Vicarious Tales:
Yoka Wao & Mari Hanafusa in "Dietrich" Musical
at Aoyama
Theater, Tokyo, Japan (March 26, 2010)
by P. Kristen Enos
(Originally posted March 30, '10.)
Back to the main page
for the Tokyo Trip
Parts:
"Did you know...?"
"Where the heck IS the Aoyama
Theater?!"
Wao in Heels (and Hanafusa Too!)
A Fan's Devotion
"Did you
know...?"
As will be explained
in my section about determining the agenda for the
trip, I had not planned on going to this musical at
all. In fact, I didn't know about it until
about two weeks before. With arriving in Tokyo
on Thursday afternoon, I had planned on having a
free Friday to do some casual exploring in mental and emotional preparation for the
Ongaku Gatas concerts on Saturday.
So then I received
the email from Takarazuka-phile Rachel where she
casually mentioned that former Takarazuka stars Yoka
Wao and Mari Hanafusa were appearing in a play (or
musical, she wasn't sure). Now while I'm not a
real fan of 'Zuka material, I have to admit I'm
partial to the pairing that the fans affectionately
call "WaoHana" (or "TakaHana", based on Wao's real
last name.) And I discovered them after
they had retired from Takarazuka so that Wao could
move into mainstream entertainment playing women
roles, with Hanafusa as
her... manager.
If you don't really
know what Takarazuka is about, here's Kristen's key
points:
This is an all-female
theatre organization that has been in existence for
around 100 years in Japan. The roles are all
played by women, and due to the culture where it is
extremely patriarchal, the ones who play the male
leads tend to be the focus and are extremely
popular. The productions are very lush and
professional, and I admit as a show queen myself, I
do enjoy watching them, even if I can't understand a
word they're saying -- especially when they're doing
non-western material.
Now Takarazuka has
five main troops, and the Cosmo Troop was the place
that Yoka Wao reigned as the male top star for
several years while being paired with Mari Hanafusa
as her female lead. Both women are extremely
talented in their own right with huge followings.
And from what I've seen in the handful of DVDs that
I have been able to get my hands on, I heartily
agree. Plus, their chemistry is undeniable.
And some English-speaking 'Zuka fans have admitted
to me that the
pairing is considered... "canon" in real
life.
When Rachel mentioned
the play, with the timing perfect for a night that I
had no concrete plans, I had to admit I was curious.
After all, this is former male top star Wao playing
the lesbian icon Marlene Dietrich, though how much
of Dietrich's real-life bisexuality was going to be
presented in the play was unknown. The idea
was intriguing, even if it's just a play. It
would be an interesting experience at the least,
especially since I know extremely minimal Japanese.
Plus, it would be a chance to see her with Hanafusa
since I missed them in 'Zuka, and especially with
this opportunity to have them both be
women.
And then Rachel wrote in
her email: "I'll be jealous of you forever if
you find a way to see them."
...
Soooooo... I immediately
placed an order with my proxy service to see if they
would be able to get me a ticket at such short
notice. When my service
confirmed that they could order the ticket and have
it delivered to the hotel, I was set. And
then I promptly sent an email to Rachel so she could start
being jealous.
(I will never claim my motives
were pure. As best friend Nico commented, "She
made it a challenge." At which I had to admit
was like waving a red flag to me. In fact, he
now calls presenting those kind of challenges to me
as "Pulling a Rachel."... And by the
way, the two of them do know each other in real life
so it's not like arbitrary teasing.)
* * *
"Where the heck IS the Aoyama
Theater?!"
Okay, so back in my 2006
Tokyo trip, I learned that I needed to bring a
compass if I was to go somewhere involving random
solo exploring. I didn't bother getting around
to buying one for this trip because things seemed
pretty straightforward. I was only going to
two places which had maps from their official
websites that I printed and brought with me. I
also checked out the one or two pictures of the
theatre to make sure I would recognize it on sight.
It was apparently "a 10
minute walk east of the Shibuya JR Station",
according to the English website and map.
The play began at 6:30, so I decided to arrive at
about 5:00 in order to grab a light dinner. My
legs were still killing me from walking around in my
earlier shopping spree but I expected to be sitting
down shortly for food and then entertainment.
Due to minimal packing
space determining limited wardrobe options, I wore a
shirt with a light over shirt and slacks. The
weather, that had been rainy the day before, looked
pretty reasonable at 5p. A little chilly but
as long as I kept walking and would soon be indoors,
I did not consider that to be a problem.
I had promised Rachel I
would get her a program copy, and of course I wanted
one for myself. However, I realized I was low
on cash and needed to find an ATM that would accept
foreign credit cards. Unfortunately, I did not
research this before leaving the hotel. I
figured "It's Shibuya, a huge commerce district,
there's got to be some around."
And so I arrived and
started to walk the street that the map said the
theater was located on. Meanwhile, I kept an
eye for various ATM options, walked over to see if
they would take foreign credit cards, which was
always 'no'. I had
quickly become frustrated and anxious as I'm
starting to think I would be limited to the cash I
had on hand. (I figured at the least, I had
enough to get one program book. And in
fairness to Rachel, I would've foregone a copy for
me and got it for her.)
However, as I'm walking along, I repeatedly checked my watch and the map as
I realize more and more that nothing I saw looked
like the theater despite the fact that I made
certain
several
times that I was on the designated street. It
mentioned that it was a large venue that actually
had two theaters inside, so I expected to see crowds
arriving but I didn't see anything like that as I
kept walking and time kept passing.
I started to wonder if the map was misleading, since
you could interpret the theater is being back from
the main street a bit (possibly on the next block
over?) I also started to wonder if my hunt for
a foreign-friendly ATM made me lose a key milestone.
However, there were a handful of English-labeled
landmarks on the map that I didn't see either, but
it was possible that the real-life signs would have been
in Japanese. I wanted to stop someone to
help me with directions, but my map was completely
in English. (I even tried a couple of times
and they claimed no knowledge of the area.)
By the time it was 6:15,
I decided I had walked far enough for what should
have been a "10 minute walk" (even by Japanese power
commuter standards.) I did a U-turn and
frantically retraced my steps for any signs of the
theater or the noted landmarks that I may have
overlooked. I even more thoroughly inspected a
couple of blocked off construction sites, in the
possibility that they hid the theater complex.
(One of them was this huge, concrete circular
structure that I thought for sure was the theater
but, no, it turned out to be fancy traffic ramps.)
And yes, my legs and
feet were killing me because I was wearing dress
shoes. (Thankfully no heels.) But
adrenaline and panic pushed those concerns aside.
By the time I reached
the site of the station again, I was completely
baffled, and it was now about 6:35. I
even thought repeatedly to just give up and go back
to the hotel to rest up for a long day on Saturday
since that needed to be my priority.
LUCKILY though, I
then remembered the one Japanese word I knew
for certain for "theater" was "gekijou", (thanks to
years of watching Hello! Morning skits.)
There was a fancy hotel
nearby with some traffic guards outside who didn't
seem busy, however they were both older men.
The rule of thumb among English travelers was that
if you needed help, your best shot is to ask someone
younger, who may be actively learning English in
school.
So I approached one of them (both of
them were older men so I figured I had equal
chance.) When I showed the guy my theater
ticket and pointed to what I thought was the theatre
name and said, "Aoyama Gekijou?", he immediately
realized what I was asking for. He started to
point down the street but then thought better of it and rushed over
to his station and pulled out a real map, (yay!!!!)
I was not
surprised to find out I had been walking in the
complete opposite direction. Flash on lack of
compass. Grrrrr.
Now that I have my
real directions, I RAN.
It was not an easy thing
to find with a limited time span (given that I was
already late) and I was concerned about missing
landmarks again. I wove and zipped through
crowds, over pedestrian bridges, across cross-walks
and even down a dark alley with rows of people
living in cardboard boxes. (I wasn't worried
if I was going to be mugged because I didn't have
any real cash on me anyway and my credit cards
didn't work. And I doubt a mugger would want
my theater ticket, which would upset me after
everything I just went through.)
But when I finally saw
the theater marquee, I felt an instant sense of relief.
And then, as if the Universe just wanted to just
piss me off, in the background was a large
billboard for Citibank! (I would've had
a huge swearing fit but I had a bigger priority at
the moment.)
Sure enough, the theater
had a huge plaza out front and looked like the style of a
large
entertainment venue that I had been expecting.
And of course there weren't any patrons outside.
But as I ran to the front doors, I could see through
the glass walls of the lobby that there was a
waiting
line of female, uniformed ushers who were ready for
people like me.
I was so frantic that I
didn't check the time to know exactly how much I had
missed but I was glad to see that I was in the back
row of the orchestra section so my arrival was
minimally intrusive since Wao was on stage with one
other actress (too old to be Hanafusa) to a deathly
quiet audience.
* * *
Wao in Heels
(and Hanafusa, too!)
This is NOT a review of
the musical because I didn't understand a majority
of the dialogue, so all I can do is write my
impressions and observations (which is actually more
fun for me.) And on the other hand, I could
give my best guess of what was going on in the play
for those who really want to know such things, but
I'm sure there are other Wao fans who would do a
better and more detailed job than I would. And
I purposefully avoided researching any other fan
write-ups before doing this one so the perspective
remained purely mine:
Now, I did absolutely no research
on Marlene's life before coming to the play, which
could have helped me understand the gist of the
scenes and plot points a bit better, but it would
have been unreliable if the play wasn't that
historically accurate. And I was
surprised to find that Hanafusa was cast as Edith
Piaf (or "Pi-A-Fu"), since it never occurred to me
that the two women were contemporaries in real-life.
But the timing was right and they were international
super stars so it should not have been too surprising
that their paths crossed.
And I admit, other than
the infamous tuxedo and flirting with the woman
scene in that film with Cary Grant, I've never seen
a Marlene film . Even when I found out that
she was quite famous in Berlin as a lesbian/bisexual
celebrity. (I know, I should have lesbian
points taken away). But with all that, I had
very minimal expectations of the play showing or
acknowledging that part of her life. I was
there more to absorb Wao and Hanafusa's performances
than to evaluate the accuracy of the depiction of
Marlene's life events.
Well, given that Wao
broke out into song within two minutes of me sitting
down, I assumed I was in for a musical, which was
more than acceptable.
From what I could
figure out of the play and bits of words from the
dialogue and scenes (not in the most accurate order,
or perhaps even interpretation) here are the main points
according to me:
- I had come in at
the point of Marlene leaving her home in Berlin
due to the growing Nazi threat.
- She then goes to
Paris, where she encounters Edith Piaf, who was
the cabaret star of the club she visited.
(Yay, that I hadn't missed Hanafusa's entrance!) She and Piaf are quickly introduced, as well as
Piaf's boyfriend, who proceeds to publicly
slap her (Piaf) down, at which Marlene intervenes.
The boyfriend runs away and then women become
friends.
- The news of
Nazi's invading Paris brings the club to a
somber moment.
- Then Marlene
goes on to expand her own career with a stressed
husband and a young daughter in tow. She
does a performance of an American-stylized
number that might have been a parody?
(More details below.)
- Edith is then
performing in New York and Marlene comes to
visit her in the dressing room. They have
a playful musical number before Edith's new
boyfriend arrives and takes over Edith's
attention.
- Marlene is
having relationship troubles while Edith is in
romantic bliss.
- Then Edith's
boyfriend is killed.
- Huge dramatic
scene of a devastated Edith with Marlene trying
to come to her emotional rescue. Edith
then dies in Marlene's arms.
- (Now that
Hanafusa is gone, I pay less attention):
Marlene's man leaves her (maybe this happened
before the Edith scene -- can't remember.)
- Daughter grows
up into a mature young woman and the war ends.
- Marlene takes
daughter to Berlin.
- Apparently
now unpopular, protestors show up with signs against
Marlene, like "Yankee Go Home!" and a sheet with
a painted U.S. flag that is crossed out with
graffiti on it.
- Marlene and
daughter arrives and are confronted by the
hateful crowd.
- Marlene
eventually wins them over into sobbing approval
and the story portion of the play ends.
- Musical finale
with Wao in the white tux outfit.
- Curtain calls
(like 4 or 5 bows worth.)
- (Oh, and the
Angel of Peace did A LOT of ballet dancing.
The most I ever sat through, in any form of
performance, live or recorded.)
My real
observations and opinions in random order:
- During
intermission, I noticed that the audience seemed
to be 90% (at least) women. I didn't
notice any men who seemed to be there by
themselves or without female companionship or
some sort. And from what I could see of
the silhouette of hairstyles, the front rows
seemed to be almost completely female.
(And of course, I had to sit next to one of the
few men, who was there with a woman who watched
every Wao scene through theater glasses. While
I constantly squirmed from aching legs, he sat
like a statue almost the entire time, not even
doing polite applause after songs, except at the very end.)
- Hanafusa was
clearly a star in her own right. When she
appeared on the stage, a couple of people
immediately started to applaud. But since
she started to sing right away, the applause
abruptly stopped so everyone could focus on her singing.
- Wao is an Amazon
compared to the rest of the cast, male and
female. In fact, from what I could tell,
there were only about two or three men she
didn't tower over, even in flat shoes. And then add to
the fact that in playing a female, she was in
tall, spiky heels a lot of the time. (It's
like putting the Tokyo Tower on a platform.)
- So with that
height factor, I found the scene of her
intervening to protect "Edith" from an abusive
boyfriend very amusing. When she snagged the abuser's
arm to stop him, it was as if there was no
mistake that she could really kick the
crap out of him if she wanted to given how much
she towered over him. Don't know how
accurate that was to Marlene in real-life.
- Hanafusa played
Edith as the endearing and trusting straight
woman, who is genuinely friendly to her female
savior. The scene where the two of them
sing a song in the New York dressing room was
choreographed with interesting dynamics.
As they sing a song that is probably about their
friendship, Edith opens the box of chocolates
that Marlene had given her. In a playful
moment, she offers the open box to Marlene, who
then takes a chocolate and puts it in Edith's
mouth. The song comes to an end with the
women face to face in a new embrace with a pause
before Edith's latest boyfriend comes in.
Marlene makes a hasty exit to leave the lovers
alone. *cough* (Personally, I thought the dynamics
of the portrayal was that Marlene was the
friendly but aggressive/predatory one with Edith
being the blissfully ignorant friend.
Still, it was more than I thought they were
going to do in acknowledging Marlene's real-life
bisexuality.)
- In the dance
numbers where Hanafusa is lifted up and placed
on her male partner's shoulder, or carried in a
chair by male dancers, I'm thinking "Now, that's
choreography that probably wouldn't happen in
Takarazuka."
- In the
American-themed musical number, there were six
back-up dancers in costumes with Stars and
Stripes patterns. The two men were dressed
in parody drag, one with a tutu and the other
with a corset with formed boobs. In the
following scene where Marlene is talking to
someone, the two men make a sudden appearance by
skipping along the stage in the background while hand in hand.
Not confident that this was an affectionate
portrayal of homosexuality, the lesbian activist
in me frowned a bit. And the audience
didn't react to them at all.
- Any male
supporting character related to show business
was portrayed as a flaming queen, unless
heterosexually defined with a female pairing.
Again, I'm frowning a bit.
- Every time Wao
or Hanafusa was hugged (or even touched) by a
male co-star, I was very sure that there were
several members of the mostly-female audience
bristling with hostility.
- In the
Marlene/Edith grieving scene, the actresses were
genuinely crying as they delivered their lines.
I could hear sniffles from several audience
members throughout the theater.
- The ONLY
time that Wao sang a song that didn't receive
any applause was her fighting duet with her
husband and he storms out of the scene.
The silence that followed was interesting given
that there was a clear pause in the performance
for the audience to do their part and applaud.
- And yes, I had
enough cash to buy two program books and train
tickets.
* * *
A Fan's Devotion
Since I am never the
type of person to rush out of a venue at the end of
a performance if I could help it, I let the crowds
proceed first while I relished resting my aching
legs and feet as much as I could before my trek back
to the hotel. When the majority of audience
had left, I finally stood to make my own exit.
When I stepped out of the lobby door, I noticed two
things: the weather sucked in that it was now
very cold, windy and a little wet; and there was a
"crowd" of apparent audience members gathering in
the plaza in front of the theater entrance.
Now I put "crowd" in quotes because they were too
organized to be any random gathering, lining up in
two sets of rows like a formation of soldiers.
I remembered stories
Rachel had told me about Takarazuka fandom
activities and I realized this had to be one of
them. My curiosity getting the better of me, I
decided it would be worth waiting to see what would
happen. But in some place out of the freezing
wind and rain sprinkles.
In the long wait, I
tried finding various spots around the plaza that
kept me in reasonable eye-sight of the gathered fans
while keeping my distance since I didn't want to
give the impression that I was trying to interfere
with their own experiences and process. But I
noticed a few things that were interesting:
- From what I
could see, they were all women. There were
a few people who was gathered behind them that
were no doubt other patrons who figured out what
was going on and were taking
advantage of the opportunity of possibly seeing
Wao up close.
- A couple of the
fans
in the front rows were madly scribbling on their
notepads, no doubt trying to immortalize the
details of the evening for themselves.
- It was freezing
cold and they were in face of the wind that
swept through the plaza. Some "organizers"
in jackets with the "Dietrich" logo on the back
orchestrated some brief exercises to warm everyone
up.
- One poor woman
in the front row was crouched down for warmth
and organizers kept checking on her and cheering
her on with the anticipation of the reward for
her effort.
- I noticed some
of them were carrying cards but I wasn't sure
what the significance at the time.
As the wait
continued, I was personally becoming worried
because, without a jacket or an umbrella, I was also
freezing, much more so than the other waiting fans.
More and more I was terrified at the thought of
getting a cold when faced with a double-concert the
next day, the REAL reason why I came to Tokyo.
But as more time passed, my own stubbornness kicked
in. I waited this long, so just a little longer.
As I kept telling myself again and again.
Finally, a few actors
started to appear and one of them recognized the
fact that there were anxiously waiting fans. I
assumed he was concerned about the people waiting in
the cold weather because he pulled out his cell
phone and started to make a few phone calls as he
stood to the side (near me) and kept an eye on the
waiting women.
Several more minutes
passed, Wao finally showed up, to the immediate
squeals of excited fans, who still remained in their
formation. Dressed in a long black coat and
hat, she greeted the fans, and immediately noticed
how cold it was herself. She started jumping
up and down for warm and signaled for them to do so
too, which (of course) they did zealously.
And then the actual
ritual happened: She stood in front of the
first block of women who then walked up to her in
single-file formation and each quickly handed her a card,
that she then passed to her nearby assistant, who
put them in a bag ready for the occasion. Once
the first group was done, the women returned to
their places but crouched down in wait and
anticipation as Wao moved to do the same with the
next crowd.
I swear, the whole
process could not have taken more than a minute or
two, as each fan quickly worked her way through the
line with the ultra efficiency of a Japanese
assembly line. The only break in the routine
was when a huge of wind came and almost knocked a
poor woman back right when she was about to hand her
card to Wao. I guess the opportunity for that
extremely brief moment of personal acknowledgement
and close proximity was the most a fan could ever
want or achieve.
That being done,
Wao's other staffers were trying to check on the
status of her private car from what I assumed was
the underground parking lot. (Also near where
I stood.)
As we all waited, Wao
kept an occasional eye on the crowd that wasn't
about to leave as long as she was still there,
giving them a couple of waves, which were
enthusiastically returned. At one point she
took off her hat (I think because of the wind),
which caused screams. Someone called out
"Taka-chan!", she waved, and more screams.
Finally, the car
arrived, which was nearer to me than the waiting
fans. However, unlike them who weren't going
to leave as long as the car was still there (with
her inside it), I quickly bolted out of there,
anxious to have a hot bath and finally rest my aching
limbs and feet for the day.
If I had ended up
with a cold from that experience and have my
Saturday ruined, I would NOT be a happy
person!
A couple of snaps
from the event:
The sculpture out in
the plaza area. If the English map had noted
this as a landmark, I think I would've realized
sooner than later that I wasn't seeing it as I
wandered around the other side of Shibuya.
The theater poster
display that I took to pass the time during The
Wait. Yes, the fact that the theater is labeled in
English was an irony that I'm very well aware of.
Another shot to pass
the time, the decorated theater column. I know
it's a bit too close but it was freezing and
stepping back would have mean I'd step right into
the intermittent sprinkles (with risking the prized
program books.)
The
Waiting Fans. Can you blame me for thinking
that something a little unusual was going on?
The wait
is over! (Yes, that's her with the white bag.)
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