ARTSETC.
Japanese take on play wows
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by Alec Luhn
Thursday, October 13, 2005
Going to a $2 play feels like buying a cheap romance novel at the grocery store. In a day-and-age when Broadway tickets cost at least $50, one can't usually get high art at pocket-change prices. But the recent student production of "Macbeth" was much better than the ticket price might suggest, and worth every penny.
Director David Furumoto revisited Shakespeare's classic play by giving it a Japanese spin, using the stylization of traditional Kabuki theatre. The actors performed against a completely black background and set pieces were kept to a minimum. Costumes consisted of colorful kimonos and makeup. The players incorporated traditional Kabuki conventions in the actual acting as well.
These elements combined to give the production an undeniable emotional power that held the audience's attention for over two hours.
For those of you who didn't explore the joys of Shakespeare in high school English, "Macbeth" is about the rise and fall of an ambitious medieval Scottish lord. Nobleman Macbeth hears a prophecy proclaiming that he will become the king of Scotland from three witches who also tell him he will become Thane of Cawdor. Once this comes true, Macbeth becomes power-hungry and murders the king. The rest of the play follows Macbeth's descent into treachery, evil and insanity.
By today's standards, Shakespeare tends to be long-winded, and the 17th-century English he uses is intimidating. The Kabuki approach allowed the actors to spice up the language with several unexpected techniques.
Most actors delivered their lines with periodic changes in pitch that sounded, for lack of a better description, like their voices were cracking. This slightly insane sound is borrowed from the Noh style of Japanese theatre and broke up the repetitive cadence of Shakespeare's verse to good effect.
As the cast explained in a question-and-answer session after the show, the performers used a Kabuki breath control technique to speak through each separate idea. Instead of taking frequent pauses for breath, lines were delivered rapid fire, with the actor or actress finishing a thought before stopping to breathe. Although this approach sometimes made it harder to follow all the dialogue, it made Shakespeare's ideas more clear on the whole.
Several of the actors also used great gestures to get partly obscured ideas across. As the drunken porter, Andrew Elbert hilariously made use of this technique during the porter's rambling dialogue about the ups and downs of alcohol consumption. With Elbert's exaggerated movements, it was hard to miss the subtle sexual humor of Shakespeare's tongue-in-cheek verse.
Much of the onstage action was also based on Kabuki tradition. Several main characters often struck a pose known as a "mie" to accentuate a climactic moment. A combination of their colorful makeup, twisted facial expressions and contorted body positions kept the audience transfixed.
The scripted movements and poses of the cast kept the play going, especially during the battle scenes. Instead of attempting to make the fights look real, the choreography emphasized dance-like sequences. This effect was nothing short of mesmerizing in the larger fight scene, when the cast's identical wooden samurai swords seemed to move like a single being. Macbeth, played by Ray Seeley, topped off the scene with a mie that featured his red-dyed tongue. His gruesome pose completed the scripted battle perfectly.
Throughout the show, director Furumoto accompanied the movement onstage with Kabuki sound effects known as "tsukeuchi." Sitting just offstage, Furumoto pounded a drum, rang bells and beat blocks of wood against the floor to emphasize the action taking place. In one case, Lady Macbeth (Kelly Bremner) hit Macbeth repeatedly with her fan as Furumoto pounded the wood blocks, effectively "breaking his back" and ending his protest to her wishes.
Scene changes, as well as a few scenes themselves, featured perfectly chosen recordings of diverse sounds. The music selection included everything from ethnic drum and flute sounds to bagpipes and wedding organ.
The show kept the audience interested the whole time. It all came to a great climax with the duel between Macbeth and Macduff (Ryan Winkles). The stage blocking involved the actors coming almost uncomfortably close to the audience before beginning their well-choreographed fight. The stage lights changed to red when Macduff stabbed Macbeth, adding a surprising level of blockbuster action effect, completed when Macduff twisted his sword in Macbeth's gut.
This Kabuki version of "Macbeth" was impressive for a student play. Any low-budget shortcomings, like Macbeth's pajama-looking pants, were more than made up for by larger-than-life acting that perfectly fit the Kabuki style.
All told, it was one hell of a show, especially for $2.
