About 300 years ago, a young Japanese woman was burned at the stake for arson. Some might not think this story is well-suited for puppetry, but the National Puppet Theatre of Japan performed it in Cahn Auditorium on Monday anyway as part of their national tour.
Bunraku, a type of Japanese puppet theater, often deals with dark themes such as arson, as in “Oshichi’s Burning Love,” said Peter Grili, president of the Japan Society of Boston.
“Of the three (forms of Japanese theater), Bunraku has more realism,” Grili said. “The stories would often be based on actual events.”
Students and community members had the opportunity to see the puppets at the Cahn performance and also at a free afternoon lecture in McCormick Auditorium at Norris University Center. Northwestern was selected as the group’s Chicago venue after the University of Chicago backed out. The tour is the theater’s first in the U.S. in nearly two decades.
Phyllis Lyons, a Japanese literature professor who worked to bring the tour to Northwestern, said Bunraku performances are rare in the U.S. because it is difficult for performers to bring the necessary stage equipment across the ocean.
“The difficulty is logistics,” Lyons said, adding that Cahn would have to be “transformed” for the performance.
“They had to build a platform, waist high (for the puppeteers), and they had to extend the stage into the audience.”
The lecture at Norris began with Grili reviewing Bunraku’s history. The art originated in the 18th century and was viewed as a form of street performance until the past century, he said.
In their performances, three puppeteers work with each puppet. They perform in the center of the stage, remaining silent aside from occasional stomps to emphasize movement. On the side of the stage, a single chanter reads the narration and dialogue for the play. Another performer playing a shamisen, a three-stringed instrument, sits next to him.
The performers, speaking through Grili as a translator at the lecture, explained their craft firsthand to students from both NU and Evanston Township High School and other audience members.
The performers said it takes about 25 years to become a head puppeteer.
Chanter Toyotake Rosetayu said his role is to narrate the story.
“My job isn’t just to sing for you,” Toyotake said. “It’s to tell the whole story. What I have to do is to convey the inner passions and feelings of the characters.”
Head Puppeteer Yoshida Kazuo explained why the male puppets’ mouths didn’t move with the dialogue.
“The mouth only opens at moments of high drama,” Yoshida said. “Otherwise the effect would wear off.”
Minnesotan puppeteer Kirk Hunter, who traveled to the lecture from Minneapolis, said that he came away impressed with Bunraku as a puppetry form, compared with the work that he does with marionettes.
“The movement is what speaks to me so much,” Hunter said. “It’s a whole world of movement, and it’s so beautifully refined. It’s just mind-boggling.”
Reach Michael Gsovski at [email protected].
