Kazuyoshi Kushida

Kazuyoshi Kushida

Born in 1942, Kazuyoshi Kushida is an actor and director. After studying in the Haiyu-za actor’s school, he joined the Bungaku-za theater company in 1965. The following year he joined with Makoto Sato, Ren Saito and Hideko Yoshida to form the company Jiyu Gekijo that would use the Underground Theater Jiyu Gekijo as its performance base. In 1975 the name was changed to On-Theater Jiyu Gekijo and Kushida continued to present a series of popular productions, such as Maboroshi no Suizokukan (1976) and Motto Naite-yo Flapper (1977) (written and directed by Kushida) and directing Ren Saito’s Shanghai Rhapsody ( Shanghai Bansking ) (1979) and Cusco (1982). From 1985 he began working in preparation for the opening of the Bunkamura Theater Cocoon from the architectural planning stage in the capacity of artistic director. With the opening of the theater in 1989, he signed a franchise agreement with On-Theater Jiyu Gekijo, which he also led, and introduced a repertoire system. Since then he has worked actively on behalf of Theater Cocoon, bringing such programs as an annual production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream directed by different directors each year and initiating the “Cocoon Kabuki” series in collaboration with Kanzaburo Nakamura XVIII. The “Cocoon Kabuki” remains a popular ongoing series today. At the conclusion of his term as artistic director of Theater Cocoon in 1996, Kushida also dissolved the company On-Theater Jiyu Gekijo. Since 2000, he has served as a professor of the Arts Dept, of Nihon University, and since April 2003 he has served as artistic and administrative director of the Matsumoto Performing Arts Centre. In 2006, he won the Outstanding Director Award of the 14th Yomiuri Drama Grand Prix for Tokaido Yotsuya Kaidan–Kita version , the seventh production of the Cocoon Kabuki series.