Sibiu International Theatre Festival 30th Anniversary Report Meeting

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dates‍

2023/8/8 (Tue) 18:30 to 20:30

venues

‍Yamamoto Nohgakudo
1-3-6 Tokui-cho, Chuo-ku, Osaka-shi, 540-0025

speakers‍

・Kazumi Kushida (director/actor)
・Yamamoto Akihiro (Kanze school Noh musician)
・Yasuda Noboru (Shimokake Hosho-ryu Noh musician)
・Sennojo Shigeyama (Okura-ryu Noh musician)
・Fujimoto Takayuki (Kinsei R&D Director, Lighting Designer)

What is the summaryHere

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A basic explanation of the “International Theatre Festival” held every year in the Romanian city of Sibiu, the circumstances leading up to participation, and a debriefing session on “Faust” performed by Yamamoto Noh Theater. The speakers had fun talking about how they came to perform, the difficulties of turning “Faust” into a “Noh” work, and the resulting fun, with slide materials.

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What was very interesting was that the Sibiu International Theatre Festival has increased the number of participating countries and participants over the past few years. Also, Japanese people were listed among them as regular customers. The last stage of a theater festival is always a large-scale “Faust” by a local director, but this year, Yamamoto Noh Theater also performed “Faust,” and Kazumi Kushida also performed a solo stage called “Moonlit Night Faust.” In other words, it seems that out of the 3 films “Faust” performed, the fact that 2 groups were Japanese was a huge thing.

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According to Yamamoto, he has previously made a work called “Orpheus” into a “Noh” work. “Orpheus” is a work where everyone in Europe knows the story, and it seems that they learned that by turning it into “Noh,” it is possible to show off the uniqueness and characteristics of “Noh.” “Faust” this time was also difficult to make “Noh” as it is, so what happens with the Bible part in the original story and Buddhism? It seems that they put quite a bit of ingenuity into the performance, such as testing it out and incorporating techniques used in Kyogen.

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The Yamamoto Noh Theater was such a beautiful facility that the building itself had become a tangible cultural property of the country. It was located in the center of Osaka, easy to access, and it seemed like they were doing quite a variety of projects on a regular basis.
I have the impression that most of the participants on this day were supporters of Noh theaters, but it seemed that some of them were pure spectator fans.

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Report: Fukunaga Mitsuhiro