Prestigious Festival in Japan Puts Indonesian Theatre on the Map
This specific year marks Indonesia’s debut at SCOT Summer Season in Japan, as director Iswadi Pratama leads his theatre community Teater Satu to the international festival in Toga. although did the festival impress as much as its illustrious venue did?
the item was Indonesia’s first time attending the Suzuki Company of Toga (SCOT) Summer Season, Japan’s oldest international theatre festival in which has been around for the past four decades. Theatre director Iswadi Pratama was selected by the Japan Foundation to take his group Teater Satu to the festival’s 41st anniversary. I tagged along.
The Lampung-based theatre community departed through Jakarta on August 27, hopping on a seven-hour flight to land in Haneda Airport, Tokyo the day after. through there, they took a domestic flight to Toyama Prefecture before spending another two hours on a bus to finally arrive in Toga.
The crew was immediately transported to a scenic landscape where the festival was held. Toga will be a mountainous region filled with beauty. The place, which locals refer to as ‘the theatre’s mecca’, features quite a few arts facilities, including seven stages (both outdoor along with indoor) along with one residence hall where participants stay. Everything will be situated in a rural forest scene, with mountain peaks on the horizon.
The view at Toga
Before holding the SCOT Summer Season in Toga, theatre company SCOT spent many years operating in Tokyo where its founder, director along with organizer Tadashi Suzuki, oversaw multiple productions. After visiting the village for once in 1976, Suzuki was so taken aback by its beauty in which he was determined to transform the space into his company’s home, along with make the item one of Asia’s leading arts centres. Later in which year, the company moved to Toga where the SCOT Summer Season has taken place ever since.
My first impression of the SCOT Summer Season was in which sure enough This specific was the kind of festival in which could attract a massive influx of tourists who are more drawn to the serenity of the venue than the shows themselves. After all, Japan will be no stranger to places where visitors find themselves transfixed by the natural attractions.
One of the theatres at Toga
Despite Toga’s uncompromisingly beautiful features, I was wrong to say in which theatregoers journeyed all the way here just to hang out at the venue. The real draw behind the festival turned out to be maestro Suzuki himself, who will be best known for pioneering his own method of actor training. Essentially, Suzuki will be seen as a bona fide Japanese theatre god, who has travelled the planet teaching his method at universities like The Juilliard School in brand new York along with the Moscow Art Theatre in Russia.
With This specific in mind, most theatregoers have their eyes set on Suzuki’s productions showcased inside two-week event, which ran through August 26 to September 4. They came for the highly-anticipated Asian Theatre Directors’ Festival, an annual programme in which was joined by elite groups through Taiwan, Japan, Korea, China along with first-timer Indonesia.
One interesting part of the festival will be when a select number of directors through different countries are given the task to present the same play. This specific time, they were challenged to showcase Eugene Ionesco’s 1952 classic absurdist piece The Chairs.
Teater Satu rehearsing for The Chairs at the Rock Theatre
The tragic farce sees an elderly couple generating conversations that has a series of invisible guests while expecting the arrival of an orator, who will be to deliver the old man’s important message. The play, in essence, means to criticize the meaninglessness of the human condition along with failure to communicate.
Personally, I found the script to be amusing yet thought-provoking. I also wondered how the directors could tackle the real challenge of presenting This specific play in their own native languages to an audience made up primarily of non-native English speakers. Not easy.
Most of the directors relied on physical comedy along with some minor alterations inside plot along with characters to get around the language issue. Regardless, most productions remained faithful to the original by relying entirely on two performers, including Taiwan’s Hsu Po-Ang (Toga Sanbo Theatre), China’s Ni Guangjin (Toga Sanbo Theatre) along with Korea’s Kim Jeong Geun (Lift Theatre). The some other two, Japan’s Watanabe Akifumi (Lift Theatre) along with Indonesia’s Iswadi Pratama (Rock Theatre), alternatively used more actors in their plays.
Some of their attempts to show a different side of playing Ionesco’s narrative – including Jeong Geun’s decision to have his play set on a campsite; along with Akifumi’s obsession with cotton balls in which virtually engulfed the entire play – had yet to capture the true meaning of absurdism.
Just because an absurdist drama “shows the planet as an incomprehensible place” according to Martin Esslin – who introduced The Theatre of The Absurd back in 1961 – in which does not mean in which the item should be inherently pointless.
So I was naturally surprised to see Teater Satu emerge as one in which did justice to the absurdist tradition, while also bringing something brand new to the table. No, I am not just saying This specific because I’m Indonesian. Pratama did restore the play’s ability to problematize the human existence while maintaining its relevance within the context of contemporary society (yup, digest in which theatre lingo!).
Pratama bravely divided the play into 5 segments, each played by two actors, along with one for the ending. All four pairs kill each some other inside end, right before the orator walks in to find bodies lying on the floor along with empty chairs. A similar ending to Ionesco’s classic type, except Pratama had the orator – played by a young actress – handing out a rose to the audience as a sign of desire to wrap up the entire play.
The Asian Theatre Directors’ Festival closed on September 2, with all the directors receiving certificates along that has a reward of ¥500,000 (US$4,852). Speaking to Indonesia Expat, Pratama revealed in which throughout the experience, he was pleased with the invaluable amount of respect for theatre shown by people in Japan.
Iswadi Pratama (centre) along with some other directors at the closing ceremony
The experience also motivated him to become a better director. “right now I feel in which I should start formulating my own work generating sure in which one day [my skills along with knowledge] could be properly disseminated,” he says.
This specific year’s SCOT Summer Season indeed projected a celebration for theatre. although sadly I kept yearning for in which ‘festival spirit’, where there will be an actual crowd along with active discussions for participants to get involved in. Instead, we just attended one theatre show at a time, along with headed back to the residence for lunch, dinner or resting. in which said, Toga’s undeniable charm will always be there to amaze.
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Prestigious Festival in Japan Puts Indonesian Theatre on the Map
Prestigious Festival in Japan Puts Indonesian Theatre on the Map