国際交流基金 The Japan Foundation Performing Arts Network Japan

New Plays 日本の新作戯曲

Jun. 24, 2009
Minilla, March 27

3月27日のミニラ

Minilla, March 27
Seigo Hatasawa

Godzilla is among the famous made-in-Japan fictional monsters. Minilla is Godzilla’s child. With a satirical touch and an analogy between Godzilla and the so-called “monster parents” that make outrageous claims against school’s and their operating systems, this play portrays the events surrounding Minilla in the last day of the school year.

Minilla, March 27
Minilla, March 27

Watanabe Genshiro Shoten 9th production Minilla, March 27
April 19 - 26, 2009Atelier Green Park (Aomori)
May 2 - 6, 2009 at The Suzunari (Tokyo)
©Shohei Yamashita
Data :
Premiere: 2009
Length: approx. 1 hour, 30 min.
Acts, scenes: 1 act, one scene
Cast: 10 (6 men, 4 woman)

The setting is the principal’s office of Utou Middle School in Aomori Prefecture.

Minilla is talking with the principal just 30 minutes before the start of the ceremony to end the school year, which will include farewells to two teachers who are leaving the school, the homeroom teacher of the second year Class No. 3, Ms. Yoshiko Kobayashi, and the health room assistant teacher, Ms. Ohashi. There will also be a retirement ceremony for the principal.

Minilla is selfishly making a lot of brusque and irreverent complaints and demands, not only to the principal but also concerning all the teachers. Almost all of his statements are quarrelsome. He has been a student who is often absent, and when he does come to school he rarely goes to class but spends most of his time either in the principal’s office or the health room. It appears that Minilla is the main reason that the health room’s Ohashi, his homeroom teacher Kobayashi and the principal Sasahara are all quitting the school at once.

The troubles began when teacher Kobayashi saw Minilla smoking one day and reported the fact to his mother. However, instead of reproaching her child for smoking, she begins an all-out offensive against the teacher Kobayashi with all the fierceness of Godzilla. That is apparently the cause of the physical and emotional breakdown that led Kobayashi to stop coming to school. She is also absent from today’s farewell ceremony, represented instead by her uncle, Yoshihiro, and nephew, Morimichi, to speak on her behalf.

Finally the school year’s closing ceremony and farewells are over and the teachers are leaving with expectations for a restful, if short, spring vacation before the new school year starts. The previously aggressive and combative Minilla now appears listless and even depressed. Perhaps he realizes now that he had actually liked his teacher Kobayashi…. As he prepares to leave, the principal says a word to Minilla.

“Even after your mother is gone, you will have to find your way in life.”

Alone now in the principal’s office, Minilla lights a cigarette and begins to smoke.

Profile

Born in Akita Prefecture, Hatasawa started out as an actor and has specialized as a playwright and director since 2000. In 2005 Ore no kabane o koete ike (Over My Dead Body) won the top prize in the short drama competition at the Japan Playwrights Association Congress 2005 in Kumamoto. In the same year, Hatasawa formed the theater production collective Watanabe Genshiro Shoten, based in Aomori, which later became a theater company in 2008. He is also involved in training local people in theater and is working to establish a new art network throughout Japan. With their blend of deep human insight and a unique sense of humor, Hatasawa’s plays have been endorsed by a wide range of companies including Subaru and Seinen Gekijo. He also writes for other theater companies. In addition, he is a high school teacher and supervises the school drama club, which frequently participates in national high school drama competitions, which it won in 2005 for Shugaku ryoko (School Trip). Hatasawa has won the top prize at the National Arts Festival for his radio dramas, as well as other major awards in broadcasting.

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