Takizawa Kabuki The Final Show - Sun, 23 Aug 2015
Watching for second time is indeed different. Watching from first floor is indeed different.
Today, my seat was 39R in the first floor (stalls). Looking from left-right, the position is the same, since both my seats were in 39. It's even better, though, Mitsu's positions was almost always on the left side of the stage. Many details that I didn't pay attention to now come into sights.
Look how close my seat was to the stage!
And the most important thing was, I get the whole storyline of the play ^^; (and there I was yesterday, saying there's no storyline, lol sorry about that). The main theme of the play was "Four Seasons". Let me re-do the review in a more in-depth understanding.
First it was spring. Takki showed up in stage in white, with a Sakura tree behind him on background. The costumes, the dancing were all colorful and cheerful. Just like it is in Spring time. Kawai showed up, followed by Mitsu, and they took part in that cheerful-colorful dance of spring. Now came into the explanation of the 4 seasons in Japan. 4 girls with kimono each representing a season, was dancing in turns accordingly to the seasons' change. Kawai and Mitsu again showed up in this part, from the stage and up to the ladder where they did their dancing when it was winter time. The explanation mentioned that what we just saw was spring. After spring comes summer, where Japanese people like to tell ghost stories, or "kaidan". It is said that chill is needed to bear with the heat. Then autumn was for abundance of food and autumn leaves. Last it was winter, and while snow is usual in Japan, Singapore doesn't have it. That's why, probably Takki will bring snow to Singapore. After 4 girls each took their turn, Kawai and Mitsu were dancing one in front of the other using the curtain-screen like, until they jumped down and disappeared to the back.
Then ghosts appeared all around first floor and audiences' screams were heard. I remembered I didn't mention this on yesterday's review because it doesn't make sense. Now it does. They were talking about summer and the kaidan. It was a dance of ghosts and the dead. The set almost reminded me of Koichi's dead scene in Shock ("Dead or Alive"), but this one is lighter and not as horror. Nothing is worth to mention until Takki showed with masks. Following not long after, Kawai and Mitsu. They were doing the mask-changing dance, where the masks kept changing colors until they unmasked.
After that, comes the story of Nezumi Kozo the thief. Now I remembered Takki did a drama titled "Nezumi, Edo wo Hashiru". Probably it has something to do with the show, like it did with Yoshitsune. So in here Takki appeared alone, acting as thief who's been surrounded with guards trying to catch him. Nezumi was said to steal for the poor. Then I suddenly remembered, probably it was during this scene that gold "confettis" were spread out. Okay, let me revise that. It was not gold confettis, but the representative of the gold Nezumi stole for the poor. Okay, one more thing that makes sense :D Luckily I was sitting within the gold shower's reach, so I caught myself some gold. I'm rich! Lol.
I got gold from Nezumi!! Of course, this pic was taken afterwards. It’s actually during waiting time in the airport lol.
Taiko drums happened in summer. But I caught quite clear detail of it yesterday so am not gonna touch up on it again.
Then Mitsu-Takki's duet. What I didn't see yesterday, now I know it was a props failure, they both were performing hand gestures puppet. You know those performances where there was spotlight shot to a huge screen and someone does hand gesture so that the silhouette is shot to the screen. Yeah it was that performance. And yesterday I thought it was some kind of comedy when Mitsu kind of tapping the spotlight machine :p Now that I see the real performance, it was quite cool. They changed shapes very fast, from birds to butterflies to dragons to cats then to kettle and teacups, and Mitsu drank the tea ^^; It was after the hand puppet the duet took place. And it was still the same word that describes it : Beautiful.
Then came the Singapore kids. I then noticed that it was supposedly turning to autumn, since there were Jr boys dressed up in autumn leaves color. Then Takizawa Kabuki explanation and Takki doing his makeup. Then Mitsu and his calligraphy. This time he painted「星」very beautifully. I personally think it's more beautiful than yesterday's 夢. Apparently each day's calligraphy is different.
After Mitsu done his calligraphy and Takki done a finishing on his makeup, came the Kagamijishi part. Lucky, Mitsu was standing in the gangway just several seats in front of me. Got a clear vision of him even without the spectators ❤
The first of the Kabuki part was the beginning of autumn. How did I not notice the autumn leaves background behind the castle =_=;;. In this part it was Takki in a bright red, sticking out hair styles and mint kimono. Kawai and Mitsu were in blue guard-like wardrobe. It was here they did the ladder stunt, all three climbed up a single ladder and was carried around by the Jr boys. I didn't know what it meant though. After that was the story of a princess (not sure what princess and what story, if I'm not mistaken it was something about "Princess Mie", dunno, need to look up to Wiki). It started with a puppet princess, then turned real to Takki in princess version. The princess was seen fleeting away while her castle was caught in fire. It was a very relistic setting, the fire was represented with red-yellow cloths which were hung upside down and shook by the boys. In the end a long red cloth spread from the princess' back to the floor below the balcony where she stood. Okay, a princess in a burning castle, need to look it up.
The last part of the Kabuki, as I wrote yesterday, was the bird kingdom part. It started with Kawai and his mates doing archer dances. Then screen opened and there were a flock of blue birds. In the center were king & queen bird (first Takki was the king), and Mitsu as the prince bird. I dunno if he's a prince or what, but certainly his costume was different from the other birds (his had a touch of pinkish feathers and his hair was done high ^^;). At first the flock were dancing merrily, it was a very beautiful dance, the winged costume really put an emphasis on hand movement and overall it was a very beautiful sight. The king & queen were playing hide and seek behind the giant tree and suddenly Takki was the queen. Everyone applauded. Then Kawai showed up from 2nd floor left side, shot the queen bird with his arrows, and the scene turned red. There were like tons of bloody red "confettis" slammed to the stage. The queen died, the stage floor was red with her blood. Then Takki switched to king again (I still couldn't figure out how he did it though, tried to watch closely but had no clue...). The kind seemed frantic with fury, and the bird flock was panic in confusion. During the fight between the bird flock with Kawai's group, Mitsu took a kind of sparkling, tree-branch-looking thing and passed it to Takki. Have no idea what it represented, don't ask me. In the end the frantic king turned more in rage (I'd say he almost lost his mind) and became a scary-looking white bird. And suddenly, a gigantic baloon in the shape of flying crane inflated at the back end of the stage. It was during this timing that I felt, one word to describe Takizawa Kabuki is beautiful. Endless Shock is grand, but this one is beautiful. You absolutely can't compare both.
Then Kabuki part finished. Then Sukiyaki took place. Sukiyaki finished, Takki showed up after cleaning up his Kabuki make up, and continued with Rasa Sayange. This time, since I was sitting in stalls area, I got the chance to see up close some Jr boys, who all spread out in the seats gangway and get everyone to dance together. It was a happy experience. I noticed one particular Jr boy who stood near my area was a complete ikemen, need to search who he is :p So during the 2nd part of the chorus, the boys ran again along the gangway and asked everyone to stand up and dance. So this what made the audience in first floor stood up and dance together, I was puzzled yesterday.
--- interruption. Now I am already back to Jakarta and lazying in the comfort of my own room, and because curiosity got me (plus, I could not move on from Mitsu), I opened the DVD and start playing it. Now my review after this will be a bit biased, I reckon, since it seems the show in Japan is much better than Singapore one. Even several few minutes of the opening act already gave me that impression. You know in the DVD, Mitsu and Yabu already appeared together with Takki during the Sakura tree scene :p
---
Then finally it was the last act, Yoshitsune the Tragic Hero. There was nothing new today, but it just came to me that, probably Mitsu's character is like Yoshitsune's eternal enemy or something. I mean, he stood there in the end and went through a duel with Yoshitsune, right? Although in the end Yoshitsune won. So I'm going to do some Wikiing on this green-armored enemy of Yoshitsune. So much Wiki-ing to do -_-;;
Really I can't concentrate at all, lol, this DVD is really taking up my attention :p
I'm going to stop here and let these pics tell the story.
The whole audience did standing ovation. It was never ending and the casts came out once again to say good byes.
Still the audience was not satisfied. They keep calling Takki’s name for some time. Hoping they would once again show their faces on stage.
Of course, they never came out again. And so, after waiting for some time and the announcement that the show has finished and it is advised to leave, people started to give up and leave the hall.
There were gold pieces everywhere in the floor. Some even has the red confetti mixed up together.
Disappointed, the audience finally started leaving. And so the performance was finished, and I immediately rushed to the airport. Time to go back home!!!