Kabuki!

And what you've all been waiting for, not really, is my reflection on the Kabuki play I saw a little over a month ago! It was a special production for students so some things are different than the normal Kabuki production. And I was feeling quite sarcastic when I wrote this, so have fun.
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In the time I’ve spent trying to figure out how to start this reflection, one kabuki actor could have put a decent number of teenage audience members to sleep. Not to say it was boring, ‘Kenuki’ had all the ingredients of a Hollywood box office hit, I promise. Two lives were lost to the dramatic crescendo of the shamisen’s… cooing (oh, a sword was involved too), there was a damsel plagued by magnetic hair pins, and even a hero enlightened with the skill of flashing cool poses.
Maybe I’m exaggerating on the effectiveness of Kabuki’s sleep inducing power, but I found the pre-production introduction to Kabuki much more interesting.* First, I must admit, it probably doesn’t help when some of the only words you catch from the production are ‘uso’, ‘ohime-sama’, and ‘jigoku’.**
The workings of a Kabuki play are quite inventive. There seem to be little tricks for everything from flying daggers to transforming babies into stone. Of course nothing could happen as smoothly if it wasn’t for the invisible assistants. The assistants dress cleverly in black to blend into the background. This works especially well when the background is blue sky. Their purpose is to assist the kabuki actors with props. So, when an actor is in need of, say, giant tweezers, they’ll magically vaporize (because you can’t see the invisible assistants of course!).
The props are also interesting because they cannot rely upon electricity to create movement or special effects. My favorite was the innocent looking carp that appeared to be dead-like on a table until a hidden string was pulled causing it to flop to life, or flop to death as the case may be. I think the fish’s pose hooked more of a reaction than some of the actors’.
I still found the actors’ different poses enjoyable. I have a feeling the mood surrounding the poses might have been more lively with an audience of regular patrons. Only at the end when striking down the hanamichi*** did the hero get his round of applause and shouts of approval.
Another notable element would have to be the onna gata, the actors who played women. They certaintly nailed the stereotypical geisha ‘pale and fragile’ look. However, once they spoke it was jarring, in an amusing way. For example, when Ohime-sama was lamenting about her cursed hair, and who wouldn’t, it sounded like an old granny out to kill all her vowels with a rolling pin. Maybe it would have sounded even better with background music from an MD player, I should have asked the whole row of students from the school behind me. Still, I have to give Ohime-sama some brownie points, in real life he’s a 16 year old high school student, which is extremely rare in the Kabuki world.Ala in all, I found ‘Kenuki’ to be a gratifying experience (as I hope you have found this reflection to be). The Kabuki style of acting definitely creates a different atmosphere than anything else I have ever seen. It is obvious a lot of care goes into keeping true to tradition while still producing something that cool hip people (like me) can appreciate. But next time I’m drinking more caffeine and bringing my own rolling pin.
* the pre-production was special for just us students to enjoy
** 'that's a lie', 'Princess', and 'hell'
*** what reminds me of a cat walk where the actors go to do special poses!