There was a period where I tried imitating that kind of “theater of the everyday.” Around 2007 I was asked by a producer if I wanted to try directing a production of Ibsen’s
The Wild Duck
. For that, I had to direct for the first time in my career a play that had a stage script, spoken lines and conversation. To prepare myself for that I wrote a script in a “theater of the everyday” style for a Penino production titled
Egao no Toride
(Fortress of Smiles). But, how should I say it? For everyday type acting there is nothing that I can really direct the actors to do, other than what comes to them naturally, is there? All they have to do is watch the variety programs on television for a week and come up with some ideas. It really made me mad. For me, going out of your way to bring reality into the theater was actually defying the essence of theater, and I couldn’t understand why we should make effort to bring the everyday into theater, which is inherently a realm of images. Later, something that I felt while I was staging
The Wild Duck
was how unnatural it felt to direct a play in manner where you are saying, “OK, now we will rehearse pages 1 to 5. As a director who wants to bring to create stages with a quality of time that is not found in everyday life, chopping up that time into arbitrary fragments like that makes it very difficult to grasp the sense of time that I, as the director, want to keep flowing through the play. In our company’s rehearsals we always go through the whole play in each rehearsal. For these various reasons, I realized how poorly suited I was for directing plays in the traditional format.
Could I ask you to tell us your thoughts about acting? You are not interested in psychological characterization. You don’t like actors using superficial techniques. That implies that you have no interest in actors who are skilled at acting roles of modern theater standards like the works of Chekhov and Ibsen? Would you tell us what your definition of a good actor is?
First of all, I am looking at the overall picture as a composition, so I am concerned more about the overall balance more than the individual actor qualities. The appearance of the actors as objects placed on the stage is important to me. About my personal preference … How shall I express it? I feel drawn to people with faces that look like they have been persecuted or discriminated against all their lives (laughs). As I said to the three men who acted in the production
Extase
that we staged in Shizuoka Performing Arts Center recently, actors are people who do worthless things on stage and then have to act proud of themselves and claim their worth as “attractions.” I believe that kind of misdirected strength of will, or nerve, is similar, for example, to the energy emitted by a person has been persecuted or the subject of discrimination. I feel that kind of person emits an aura of unshakeable self-confidence of a form similar perhaps to an outpouring of resentment.
That is an interesting idea. In any case, what you want is for the actor to stand on stage with a confident, unshakeable presence?
That’s right. In proper terms it is “Being confident in one’s cowardice.” That is why I tell the actors that appear in my plays to choose one of three attitudes to stand on the stage with. The first is to take to the stage as if you have played this role in 50,000 performances already and this is your 50,001st. The second is to act like an actor who receives a million dollars per stage. The thirds is to act like a person who has been thoroughly discriminated against by society but you have the job of going on stage and entertaining people. I believe that if an actor goes on stage with one of these three attitudes they will be attractive as an actor. In short, the important thing is how the actor draws a line that separates them from the audience. The more clearly that attitude of distinction is defined, the better the actor will be. I think the same is true of the play itself as well. It is always a matter of attitude.
That is fascinating. You profess to have no interest in the inner psychological machinations of people and yet you worked as a psychiatrist (laughs).
That’s true. I think I was no good as a doctor (laughs). I don’t see patients anymore but when I look back a few years, I think I basically didn’t know what was sick about the patients I saw. For example, there was one patient who complained that he only wanted to take pictures of dead cats. But I didn’t see anything wrong with that and suggested that he go ahead and take lots of pictures of those dead bodies. Now he is a successful photographer. The idea for
Frustrating Picture Book for Adults
also came from a former patient. It was a person who had a guilt complex about masturbating. That led to the creating of that kind of play where everything that happens seems to have sexual undertones. It may be improper to say this, but rather than getting serious about patients’ problems, I become fascinated by them.
Frustrating Picture Book for Adults
was performed at
HAU
in Berlin in 2010 and further performances were then scheduled for Switzerland and the Netherlands. After the HAU performances a review was printed that pointed out a similarity between you directing style of cutting up a picture randomly into fragments and the novels of William Burroughs. How do you feel about the way your works are received abroad?
One thing that impressed me among the reactions after the HAU performances was being told that the other Japanese performances at that festival by
chelfitsch
and
faifai
could be seen in the context of Japanese pop culture as seen from the West, but Penino’s work didn’t fit in that same context. And, although our performance was definitely of another cultural context from that of the West, it didn’t have the feeling of something exotic. I think they saw something universal in our work. This year it will be performed in Belgium and Germany. We are able to do this because we were able to have the set of stage art we made for the HAU production of
Frustrating Picture Book for Adults
stored at Groningen in the Netherlands. A lot of effort goes into creating the stage art for one of our works and the sets we make are not portable, which is a problem in overseas performances. So for each performance we have to go early and re-create the stage art. But it is possible [because the basic set of
Frustrating Picture Book for Adults
was stored for reuse], and working with local staff at each venue to re-create the fine details of the stage art is an enjoyable process for me.
The new work
Extase
that you presented at the 2011 World Theater Festival Shizuoka had a set where you built a huge ten-meter wall on three sides of the outdoor stage and in doing so created a man-made set that completely shut out the surrounding woods of the outdoor theater. That, indeed, is not a portable set.
That is true (laughs). After the disastrous earthquake and tsunami of March 11, I was tired of seeing images of what you might call the violence of nature. So this became a stage that started from the act of shutting out the woods. So when those light pink muscle colored walls are torn down, the play becomes meaningless as a work. It was a project where we were to do a residence of three months there and create a new work, but until I decided to build those walls I couldn’t come up with any idea of what kind of work I wanted to create. So, for the first week I was there in Shizuoka I just stared at the endless sky and woods completely at a loss. I didn’t know what to do, because no ideas came to mind. Then it suddenly occurred to me that it was because there was no frame. So when I decided to build the walls the things I should do became clear. I realized once again that because my roots are in painting, no ideas come to me until I see the canvas. Next I had to decide what color to make the walls. Muscle color would be good, I thought. As the actors to stand in front of the muscle colored walls I wanted old grandmothers. The grandmothers they got together for me were old and amateurs, so they couldn’t memorize lines well. But I found out that apparently they could sing. So, I thought the setting could be the playroom of a home for the elderly. In that way things came together through a process of elimination. But due to the limitations of the performers, it became a work where they performed without hesitation.
As our final question, would you tell us about the outlook for the future of Niwa Gekidan Penino?
I am always at a loss when I am asked this question because I really have no outlook for the future. I can’t think in those terms. Well, I do believe that I will continue creating art that respond to the time and situation. I really don’t care about the future. If I were to say one thing, it would be that I want us to be a strong company doing strong works. Really, that is all I want.
Profile
Tanino Kuro
Born in Toyama Pref. in 1976. While a student in the Medical School of Showa University, he formed the theater company Niwa gekidan Penino (Theatre the Garden Penino) in 2000 with members of the university’s drama club. Besides his activities as representative, playwright and director of this company, Tanino is also a licensed and practicing psychiatrist. The company’s works are built around imaginings and obsessions of Tanino’s that don’t really exist and are staged in spaces carefully designed to the finest detail. For his first serious attempt at playwriting, Egao no Toride (2007), and for Hoshikage no Jr. (2008), composed as a play-within-a play in which child actors from child-actor training program play a “fake family,” Tanino’s plays were nominated as finalists for the Kishida Drama Award for two consecutive years. With Frustrating Picture Book for Adults , Tanino and Niwa gekidan Penino participated in the 2009 HAU Theater’s festival in Germany.
http://www.niwagekidan.org
Niwa gekidan Penino
Kuroi OL
(Dark Office Ladies)
(Nov. 2004 at Nishi-Shinjuku 6-chome special stage)
Photo: Aki Tanaka
Niwa gekidan Penino
Chiisana (small) Limbo Restaurant
(Apr - May, 2004 at Hakobune)
Photo: Aki Tanaka
Niwa gekidan Penino
Frustrating Picture Book for Adults
(Oct. 2009 at HAU Theater, Berlin, Germany)
Photo(s) by Tim Deussen, www.fotoscout.de
Extase
(Jun. 4 - 5, 2011 at Open Air Theatre UDO, Shizuoka Performing Arts Park)
Photo: Shizuoka Performing Arts Center