EXAM 

Natascha Perez THEA 2000 Richmond 3/31/2017

EXAM: Theatre Forms  After reading the chapter on World Theatre within my Theatrical worlds textbook. I felt that the Japanese art of Kabuki theatre really intrigued me. I loved its complicated history within the Japanese society. Its relation to prostitution and the opinion of the higher upper class shogunate is what I found the most interesting form the book. Aside from its captivating history, I looked online and found various other facts about the art form that I found added to my knowledge to further understand this art form.

One thing that I found online was that Japanese Kabuki is categorized into two themes: kabuki kyougen and kabuki buyou. Kabuki kyougen, specifically kyougen means “a play”, and they have stories, that actually happened in the past (ex. death of a general), or a fictional story set in a certain era. Kabuki buyou is mainly dance with the word Buyou itself meaning dance. Another thing that I found online extended from the concept of Mie. Mie is when the actor makes a pose in the heat of the moment. It’s something like a stop motion moment in a movie. Mie emphasizes the picturesque beauty of the whole stage, including the actor. I also learned about the music within this theatre and how the shamisen is the central instrument in the Kabuki music. It's importance lies in that it plays the melody of the Naguata song, which establishes the specific mood of the kabuki scene. Its origins traces to China where a similar, much older instrument called the san-hsien was being played.

Further along this page will have videos exemplifying the action of Mie and the unique music played by the Shamisen in more detail than described in the book as well as some pictures that exemplify in detail the unique makeup within this art form:

Example of makeup and wardrobe:  Example of the Shamisen:

Video!!!!: media type="youtube" key="67-bgSFJiKc" width="560" height="315"