Citizendia
Your Ad Here

Traditional Japanese theatre includes kabuki, noh and bunraku. For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Japan topics. Theatre (or theater, see spelling differences) is the branch of the Performing arts defined by Bernard Beckerman as what "occurs when one is a form of traditional Japanese theatre. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate Make-up worn by some of its performers or is a major form of classic Japanese musical Drama that has been performed since the 14th century also known as Ningyō jōruri (ja 人形浄瑠璃 is a form of traditional Japanese Puppet theater founded in Osaka in 1684

Contents

Traditional form of theatre

There are four major forms of traditional Japanese theatre that are famous around the world. These are Noh, Kyogen, Kabuki, and Bunraku, or puppet theatre. or is a major form of classic Japanese musical Drama that has been performed since the 14th century is a form of traditional Japanese theatre. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate Make-up worn by some of its performers also known as Ningyō jōruri (ja 人形浄瑠璃 is a form of traditional Japanese Puppet theater founded in Osaka in 1684

Noh and Kyogen

The earliest existing Kyogen scripts date from the 300s. Kyogen was used as an intermission between Noh acts — it linked the theme of the Noh play with the modern world by means of farce and slapstick. Unlike Noh, the performers of Kyogen do not wear masks, unless their role calls for physical transformation. A mask is an artefact normally worn on the face typically for protection concealment performance or amusement

Both men and women were allowed to perform Kyogen until 450.

Kabuki

The most well-known form of Japanese theatre is Kabuki. Perhaps its fame comes from the wild costumes and swordfights, which used real swords until the 1680s. Kabuki grew out of opposition to Noh — they wanted to shock the audience with more lively and timely stories. The first performance was in 1603.

Like Noh, however, over time Kabuki became not just performing in a new way, but a stylized art to be performed only a certain way.

As a matter of interest, the popular Gekidan Shinkansen, a theatrical troupe based in Tokyo today, insists it follows pure kabuki tradition by performing historical roles in a modern, noisy, and outlandish way — to shock the audience as kabuki intended, if you will. officially, is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan and located on the eastern side of the main island Honshū. Whether or not they are kabuki, however, remains a matter of debate and personal opinion.

Bunraku

Puppets and Bunraku were used in Japanese theatre as early as the noh plays. Medieval records record the use of puppets actually in Noh plays. The written history of Japan begins with brief references in the 1st century AD Twenty-Four Histories, a collection of Chinese historical texts Puppets are three to four foot tall dolls that are manipulated by puppeteers in full view of the audience. The puppeteers controlling the legs and hands are dressed entirely in black, while the head puppeteer is wearing colorful clothing. Music and chanting is a popular convention of bunraku, and the shamisen player is usually considered to be the leader of the production. The shamisen or samisen ( Japanese: 三[[wiktionary 味|味]] 線, literally "three flavor strings" also called sangen (literally

In modern media, a readily accessible example of bunraku is in Kitano Takeshi's 2002 movie, Dolls. is a Japanese Filmmaker, Comedian, Actor, Film editor, Presenter, Screenwriter, Author, Poet is a 2002 Japanese film written edited and directed by Japanese director Takeshi Kitano.

Modern theatre

Japanese modern drama in the early twentieth century, the 1910s, consisted of Shingeki (experimental Western-style theater), which employed naturalistic acting and contemporary themes in contrast to the stylized conventions of Kabuki and Noh. The twentieth century of the Common Era began on

In the postwar period, there was a phenomenal growth in creative new dramatic works, which introduced fresh aesthetic concepts that revolutionized the orthodox modern theater. Challenging the realistic, psychological drama focused on "tragic historical progress" of the Western-derived shingeki, young playwrights broke with such accepted tenets as conventional stage space, placing their action in tents, streets, and open areas and, at the extreme, in scenes played out all over Tokyo.

Plots became increasingly complex, with play-within-a-play sequences, moving rapidly back and forth in time, and intermingling reality with fantasy. Dramatic structure was fragmented, with the focus on the performer, who often used a variety of masks to reflect different personae.

Playwrights returned to common stage devices perfected in Noh and Kabuki to project their ideas, such as employing a narrator, who could also use English for international audiences. A narrator (or the extremely rarely used female equivalent narratress) is within any story (literary work movie play verbal account etc English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the First language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States Major playwrights in the 1980s were Kara Joro, Shimizu Kunio, and Betsuyaku Minoru, all closely connected to specific companies. In the 1980s, stagecraft was refined into a more sophisticated, complex format than in the earlier postwar experiments but lacked their bold critical spirit. Stagecraft is a generic term referring to the technical aspects of theatrical film and video production

Tadashi Suzuki developed a unique method of performer training which integrated avant-garde concepts with classical Noh and Kabuki devices, an approach that became a major creative force in Japanese and international theater in the 1980s. Tadashi Suzuki is a theatrical director, writer and Philosopher working out of Toga Toyama, Japan. Avant-garde (avɑ̃gaʁd in French) means "advance guard" or "vanguard Another highly original East-West fusion occurred in the inspired production Nastasya, taken from Dostoevsky's The Idiot, in which Bando Tamasaburo, a famed Kabuki onnagata (female impersonator), played the roles of both the prince and his fiancée. Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (Фёдор Миха́йлович Достое́вский, sometimes transliterated Dostoyevsky, Dostoievsky, The Idiot is a novel written by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky and first published in 1868 is a form of traditional Japanese theatre. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate Make-up worn by some of its performers

Sho-Gekijo

The 1980's also encouraged the creation of the Sho-Gekijo, or literally, little theatre. This usually meant amateur theatrical troupes making plays designed to be seen by anyone and everyone — not necessarily as meaningful in nature as they were simply entertaining.

Some of the more philosophical playwrights and directors of that time which are still active today are Noda Hideki, Kogami Shoji and Keralino Sandorovich (a pen name for a Japanese playwright). is a Racing driver from Japan. He participated in 3 Formula One Grands Prix debuting in the 1994 European Grand Prix, but did not score any championship

Popular sho-gekijo theatrical troupes include Nylon 100, Gekidan Shinkansen, Tokyo Sunshine Boys, and Halaholo Shangrila. The is a Japanese theatrical troupe that was active from 1983 until about 1994.

Western plays in Japan

Many Western plays, from those of the Ancient Greek theatre to William Shakespeare and from those of Fyodor Dostoevsky to Samuel Beckett, are performed in Tokyo. The theatre of ancient Greece, or ancient Greek drama, is a theatrical Culture that flourished in ancient Greece between c William Shakespeare ( baptised Samuel Barclay Beckett (13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989 was an Irish Writer, Dramatist and poet An incredible number of performances, perhaps as many as 3,000, are given each year, making Tokyo one of the world's leading theatrical centers.

The opening of the replica of the Globe Theatre was celebrated by importing an entire British company to perform all of Shakespeare's historical plays, while other Tokyo theaters produced other Shakespearean plays including various new interpretations of Hamlet and King Lear. The Globe Theatre was a Theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare. Hamlet is a Tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1599 and 1601 King Lear is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1603 and 1606 and is considered one of his greatest works The Globe Theatre, located in Shin-Ōkubo in Tokyo, now belongs mostly to Johnny's Entertainment and the promotion of pop idols in the acting field. is a railway station located in Shinjuku Tokyo, Japan. Opened on November 15 1914, it is close to the large local Korea Town. formed by Johnny Kitagawa in 1963 is a talent agency that trains and promotes groups of male idols in Japan In Japanese culture refers to mostly female media personalities in their teens and early twenties who are considered particularly cute and pretty and who will for a period

Yukio Ninagawa is an internationally known Japanese director and playwright who often turns to elements of Shakespeare for inspiration. is a Japanese Theatre director, particularly known for his Japanese language productions of Shakespeare plays and Greek tragedies. In 1995 he performed the "Shakespeare Tenpo 12Nen", an interpretation of the wildly popular British theatre Shakespeare Condensed: all of Shakespeare's plays in two hours. Famous actors such as Natsuki Mari and Karasawa Toshiaki were involved. Mari Natsuki (夏木 マリ Natsuki Mari) real name Junko Nakajima (中島 淳子 Nakajima Junko; born 2 May, 1952) is a Japanese (real name Kiyoshi Karasawa (唐沢 潔 Karasawa Kiyoshi) is a Japanese theatre and film actor

References

External links

© 2009 citizendia.org; parts available under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License, from http://en.wikipedia.org
 Dapyx Software network: MP3 Explorer | Ebook Manager | Zenithic