Satoko Ichihara
Yoroboshi: The Weakling
novembernov 7 – 11
© Jörg Baumann ©
© Jörg Baumann ©
Thursday november 7
20h00
Friday november 8
20h00
Saturday november 9
18h00
Sunday november 10
16h00
Monday november 11
16h00
Written and directed by Satoko Ichihara. Narrator Sachiko Hara. Puppeteers Terunobu Osaki, Seira Nakanishi, Ryota Hatanaka, Tomarimaimai. Music (biwa) Kakushin Nishihara. Musical coordination Kenichi Iijima. Set design Tomomi Nakamura. Lighting Rie Uomori (kehaiworks). Sound Takeshi Inarimori. Video Kotaro Konishi, Kosuke Katakura. Costumes Hanaka Kiki, Natsuki Oku. Doll creation Eri Fukasawa, Yosuke Sato, Yuna Yoshida, Kenichiro Okonogi, Mugiho Sasaki. Doll creation assistant Mika Kan. Stage manager Daijiro Kawakami. Assistant stage manager Yuhi Kobayashi. Production coordinator Makiko Yamazato.
Production General Incorporated Association Q
Distribution ART HAPPENS in collaboration with the Festival d'Automne à Paris
Coproduction Theater der Welt 2023 - Frankfurt-Offenbach ; DE SINGEL (Anvers) ; The Museum of Art, Kochi ; Toyooka Theater Festival ; Theater Commons Tokyo ; Kinosaki International Arts Center (Toyooka) ; Festival d'Automne à Paris
With the support of the Saison Foundation, Arts Council Tokyo - Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and Culture
The Festival d'Automne à Paris is executive producer of the European tour. It is co-producer of the show and co-presents it with the T2G Théâtre de Gennevilliers, Centre Dramatique National.
Taking his inspiration from traditional Japanese forms, playwright and director Satoko Ichihara brings us a puppet theatre for today's world. It is a troubled one, in which the story revolves around the ambiguous nature of the dolls. In this modern tale, loneliness, suffering and sexuality are the driving forces behind these puppets the various weaknesses of which makes them ever more human.
In to the Japanese legend Shuntoku Maru, a blind boy who has been abandoned by his father because of his disability is called Yoroboshi, or “the weakling”. Drawing upon the bunraku structure of Japanese puppet theatre, Satoko Ichihara breathes new life into this legend in a contemporary version which depicts the violent relationships between a boy, his father and his stepmother. The puppets are manipulated in full view, while actress Sachiko Hara narrates the story, and musician Kakushin Nishihara integrates noise and electronic elements into the traditional biwa sound. As a result, the boundary between the world of puppets and that of human beings becomes blurred. In this unsettling mise en abyme, the puppets, mannequins and sex dolls, icons that bring with them a strong passion-based charge, carry out acts of near-organic desires and suffering. Traversed by multi-faceted forms of violence, their ambivalent place, that of non-living people with a likeness to humans beings, shifts our gaze in their direction and hence unto our own condition.
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