with naturalism and the techniques of Western painting. A recurring theme in the catalog entries and accompanying notes is the way in which Shunsen’s kabuki prints combine a grounding in established conventions with a sort of “realistic representation” that suggests an affinity with these new developments. Stars of the Tokyo Stage was published in conjunction with the National Gallery of Australia’s exhibition of the same title, curated by Lucie Folan. The catalog presents Shunsen’s most famous series of actor prints, Sōsakuhanga Shunsen nigao shū (1925–1928, translated as Collection of Creative Portraits by Shunsen), in its entirety; a number of other prints are included in addition to these thirty-six, among them a few from the fifteen-print supplement Shunsen nigao shū tsuika (1929–1934, Supplement to Collection of Portraits by Shunsen). Shunsen’s prints were, from their inception, aimed at collectors and theater aficionados of means, and they feature lavish production values, including expensive paper and dyes, mica pigment, and embossing. While certain qualities are difficult to appreciate unless one is in the presence of the original, the sumptuous colors and high level of detail are well served by the catalog’s high-quality, full-color reproductions. There have been a few catalogs featuring Shunsen’s work to date; most recently, Dilys Pegler Winegrad’s Dramatic Impressions: Japanese Theatre Prints from the Gilbert Luber Collection (Philadelphia: Arthur Ross Gallery, 2007), for example, included some two dozen prints. As a catalog devoted solely to Shunsen, however, Stars of the Tokyo Stage is a most welcome addition and now represents the best point of entry into his captivating world. Each print is reproduced as a full page with commentary opposite. These detailed explanations consist of three parts: (1) a relatively thorough synopsis of the play the print depicts, followed by (2) a short discussion of the particular scene or moment, its significance, and salient aspects of Shunsen’s design, and (3) a few lines about the actor performing the role. In several instances, side-by-side comparisons with contemporary photographs enable [End Page 343] the reader to see more clearly how Shunsen’s portraits preserve conventions of earlier ukiyo-e while achieving a high level of realistic likeness to their subjects. Shunsen’s prints feature many of the great actors of his day, and the scenes depicted span much of the diverse repertoire of 1920s and 1930s kabuki. While it is difficult to choose among such treasures, highlights include the portraits of Bandō Hikosaburō VI and Matsumoto Kōshirō VII in dramatic kumadori makeup as Matsuōmaru and Umeōmaru from Sugawara’s Secrets of Calligraphy (pp. 62–63; close-up on p. 66); the depiction of Bandō Shūchō III as a lithe, willowy Shizuka Gozen in Yoshitsune and the Thousand Cherry Trees (p. 76); and the lovely print of Kataoka Nizaemon XI in profile against a mica background as Chūshingura’s Kakogawa Honzō, with its suggestion of Sharaku (p. 79). (As...

Memory and Guilt

Memory and Guilt

Scientific Journal of Applied Computer Systems: Looking Back and Moving Forward

Precisely twelve years have passed since 2000, when the first issue of the 5 series of “Computer Science, Applied Computer Systems” was compiled into the Scientific Journal of Riga Technical University. According to the Chinese Zodiac based on a twelve year cycle, in which each year in a cycle is related to an animal sign and its reputed attributes, the Scientific Journal of Applied Computer Systems is attributed the sign of a Dragon. Dragon is a mythical powerful creature highly worshiped in Chinese culture that symbolizes strength, health, harmony, and intellectual power. Many consider Dragons extremely lucky and blessed. Most entities born or created under this Chinese Horoscope sign are generally charismatic, endued with great powers and are likely to evolve into great inventors, scientists, actors, lawyers, politicians, and managers. Likewise, we are convinced that the Journal publishing the research results in the traditional fields of Institute of Applied Computer Systems, which has been born under the Dragon’s sign, is endowed with all these features. The first 12-year cycle is over, and the co-editors of the Journal of Applied Computer Systems would like to give a brief overview by looking back into the history of the journal formation and reaching its current status. The first issue was published in 2000 in response to the appeal by professor Ivars Knets to regenerate scientific traditions and to provide an opportunity for the scientists to publish major results of their research. The volume contained 9 papers that were presented at the 40 RTU International Scientific Conference. In its turn, to go on with the tradition of publishing scientific papers in the journal next year, the editors issued the call for paper with the announcement that the applications from PhD students would be of special interest. As a result, the amount of the submitted papers doubled. The second compiled issue bridged the 20 years' gap between the so-called “old” scientific school lead by professor Janis Osis, who developed the original approach to complex technical system diagnostics based on topological models, and the young generation of scientists. It is quite significant that the first paper of this issue was the paper dedicated to the history of research on system modeling at RTU, in which professor Janis Osis in honor of 40-year anniversary of the faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology described the evolution of the faculty scientific school over the last 40 years and presented its structure. The third issue of the series opened with the five papers presented at the international conference “Information System Development” (ISD), which for the first time was held in Eastern Europe and organized by the Division of System Theory of RTU. The papers devoted to the common problems investigated by the scientists of the Institute of Applied Computer Systems were also included in the agenda. In 2002 the editorial board had already 38 submissions of papers, which required a careful review. Therefore, the evaluation of the papers for this issue was characterized, first, by two blend reviewers for each paper, where disputable papers were additionally evaluated by one of the core editors. Figure 1 shows statistical data on the number of the published and rejected papers for all 13 issues launched during the last twelve years.

Disrupting the Quotidian: Hoaxes, Fires, and Non-theatrical Performance in Nineteenth-century London

In this essay Jim Davis considers two examples of everyday non-theatrical performance in nineteenth-century London: hoaxes and fires. Whereas an element of hoaxing can be perceived in some contemporary performance events and in the practice of ‘invisible theatre’, usually with some ethical intention, hoaxes in early nineteenth-century London were perpetrated for the sake of creating disruption and making dupes of unsuspecting witnesses. A more visible form of disruption and spectacle was created by fires and firefighting itself, which, at least after Captain Eyre Massie Shaw took control of the London fire brigade, became a form of public performance. Although hoaxes were common in pantomime and farce, and conflagrations often strengthened the impact of sensation melodramas, the disruptive effects of extra-theatrical hoaxes and fires on everyday life created a less reassuring and more dystopian sense of the metropolis. An earlier version of this paper was originally delivered at ‘The Audience through Time’ conference at Queen Mary College, University of London, in December 2011. Jim Davis is Professor of Theatre Studies at the University of Warwick. His his most recent books are Victorian Pantomime: a Collection of Critical Essays (2010) and Lives of the Great Shakespearian Actors: Edmund Kean (2009). He is also joint author of Reflecting the Audience: London Theatregoing 1840–1880 (2001).

The actor within: intimate conversations with great actors

The actor within: intimate conversations with great actors

Measurement Models for Event Data

Event data, the sequences of dated categorised events between identifiable actors typically harvested from newswire, are a vital source of information about interacting political actors (Quarterly, 1983; Schrodt and Gerner, 2001; Schrodt, 2012). They offer a finer time scale and greater actor and spatial specificity than perhaps any other systematic data source. From a statistical perspective they are also undeniably awkward (see Schrodt, 1994, for useful discussion).

Indonesia

The emergence of new perspectives in the International relations study is driven by analysis unit studies which experience a fundamental change in the world of interdependency today. The old unit analysis, which emphasized “great actor” and formal started to be sued. International relations are characterized by the presence of International society which includes issues, actor also new pattern relation which very influences the explanation and description of International relations. Hierarchy of International relations has been yielding to the external problems and internal problems blurred. Post-positivist view of descent proposed as a new analytical tool in International relations which changed drastically.

Bohemians on the Bookcase: Quotations in Long Day's Journey into Night and Ah, Wilderness!

The literary allusions in act 4 of Long Day’s Journey Into Night have worried producers and commentators alike. Often pared down on stage to cut the play’s running time, they are heard as redundant, unnecessary, even as a substitute on O’Neill’s part for the hard work of writing expressive dialogue. George Steiner deplores the quotations in Long Day’s Journey, suggesting that their brilliance “burns a hole” in the fabric of the play and shows up O’Neill’s deficient writing. In response to Steiner, Laurin Porter has argued persuasively for the economy and effectiveness of these quotations. She goes through all the musical and literary allusions in the late plays, showing how they reinforce character and theme, move the plot, and create counterpoints of feeling, atmosphere, and thought. Indeed, she argues, the allusions are deeply and significantly embedded in the plays.1 In this article I would like to suggest that they serve another purpose as well. The quotations from what James Tyrone, speaking to Edmund, calls “That damned library of yours!” evoke the darkest, most radical thought of the previous century, the late-romantic nineteenth century that the characters in O’Neill’s play, set in 1912, are trying to survive without knowing how.2 The quotations from Baudelaire, Swinburne, Wilde, and Dowson suggest in their pessimism an impasse reached by the end of the romantic century, an impasse of identity. The characters in Long Day’s Journey, who have inherited their identities from the previous century, no longer know who they are. Ah, Wilderness! contains quotations also, from the same or similar nineteenth-century authors, but they are not so troubling because there are fewer of them, they are briefer, and their purpose is clear and less

The Curse of the Chameleon: A Comparison between Brutus Jones and James Tyrone

The Curse of the Chameleon: A Comparison between Brutus Jones and James Tyrone

Charudattam (Kathakali Julius Caesar) (review)

Reviewed by: Charudattam (Kathakali Julius Caesar) Graeme Vanderstoel Charudattam (Kathakali Julius Caesar). Adapted and composed by Sadanam Harikumaran. Sadanam Kathakali Academy, Kerala, India, 17 January 2010. Since its premiere at the National Drama Festival in 2001, Sadanam Harikumaran’s kathakali adaptation of Julius Caesar, Charudattam has been performed over two dozen times, in and outside Kerala, but still to date not overseas. Harikumaran is unusual in the present-day world of kathakali: he is at once actor, vocalist, playwright, composer, and designer of new forms of makeup and costumes. He is also principal of the Sadanam Kathakali Academy, where his play was staged on 17 January 2010. Harikumaran wrote six kathakali plays based on Indian epic puranas before turning to Shakespeare. “Why Julius Caesar?” I asked, to which he replied: “Most kathakali plays are man-woman love stories. I wanted to do a political play when the good and bad are not as obvious at the beginning as they usually are in kathakali.” Harikumaran named his adaptation Charudattam (Play of Charudatta, as he names Caesar). All the characters are given Indian names; however, for clarity I will here use those of Shakespeare. As author of a kathakali play, Harikumaran is composer of the text and music as well as choreographer and director. For the premiere, rather than acting, he was the lead vocalist so he “could manage the stage.” He has played the role of Brutus a number of times. At this performance Harikumaran had planned to perform Brutus, but the lead vocalist who knew the text was not available, so once again he was vocalist and another actor took the Brutus role. All the characters in Charudattam except one are in standard kathakali [End Page 569] makeup. Sadanam Suresh as Julius Caesar and Sadanam Manikandham as Brutus were both pacca, noble “green” face roles. Harikumaran created the makeup for Cassius and variation of the headdress (Fig. 1). The new makeup has been the most controversial. Kathakali audiences are accustomed to standard roles, and any deviations usually draw criticism and concern. Certainly with the new makeup they are left wondering about the qualities of Cassius’s character: Is he good, bad, or otherwise? Some thought katti makeup used for those having a noble streak but with major faults, for example the demon-king Ravana, would have been more appropriate. Julius Caesar is the one of the shortest Shakespeare plays at well under three hours. Nowadays kathakali performances are usually a few scenes from a longer play edited to about three to four hours in length. Shakespeare’s play has nineteen scenes; Harikumaran reduces that number by half. He reduced the number of characters from Shakespeare’s nineteen and dozens of supernumeraries to nine, more typical in a kathakali play. So, Brutus’s wife, Portia; Octavius’s first appearance; street scenes; ghosts; and omens (apart from Calpurnia’s dreams) were cut. Even then Charudattam lasted three hours and fifteen minutes. With so much omitted, why still so long? Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 1. Sadanam Narayan Namboodiri as Cassius in the new makeup Sadanam Harikumaran created for Charudattam, his adaption of Julius Caesar for kathakali. (Photo: Graeme Vanderstoel) One of the glories of kathakali are the interpolations that allow actors to follow standard embellishments of the text or create their own, accompanied [End Page 570] by the drummers, with the vocalists playing only their handheld gong and cymbals. A few lines of text can become more than half an hour of improvisation by the actor. The aim is to convey the rasa (essence) of a character, and great actors are masters in doing so. Calpurnia’s dream scene is embellished when Caesar (Sadanam Suresh) declares his love in an extended sequence while she sleeps. Sadanam Sreenath, who plays Calpurnia, only recently added this fine Shakespearean woman to his large repertoire of streevesham heroines (female roles performed by male actors). Calpurnia awakes in terror. Harikumaran’s text changes the dream, and Calpurnia in gesture-language follows this new text: “I dreamt of many serpents emerging from your garlands. I saw them biting you and ripping you apart. Your jeweled crown turns into a thorny headdress. The cleansing waters of...

William Shakespeare, “Our Roscius”

The Huntington Library copy of the third edition of William Camden’s Britannia (1590) contains a manuscript notation in Latin referring to William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon as “our Roscius.” The authors conclude that the annotation was written by Richard Hunt, vicar of Bishops Itchington, Warwickshire, probably during his tenure as vicar (1621–61). Hunt was an Oxford graduate whose family, properties, and social acquaintances link him to towns and villages in the vicinity of Stratford. By employing the term “our Roscius,” Hunt apparently meant to characterize Shakespeare as a great actor; since “Roscian” was sometimes used in a broader sense, Hunt may also have meant to characterize Shakespeare as a playwright or, more generally, as a man of the theater.

Sean Penn and American Spirits in a Vanity Fair feature: blurring journalism and cigarette advertising

Sean Penn is one of the great actors of our time. He is also a heavily addicted smoker, and he uses his real-life smoking to convey independence and rebelliousness. Penn...

Global economics crisis and IMF

3 Mart 2009 tarihinde, dergimiz Genel Yayın Yönetmeni Ali Bilge tarafından IMF eski Başekonomisti Michael Mussa ile Washington, DC’de gerçekleştirilen söyleşide; Dünya ekonomilerini derinden etkileyen küresel ekonomik krizin nedenleri ve olası sonuçları, finans ve mal piyasalarına etkileri, Neo-liberal iktisat politikaları, finans piyasalarını düzenlemede yaşanan zaafların krize etkileri, Dünya iktisatçılarının mevcut krize bakışları ile krizin aşılması için bugüne kadar ortaya konan çözüm önerileri, IMF ve diğer uluslararası kuruluşların performansları, krize karşı geliştirdikleri önlemler ve uluslararası kuruluşların gelecekleri konuşuldu. Söyleşi, geçmişte bir çok ülke ekonomisi için önemli bir aktör olan IMF’nin, eski Başekonomistinin değerlendirmelerini içeriyor.

Entre o ser e o não-ser: o processo de construção da idéia de ator (profissional) à luz de Georg Simmel

Neste artigo, analiso o processo de construção da idéia de ator profissional, desde sua origem até a que predomina no discurso dos que se dedicam a essa atividade nos dias de hoje. Com base na bibliografia especializada sobre o ator e à luz das reflexões de Georg Simmel, apresentarei quatro tipos ideais de ator que elaborei para evidenciar as mudanças ocorridas na noção de ator e as suas correspondentes formas-padrão de representação em acompanhamento às formas que a valorização do indivíduo assumiu ao longo do período moderno. Os quatro tipos ideais de ator são: o "ator-declamador-ilustrador ", o "ator-racional-realizador ", o "grande ator " e o "ator-psicológico-criador ". É neste último tipo que identifico a noção de ator de Stanislavski - que, em larga medida, marca, ainda, o discurso atual dos atores profissionais - e a associo à própria concepção simmeliana de indivíduo moderno, que se caracterizaria por sua ambigüidade.

Chekhov the Immigrant: Translating a Cultural Icon (review)

Reviewed by: Chekhov the Immigrant: Translating a Cultural Icon Maria Ignatieva Michael C. Finke and Julie De Sherbinin, eds. Chekhov the Immigrant: Translating a Cultural Icon. Bloomington, Indiana: Slavica Publishers, 2007. Pp. 352. $29.95 (Pb). Chekhov the Immigrant: Translating a Cultural Icon evolved out of a successful Chekhov symposium in Maine in 2004, which marked the one-hundredth anniversary of Chekhov’s death. Explaining the title of the new collection, which he edited with Julie de Sherbinin, Michael Finke asserts that “[n]o major Russian author has been more thoroughly assimilated by the American audience” (1). This assessment is apt. Perhaps only Tchaikovsky in music and Stanislavsky in theatre can be compared to Chekhov in their powerful influence on American culture. [End Page 615] At the same time, there has always been a gap in American Chekhovian scholarship: very often Slavic scholars do not talk about theatre productions, while their colleagues in theatre often cannot adequately interpret the original texts. With the works of Vygotsky, Skaftymov, Berkovsky, Lotman, Chudakov, Katayev, and others having presented the world with a wealth of excellent philological, structural, aesthetic, and philosophical analyses of Chekhov’s prose and plays, Russian scholarship has greatly benefited from a more integrated approach. The editors of the anthology Chekhov the Immigrant intend to do likewise, to introduce readers to various angles in Chekhovian study and to bring various scholars together. The anthology offers essays on Chekhov’s drama, on the problems of translating both his prose and drama, on Chekhov’s influences on American and British writing, on performance practices, and even on the medical humanities. Thus the collection, although it cannot be equally appealing to everyone, intends to satisfy the intellectual appetites of people with various interests in the Chekhovian heritage. Some very important ideas were presented at the symposium, as is revealed in the collection’s highlights. Julie de Sherbinin argues that our preoccupations, prejudices, perceptions, and language distort iconographic ideas about Chekhov. She writes that “similar to the characters’ acts of viewing icons and pictures in Chekhov’s prose, [cultural translation] involves importing an image and seeing it in terms of one’s own orientations, in relationship to what is culturally familiar” (106). Sharon Carnicke analyses various contemporary stage translations and versions of Chekhov’s plays, trying to find the balance between critical points of view from both drama and theatre. Writing about fashionable contemporary playwrights’ adaptations (such as those of David Hare, Edward Bond, David Mamet, and Tom Stoppard, among others), Carnicke notes, “Whether ‘channeling’ or ‘exorcising’ Chekhov, whether translating or adapting him, playwrights put their own stamp upon his plays” (93). Laurence Senelick emphasizes how the incorrect translation of one word can distort the very essence of Chekhov’s plays. He writes about the importance of details and the rhythm of the characters’ speech and sounds, and he alerts translators to the “echoic effect between different characters who were not on stage at the same time” (76). An anthology requires greater methodological coherence, greater thematic focus, and tighter enforcement of writing standards than a symposium. An anthology requires commentary – and index pages – to guide its readers. Despite its highlights, the symposium has not netted an anthology: it remains a loose collection of papers too closely based on the presentations of the participants, whose methodologies, and even professional backgrounds, differed widely. The essays vary greatly in length, and some of them need much tighter editing. (Richard J. Kahn’s [End Page 616] two-page essay expresses his surprise and gratitude for having been invited to the symposium.) Some of the papers, although announced in the introduction, are not included: for example, Cynthia Marsh’s piece, alluded to on page 56, on differences between British and American translations of Chekhov and on the role of intonations and rhythms in translation. Finally, the title itself, Chekhov the Immigrant: Translating a Cultural Icon, seems to me to lack precision – calling to mind Michael Chekhov, the great actor and Anton’s nephew, so often referred to as an “immigrant”; to me, regardless of the hundreds of languages into which his writing has been or will be translated, Chekhov will remain a Russian writer and a citizen of the world...

Disability, Heroism and Australian National Identity

Disability, Heroism and Australian National Identity

The man who was Rip van Winkle: Joseph Jefferson and nineteenth-century American theatre

The most beloved American comedic actor of the nineteenth century, Joseph Jefferson made his name as Washington Irving's Rip Van Winkle. In this book, a compelling blend of biography and theatrical and cultural history, Benjamin McArthur chronicles Jefferson's remarkable career and offers a lively and original account of the heroic age of the American theatre. Joe Jefferson's entire life was spent on the stage, from the age of Jackson to the dawn of motion pictures. He extensively toured the United States as well as Australia and Great Britain. An ever-successful career (including acclaim as painter and memoirist) put him in the company of the great actors, artists, and writers of the day, including Edwin Forrest, Edwin Booth, John Singer Sargent, and William Dean Howells. This book rescues a brilliant figure and places him, appropriately enough, on center stage of a pivotal time for American theatre. McArthur explores the personalities of the period, the changing theatrical styles and their audiences, the touring life, and the wide and varied culture of theatre. Through the life of Jefferson, McArthur is able to illuminate an era.

Ira Aldridge: the African Roscius

Ira Aldridge -- a black New Yorker -- was one of nineteenth-century Europe's greatest actors. He performed abroad for forty-three years, winning more awards, honors, and official decorations than any of his professional peers. Billed as the Roscius, Aldridge developed a repertoire initially consisting of Shakespeare's Othello, melodramas about slavery, and farces that drew on his ability to sing and dance. By the time he began touring in Europe he was principally a Shakespearean actor, playing such classic characters as Shylock, Macbeth, Richard III, and King Lear. Although his frequent public appearances made him the most visible black man in the world by mid-nineteenth century, today Aldridge tends to be a forgotten figure, seldom mentioned in histories of British and European theater. This collection restores the luster to Aldridge's reputation by examining his extraordinary achievements against all odds. The early essays offer biographical information, while later essays examine his critical and popular reception throughout the world. Taken together, these diverse approaches to Aldridge offer a fuller understanding and heightened appreciation of a remarkable man who had an exceptionally interesting life and a spectacular career. Contributors: Cyril Bruyn Andrews, Nikola Batusic, Philip A. Bell, Keith Byerman, Ruth M. Cowhig, Nicholas M. Evans, Joost Groeneboer, Ann Marie Koller, Joyce Green MacDonald, Herbert Marshall, James J. Napier, Krzysztof Sawala, Gunner Sjogren, James McCune Smith, Hazel Waters, and Stanley B. Winters. Bernth Lindfors is Professor Emeritus of English and African literatures at The University of Texas at Austin.

The Kyōgen of Errors (review)

Reviewed by: The Kyōgen of Errors Kathy Foley The Kyōgen of Errors. Adapted by Takahashi Yasunari from William Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors. Directed by Nomura Mansai. Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco International Arts Festival. 3 June 2005. This adaptation of Comedy of Errors presented by the Mansaku Nomura Company was developed at Setagya Public Theatre to go to the Globe-to-Globe Festival in London ("Kyōgen of Errors at New Globe" 2001). The late Takahashi Yasunari's text is a pared-down version of Shakespeare's plot of twins and mistaken identity, but the author with director Nomura Mansai added feminine, Shinto, and Buddhist elements, elevating a funny play of stock misunderstandings to a laugh-out-loud kyōgen on the illusion of self. The work was rich with visual elements, plot complications, acting style, and multivocal meanings. Visually, the empty square of a nō stage and the Shakespearean platform with its upper story were united in the set designed by Horio Yukio. As the play starts, the typical nō masculine pine image is nowhere to be seen. The backdrop is of flowing white silk, which is waterlike in its movement and is etched with sinuous squiggles and a rope design. Director Nomura Mansai (b.1972) later explained that these curvilinear forms represent sperm swimming toward the birth canal and that the rope is the umbilical cord (Nomura 2005). The imagery of white and water was associated with birth, while black and frozenness was linked to death. The birth image is repeated with costumes; early in the show, chorus members, who have been playing the menacing citizens of Black Island, throw off their dark shroudlike cloaks and light hits their long white pigtails. Like microsperm, the actors' white heads swim toward the backdrop. Finally one breaks through, initiating the birth of two sets of twins. The white central drop is repeatedly used as a shadow screen, while actors also climb to the small second story playing area above it for indoor scenes. Though aspects of the set remind viewers of the nō stage, the hashigakari (bridgeway) is absent. Instead, on each side of the center stage is an entrance with a snowflakelike mon (crest) on the curtain, one representing White Island and the other Black Island. The entrance helps identify which pair of master and servant twins (White or Black) is entering. The image of a snowflake links to the water theme, reminding us with its frozen setness (snow) that we think we are separable. But the middle is an amorphous world, where everyone is always at sea, mistaking one twin for the next. As with Shakespeare's original, often repeated by the chorus, "It's complicated!" [End Page 294] The plot is simple mistakes of identity. Ishinosuke of White Island, having been separated from his twin brother and mother in a storm as a child, goes with his servant Tarō Kaja, who is also a twin, to find his brother on Black Island. There, mistaken for his brother, the white Ishinosuke spurns the woman who thinks she is his wife and instead woos his sister-in-law. The women think him possessed and call in a yamabushi (mountain priest). Confusion reigns and no one recognizes who is who. The black-cloaked citizens are menacing and demonic, and soon the ruler is about to kill the white Ishinosuke's father, who has come to seek him. Then their abbess mother who was shipwrecked on this Black Island with black Ishinosuke solves the conundrum. As the show begins the group chants,"Ya-ya-koshi-ya!" (It's complicated). Or is it "Ya-ya-ko-koishi-ya!' (How I long to see my son)? Clearly it is both. The acting is excellent. A filmed version of the production The Kyogen of Errors: A "Global" Version is available from Columbia Music Entertainment (Mansai 2001), and even the mediated version, with sometimes oddly worded supertitles, captures great actors at work. They evoke stock kyōgen characters—servant, master, women—with economy and form. The timing is precise and richly comic, and the blocking is full of visual gags. Nomura Mannosuke played Naosuke, the ill-starred father (Shakespeare...

From Summit to Tragedy: Sulayman Al-Bassam's Richard III and Political Theatre

Richard III is one of Shakespeare’s best-known characters, a familiarity independent of the history plays, Henry VI and Richard III, in which he appears. This celebrity has less to do with Richard’s historical reputation, and more with the way in which great actors of the 19 and 20 centuries gave the role status and popular visibility, particularly perhaps via Laurence Olivier’s 1955 film version. Just as Hamlet is automatically identifiable by black suit and prop skull, Richard is immediately recognisable by his legendary deformity (mandatory hump, optional limp), and by the famous opening lines of his initial soliloquy: