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<\/p>\nThe stage, with a surface like black granite, measures about 10 x 10 meters. It is significantly slanted from the back down to the front, and has an additional lengthways fold in the center. It all looks like a laptop computer that was opened as wide as possible, turned around by 90 degrees, and propped against something. The actors wear Japanese-style work shoes and leggings made of straw-like material, and watching them as they seem to slip and fall with every move they make on the sharply sloped stage is quite a nerve-stretching affair. They only manage to get stable footing when they cling to one of the seven square timber bars that reach from the stage up to the ceiling, lie down, or fling themselves face down on the slanted floor. It\u2019s just as shaky and uncertain a scenery as the \u201cSite of Reversible Destiny\u201d by Shusaku Arakawa and Madeline Gins.<\/p>\n
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Photo: Takuya Matsumi<\/small><\/p>\n
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The seven characters that appear in the play are the \u201dWife,\u201d the \u201cHusband,\u201d the \u201cDaughter\u201d and the \u201cProdigal Son\u201d \u00ac\u2013 the family whose peaceful life has been disrupted \u2013 as well as the \u201dWorker\u201d in charge of decontamination with his robot \u201cBush,\u201d and the \u201cEmployee\u201d who gives instructions. The expression \u201cano hi (that day)\u201d frequently appears in their dialogues, making the viewer involuntarily think of the disaster that happened in Japan seven years ago. The unstable blackish stage floor is reminiscent of the heavily shaking earth, the ocean that swallowed up countless lives, and the subsequent contamination with radioactive substances. The theme of this piece is, quite clearly, \u201cJapan after that day.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Photo: Takuya Matsumi<\/small><\/p>\n
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Discrimination, group behavior, smartphones, the seniority system, vested interests, total obedience and nationalism, social withdrawal, deflation, nursing care, work-until-late\/play-tetris-on-the-train\/shop-at-the-convenience-store\/get-home-late-at-night\/sleep-over-the-weekend\u2026 These are taken from Shuntaro Matsubara\u2019s original script. While casually slipping in (the Japanese translation of) Marcel Duchamp\u2019s wise saying, \u201cIt\u2019s always the others who die,\u201d the actors additionally read out names of \u201dofficial sponsors of the Olympic Games in Tokyo 2020,\u201d which are not in the original. There are also expressions that sound to me like \u201cTokatonton\u201d and \u201cKasa ga nai\u201d (Osamu Dazai\u2019s novel and a popular song by Yosui Inoue, both of which in a way embody the postwar Japanese society), but I might have misheard those.<\/p>\n
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Photo: Takuya Matsumi<\/small><\/p>\n
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Dialogues are frequently interrupted by buzzer sounds and other harsh noises, as well as lights that rotate like searchlights or emergency lamps. The illumination \u2013 in the same yellow and magenta tones as Andy Warhol\u2019s \u201cCow\u201d \u2013 is at times so gaudy that it seems to be indicating local bubbles in our polarized society. Sounds, lighting, the slanted stage, the actors\u2019 acrobatic movements, peculiarly intonated speech \u2013 it\u2019s all plucking the viewer\u2019s nerves from beginning to end.<\/p>\n