Outline

date	Fri 17th Oct - Sun 19th Oct
Venue	Ono Auditorium(17th Oct), Masaru Ibuka Auditorium(18th Oct), Okuma Auditorium(19th Oct)
Organizer	Theare Museum Global COE
outline	17th October "Raising Questions" 14:00-16:15 Research Papers "Film, Theatre, and Dance in the 1960s" You Sato [14:10 - 14:40] Sunao Otsuka [14:50 - 15:20] Naomi Inata [ 15:30 - 16:00] 16:25-17:15 Plenary Lecture 1 "What was the Underground Theatre?" Yoshio Ozasa 17:45-18:45 Plenary Lecture 2 "A Ghost of the Underground Theatre." Ryuko Saeki 19:00-20:15 Panel Session 1 "Theatre in the 1960s from a Present Point of View." Oriza Hirata, Akio Miyazawa, Toshiki Okada Chair : Kentaro Matsui 18th October "Taking of the Movement" 10:00-10:10 Opening Address 10:10-11:00 Plenary Lecture 3 "The History and Influence of Theatre in the 1960s." Akihiko Senda 11:00-11:30 "Truth -telling and Demystification of the Undergroud Theatre." Itsuki Umeyama 13:00-15:00 Symposium "Coffeehouse Chronicles: 47 years of La MaMa E.T.C." Chair: Minako Okamuro Ellen Stewart, Ozzie Rodoriguez, Kaori Fujiyabu (Simulataneous Translation available) 15:30-16:45 Panel Session 2 "The Dawn of Shuji Terayama and his Visual Works." Kyoko Kujo, Sakumi Hagiwara, Kohei Ando 17:00-18:15 Colloquy 1 "Theatre as Movement: Concerning Theatre Center 68/71." Makoto Sato Interviewer: David G. Goodman 19th October "Revealing the Facts" 10:10-11:00 Plenary Lecture 4 "Historical Background and Contemporary Evaluation of Theatre in the 1960s." Takayuki Kan 11:15-12:30 Colloquy 2 "The Function of a Director." Yukio Ninagawa Interviewer: Akihiko Senda 13:30-14:45 Colloquy 3 "The Red tent for Juro Kara" Juro Kara Interviewer: Naoto Horikiri 15:00-16:15 Colloquy 4 "A Strategy for Words." Minoru Betsuyaku Interviewer: Minako Okamuro

Details

"Reconsidering the Underground Theatre of the 1960s: An International Conference", with a focus on the 1960s Japanese theatre movement, was the largest event in the Global COE programme at Waseda University's Theatre Museum to take place in 2008. It was attended by roughly 1,500 people, with a total of 23 speakers over the three-day event taking the podium in 15 hours of discussions that were both exciting and entertaining. As related events, David Goodman presented a series of seminars from October 21 to October 23 under the title "The Japanese Avant-Garde Theatre of the 1960s: Action, Salvation and Revolution", while the Theatre Museum held a poster exhibition from October 15 to October 20 titled "Angura: Posters of the Japanese Avant-Garde". Both of these also had very good attendance.

Sometimes known as the "sho-gekijo" ["little theatre"] movement, and commonly referred to as "angura" [an abbreviation of "underground"], the underground theatre movement in Japan reached a peak of popularity around the end of the 1960s, which continued throughout the 1970s. The movement had wide and far-reaching influence, but despite being the object of a fair amount of popular myth it has never been taken up on a large scale by an education and research institution until now. The idea was to build a conference around personal accounts from figures directly involved in angura, and to combine these with statements from people in the theatre world who came afterwards, and presentations by young researchers. In this way mythologizing could be avoided, and the 1960s experimental theatre movement in Japan could be treated from a more objective point of view. This would be the first time such a conference had ever taken place in Japan.

The first day, which had the broad theme of "Raising Questions", began with presentations on the subject of "Film, Theatre, and Dance in the 1960s". Presentations had been solicited from a wide range of researchers, including but not limited to theatre studies. Three presentations were delivered by Global COE associate fellows: "Views of the Current Generation: On Historicizing Films of the 60s", by You Sato; "The 'City Plays' of Shuji Terayama: A Reexamination of Experimenta 3 in 1969, Frankfurt International Festival of Experimental Theatre", by Sunao Otsuka; and "'Rose-Colored Dance' (1965) as a Pop art: Rethinking the Tatsumi Hijikata's 'dozoku' in the 1960s", by Naomi Inata. These presentations stimulated numerous questions and observations from the audience. This was followed by two plenary lectures. In the first, titled "What was the Underground Theatre?", theatre critic and historian Yoshio Ozasa gave an account of popular culture in the 1960s, including popular songs, followed by an explanation of aspects of journalism of the time and the origins of the word angura, accompanied by relevant materials. Ryuko Saeki, a theatre critic and professor at Gakushuin University who was involved in the angura movement, followed with a talk titled "A Ghost of the Underground Theatre", in which he went beyond talking about the underground theatre movement in Japan and delivered a soaring discourse, in the same wordy, almost garrulous delivery that marks many angura plays, on theatre in general. This was followed by a panel discussion on "Theatre in the 1960s from a Present Point of View", chaired by Kentaro Matsui (Visiting Lecturer [GCOE]), between three playwrights, Akio Miyazawa, Oriza Hirata, and Toshiki Okada, whose use of language in their plays shows clear differences with the linguistic sensibility of Ryuko Saeki and other figures involved in the underground theatre movement. More interesting than points of difference with the underground theatre movement, however, were the aspects these playwrights felt they had inherited from the theatre of the 1960s—the points they had in common.

The theme on the second day was "Talking of the Movement". In the morning, theatre critic Akihiko Senda, also a professor at Shizuoka University of Art and Culture, delivered a plenary lecture titled "The History and Influence of Theatre in the 1960s". In it he gave an overall picture of theatre in the 1960s, and a summary of the main points of the underground theatre movement in Japan. This was followed by a presentation by Itsuki Umeyama, Research Associate at Waseda University, on the underlying purpose of the conference, titled "Truth-telling and Demystification of the Underground Theatre".

Two groups from overseas had been invited to this conference. The first group comprised Ellen Stewart and Ozzie Rodriguez, director and archivist respectively of New York's La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club (La MaMa E.T.C). These two people, accompanied by Kaori Fujiyabu, in charge of archives and marketing at the Club, gave a symposium titled "Coffeehouse Chronicles: 47 Years of La MaMa E.T.C." The chair was Minako Okamuro, general director of the conference. Sachiko Ninomiya, facilitator for the guest-speakers, also provided some interesting observations. Stewart, Rodriguez and Fujiyabu all spoke very interestingly on La MaMa E.T.C.'s unique contribution to theatre and society. The day that this symposium took place happened to be La Mama's 47th anniversary, so at the end there was a presentation of flowers to Stewart by the younger members of the conference steering committee. The two-hour symposium allowed the audience to get a feel for the irrepressible spirit of Stewart, a figure who helped establish experimental theatre in the U.S. and continues to be very active to the present day.

Someone who played a huge role in Japan's underground theatre movement in the 1960s, and indeed had strong connections with La MaMa E.T.C., was avant-garde dramatist, director, writer and poet Shuji Terayama. Kyoko Kujo Terayama, Sakumi Hagiwara, and Kohei Ando, all of whom worked closely with this giant of Japanese theatre, talked on his world, in a panel discussion titled "The Dawn of Shuji Terayama and his Visual Works", focusing on his films and overseas theatre productions.

The other guest speaker from overseas was David Goodman, a scholar in early modern Japanese underground theatre movements. As someone who participated in Theatre Center 68/71, an avant-garde group active in Japan at the end of the 1960s, Goodman is a leading figure in research of 1960s theatre and has produced many papers and books in English on Japan's underground theatre movement. At the same time as offering a series of related seminars, on October 18 he conducted a discussion with director and playwright Makoto Sato on "Theatre as Movement: Concerning Theatre Center 68/71". The two men looked at certain songs inserted in Sato's plays, and exchanged observations from their respective positions as academic and playwright. Sato expressed a desire that researchers would look more specifically at the revolutionary quality of the drama of plays of the underground movement of the 1960s.

On the final day of the conference, playwright and political writer Takayuki Kan delivered a talk titled "Historical Background and Contemporary Evaluation of Theatre in the 1960s". In it he compared angura with another theatrical movement that arose in the 20th century, the shingeki ["new theatre"; experimental Western-style theatre] movement. The theme for the final day of the conference was "Revealing the Facts". The audience was treated to individual interviews with three leading figures in Japan's 1960s underground movement. The first was with theatre director Yukio Ninagawa, and titled "The Function of a Director". The interviewer was Akihito Senda. Ninagawa spoke of the impetus underlying all his work in the theatre, and with some emotion he spoke of how he was trying to put on plays as fast as he could, how he wished his old friend playwright Kunio Shimizu, a friend since their days in the Gendaijin Gekijo group in the 1960s, would start writing again so that he could produce his plays, and how important his time as an activist in Gendaijin Gekijo and Skaura-sha groups had been. This was followed by an interview with the playwright, director and actor Juro Kara conducted by the critic Naoto Horikiri. The topic was broadly the "The Meaning of 'Aka Tento' ['the Red Tent'] for Juro Kara". Kara spoke first of his early days doing street and outdoor theatre even before he started giving performances in the red tent. In the second half of the discussion Atsuyuki Nakano, the head of Karazemi theatre company, was invited up to the podium to talk about the fascination of Juro Kara's plays. This company is a spin-off from Kara’s seminars at Yokohama National University, which were an important part of Kara’s activities in recent years. The discussion was extremely lively, with much laughter from the audience occasioned by Kara's delivery, which like his dramas is highly entertaining. The final event and climax of the final day of the conference was a discussion titled "A Strategy for Words" / "Wrestling with Words: Struggles with a Living Language" with the absurdist playwright Minoru Betsuyaku, who was interviewed by Professor Minako Okamuro of Waseda University, general director of the conference steering committee. Well-known for his outstanding achievements as a playwright, Betsuyaku wrote numerous books and essays on theatre and other fields. The book Kotoba e no senjutsu (A Strategy for Words / Wrestling with Words: Struggles with a Living Language), which lent its title to this discussion, is known as a seminal work and includes a number of his particularly important essays on theatre released between 1969 and 1971. Using the book as a departure point, Betsuyaku's talk was mainly about factors that lie behind the use of language in his plays, such as Samuel Beckett's influence on him and his present interest in hogen, or regional dialect.

The underground theatre movement of the 60s is generally regarded as marking a significant turning point in the history of Japanese theatre. However, the energy felt at the time, and indeed today, in the works of these playwrights did not derive simply from their prodigious ability, but also from their sincere belief in the value of words to have a direct effect on audiences. This is true even today when they have reached the height of fame and success. This belief was what led them to produce such rich theatrical works with enduring appeal for so many people. There were many moving and inspiring moments over the course of the three days in the talks of the guest speakers. As hosts of the conference we must make sure that the talks and presentations reach as wide an audience as possible, in the form of publications, and we should also use this opportunity to build up a global network of researchers in modern theatre studies. The organizers wish to express their sincere thanks to the many wonderful guest speakers, as well as Professor Akihiko Senda, and Professor Ryuko Saeki for their help in facilitating their participation, to the audience, and indeed to everyone who gave their support and cooperation. We would also like to express our thanks to the conference committee, including the staff in the administration office, as well as to the more than 30 students of Waseda University, who gave time and energy unstintingly, despite the short preparation period of less than six months, in order to make this conference a reality.