Download Sumida River (Sumidagawa)

Front of House Staff
Noh dates back over 700 years to medieval Japan; yet this highly
stylized, poetic, musical dramatic form is a vibrant, living tradition
that continues to move audiences around the world today. The flute,
drum calls and rhythms of the shoulder and hip drums, and voices of
the characters and chorus all weave together to form a soundscape that
accompanies the distilled movements of the characters and moves the
audience into an altered, contemplative state. Here, as in many noh
plays, the main “action” of the play is the emotional and spiritual
journey of the shite (main actor). This production follows the Kita
school tradition, one of the five main stylistic schools of noh.
Staff Theatre Manager: Marty Myers
Box Office Staff: Sarah Jane Carlton, Chris DeMoville,
Elise Sanders, Stefannye Slaughter, Hannah Tuson-Turner
Publicity Director: John Oglevee
Publicity Assistant: Jeremy J Dowd
Web Assistant: Erin Sim
Graphic Designer: Brett T. Botbyl
Photographer: Karis Lo
House Manager: Kyle Klapatauskas
Assistant House Managers: Kristina Tannenbaum, Students from
THEA 200E
Department Office Staff: Tana Marin, Lori Ann Chun
Department Chair/Director of Theatre: W. Dennis Carroll
Production Staff
Stage Manager: Caitlin Carberry
Scenic Artist and Properties Coordinator: Chesley Cannon
Costume Coordinator: Hannah Schauer Galli
Light Board Operator: Kelsi Ju
Faculty Technical Director: David A. Griffith
Staff Technical Director: Gerald Kawaoka
Set Construction Crew: Chesley Cannon, Asuka Endo, David
Gerke, Angela Gosalvez, Kazumi Hatsumura, Jack MacMillan,
Joseph Orton, Donald Quilinquin, Students from THEA 240
and THEA 221.
Electrics Crew: Abel Coelho, Asuka Endo, Kazumi Hatsumura,
Donald Quilinquin, Students from THEA 240
Staff Costume Shop Manager: Hannah Schauer Galli
Costumes: Hirobe Textiles, Inc. (Kyoto), Hiromi Kikuchi
(Osaka), Bonkura Inc. (Kyoto)
Costume Alterations: Johnna Batiste, Marie Charlson,
Kat Pleviak, Corinne Powell, Amy Schrag, Priscilla Stafford
Wardrobe Supervisor: Toby Rinaldi
Primary Dressers: Aisha Goshi, Toby Rinaldi, Tony Young,
Yvette Vandermolen
Dressers: Valerie Carrillo, Elisa Diehl, Amy Edwards, Nathan Garrett,
Matthew Peseador, Alan Shepard, Matthew Shores
Faculty Design Consultants: Joseph D. Dodd, David A. Griffith
Special Thanks
Joshua Barnes, Marie Casciato, Ed Hawkins, Bob Huey, Byron
Moon, Jonah Salz, Michael Schuster, Tana Marin, Arthur Thornhill,
Ed Hawkins, Bill Feltz, Tim Slaughter, Japan America Society of
Hawai‘i, Honolulu Magazine, Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai‘i,
Consulate General of Japan in Honolulu, Outrigger Hotels and
Resorts.
Front of House Information
For translations, large print programs, Assistive Listening
Devices or any other accessibility requests please contact the
House Manager or call the Kennedy Theatre Box Office at
956-7655.
To arrange a Campus Security Escort from any two points on
campus, please see a House Manager.
- Please silence all pagers, phones and digital watches.
- No photography or video recording is permitted.
- Please refrain from eating, drinking or smoking in the theatre.
Visit us on the web at http://www.hawaii.edu/kennedy
Funding for the 2009-2009 Noh Training and Production
Center for Japanese Studies Endowment grant to bring Hideta
Kitazawa to UHM for a three week intensive mask carving course
and public lecture-demonstrations at the East-West Center Gallery.
Friends of Kennedy Theatre grant to assist with purchase of mask
carving tools and production costumes.
Chie Yamada Ethnomusicology grant for repair and purchase of
musical instruments.
The University of Hawai‘i at Manoa Chancellor’s Office for funds
in support of the residencies of guest artists Richard Emmert, Akira
Matsui and Kinue Oshima, and production costs.
M A I N S TAG E
2008-2009 SEASON
Sumida River
About noh
Mar 6, 7*, 12, 13, 14* at 8pm
Mar 15 at 2pm
*Free pre-show chat at 7:00pm at the East-West Center Gallery
Translated and Directed by
Richard Emmert
Training by Kita School Noh Actors
Akira Matsui, Richard Emmert, Kinue Oshima
Project Director
Julie A. Iezzi
Scenic and Properties Designer
Joseph D. Dodd
Lighting Designer
Asuka Endo
Shite Mask Carver
Hideta Kitazawa
College of Arts and Humanities
Department of Theatre and Dance
in Conjunction with the Music Department
Cast (March 5, 7, 13, 15)
SHITE (mother)
WAKI (boatman)
WAKITSURE (traveler)
KOKATA (child)
CHORUS leader
CHORUS members
OTSUZUMI (hip drum)
KOTSUZUMI (shoulder drum)
NOHKAN (flute)
MUSIC KOKEN
KOKEN (stage assistant)
John Oglevee*
Jeremy J Dowd*
Futoshi Terashita*
Olivia I. Barnes
Kathleen Sakaguchi
Aya Ohara
Meg Thiel
Amy Edwards**
Elisa Diehl*
Rhiannon McCullough*
Noriko Katayama
James Schirmer*
Mayco Santaella
Richard Emmert (3/5, 3/7)
Frederick Lau (3/13, 3/15)
Abel Coelho*
Luke Cheng
Daniel Akiyama
In partial fulfillment of the requirements of the Master of Fine Arts degree
in Asian Performance* and Acting**
ABOUT THE GUEST ARTISTS
Akira MATSUI is an award winning shite kata (main role performer) of the
Kita School of Noh. In 1998 he was designated as an Intangible Cultural
Property by the Japanese National Department of Cultural Affairs, and in
2001 received the Wakayama City Cultural Affairs Distinguished Artist
Award. Working as a noh performer, choreographer, teacher, and director
for the past thirty years, he has performed and conducted workshops in
India, Australia, the U.K., Lithuania, the Czech Republic; and at universities
throughout the U.S.
Kinue OSHIMA is a fifth-generation noh actor-teacher and the first female
Kita performer admitted into the Noh Performers Association. She trained
under her grandfather and father, and was a guest teacher at the Taiwan
National University of Arts in 2000, and toured Europe in 2002 with a Kita
School noh troupe.
Hideta KITAZAWA, is a second-generation award-winning woodcarving
artist from Tokyo. His noh and kyôgen masks have been exhibited in Japan,
Singapore, North Carolina and Hawai‘i. He designs both traditional and
new masks, and carved the shakumi mask used for the shite in Sumida
River. Some of his masks are currently on display at the East West Center
Gallery.
Director’s Notes
Sumida River (Sumidagawa) is one of the most popular noh plays in Japan.
It is also one of the, if not the, saddest plays in the classical repertory of
some 250 plays. A story of a boy kidnapped by slave traders from any
period in any culture cannot be a happy play, particularly if the boy dies
without being reunited with his mother.
While the plot gives this play an emotional power, I wondered if it is too
sad for American audiences. The tragedies portrayed in American film
or television seem to end with some sort of resolution. Sumida River
supplies no such resolution. After her long search, the mother only finds
that her young boy has died. Though she prays for him, it is difficult to
see that Buddhist prayers provide her much relief.
British composer Benjamin Britten, after seeing a performance of
Sumidagawa in Japan in the late 1950s, created his own operatic version
of the play. His Curlew River was transposed to a make-believe river in
England and employed a Christian theme. But there was one significant
plot difference: the boy’s spirit appears to his mother and comforts her,
saying that they will meet again in heaven. There is no such comfort for
the mother in noh’s Buddhist rendering of Sumidagawa.
In addition, for American audiences there is the difficulty of presenting a
classical Japanese theatre form so unlike anything we have in the West.
UH has a long history of doing Asian plays, although it has been twenty
years since the last noh play was done here by students. The demanding
techniques of the noh style are something that professional performers in
Japan take years to master and thus place high demands on students and
audience alike.
It is with full knowledge of these parameters that we present this play. The
difficulties presented by this highly stylistic theatrical form will, I hope,
help the audience feel the emotional depth of the play. If that can happen,
it will not only be a learning experience for both student performers and
audience members, but a unique theatrical experience as well.
ABOUT THE GUEST DIRECTOR
Richard EMMERT, Translator and Guest Director, is Founder and Artistic
Director of Theatre Nohgaku, an international company performing noh
in English. A licensed Kita school noh teacher, he has composed music
for seven new noh plays, has performed in traditional and new plays in
and out of Japan, and has been a guest artist/faculty for noh projects in
various countries in Asia, North America and Europe. He is the director
of an on-going noh workshop in Tokyo and the summer intensive Noh
Training Project in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, as well as a professor of
Asian theatre and music at Musashino University, Tokyo.
This show will be performed without an intermission.
Cast (March 4, 6, 12, 14)
SHITE (mother)
WAKI (boatman)
WAKITSURE (traveler)
KOKATA (child)
CHORUS leader
CHORUS members
OTSUZUMI (hip drum)
KOTSUZUMI (shoulder drum)
NOHKAN (flute)
MUSIC KOKEN
KOKEN (stage assistant)
Noriko Katayama
Meg Thiel
Rhiannon McCullough*
Devika Wasson
John Oglevee*
Futoshi Terashita*
Daniel Akiyama
Matthew Shores
Alan Shepard*
Jeremy J Dowd*
James Schirmer*
Abel Coelho*
Ju Hua Wei
Frederick Lau
Mayco Santaella
Luke Cheng
Aya Ohara
In partial fulfillment of the requirements of the Master of Fine Arts
degree in Asian Performance*
Scenic Designer’s Notes
The scenic design reflects a slight departure from the noh theatre tradition.
Although faithful to many of the practical elements of the conventional noh
stage, it takes advantage of a more conceptual, play-specific approach. The
first traditional element I wished to reinvent was the footprint of the stage
floor, traditionally composed entirely of hard angles, straight lines and sharp
edges. I felt that the shape of the floor would better serve the spirit of the story
if it gave the impression of a flowing river, with the direction of the wooded
planks subtly representing the current. For me, the constantly moving river
not only helps to establish the primary location of the play, but also serves
as an analogy for the woman’s largely futile search for her missing son.
A dual analogy for the stage treatment can be found in the suggestion of
an organically-shaped boat dock amid the reeds. Since a willow tree
is already mentioned in the play as a marker for the grave mound, the
traditional pine tree became a “weeping” willow tree and saplings,
common river bank flora that becomes an analogy for the perpetually
grieving woman. As a final touch, smooth, pale gray river rock serves as
a suitable substitute for the white gravel edging of the traditional stage.
(Please visit the lobby display for more information on the design and to
view the set model.)