Workshop 11 Cultural translation, Adaptation and Resistance: The multicultural
transformation and the imperialism in modern East
A Transvestite Caliban Rules over Kowloon --- The Tempest in
Kowloon : A Takarazuka adaptation of Shakespeare’s Tempest
YOSHIHARA Yukari
University of Tsukuba
Abstract
In 1999, 2 years after Hong Kong’s reversion, a major Japanese theatre troop,
Takarazuka, performed its adaptation of Shakespeare’s Tempest, titled The Tempest in
Kowloon. In the adaptation, Caliban, played by an actress in man’s clothing, shoots
Prospero to death, cursing him in Chinese. The Takarazuka Tempest is a play divided
within itself, between being a political play criticizing the British colonization of Hong
Kong, and being a flimsy, apolitical play about Hong Kong represented as a chaotic,
hybrid city where everyone seeks one night’s pleasure forgetting serious things like
colonization As it appropriates Shakespeare’s Tempest, it tries to criticize the British
colonization of Hong Kong by the very means of The British Shakespeare’s authority;
yet, at the same time, it erases the memory of Japanese colonial violence in Hong Kong.
The adaptation was performed in 1999, 2 years after Hong Kong “handover” to China .
As such, it reflects nervously complex feelings on the part of Japan about the past,
present and future of Hong Kong in its relation with Japan.
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Workshop 11 Cultural translation, Adaptation and Resistance: The multicultural
transformation and the imperialism in modern East
A Transvestite Caliban Rules over Kowloon --- The Tempest in
Kowloon : A Takarazuka adaptation of Shakespeare’s Tempest
YOSHIHARA Yukari
University of Tsukuba
In 1999, 2 years after Hong Kong’s reversion, a major Japanese theatre troop,
Takarazuka, performed its adaptation of Shakespeare’s empest (performed at Bow Hall
Theatre, Takarazuka, 1999/9/5 – 9/12. Directior: Saitoh Yoshimasa), titled The Tempest
in Kowloon. In the adaptation, the scenes are set in Hong Kong in 1942 and 1947, that
is, around the time of Japanese occupation of Hong Kong on 25th Dec., 1941 (Black
Christmas) and 2 years after Japan’s defeat in 1945. Takarazuka theatre troop is all
female theatre troop, where all male parts are played by actresses called “otokoyaku”
(male parts).
Accordingly, all male parts including Prospero, Caliban, Ariel and
Ferdinand in the adaptation are played by actresses in men’s clothing.
The adaptation is intriguing in several ways: 1. in the ways how it transforms
the original story, which is about a European colonist on a Carribean island in the 16th
Century, into a story of the British rule over Hong Kong in the mid 20th Century, and, by
doing so, it erases or evades the historical memory of Japanese colonial violence in Hong
Kong in 1941-1945.
2. in the ways in which it appropriates gender politics in
Shakespeare’s original by the means of cross-dressing.
Characters in The Tempest in Kowloon
Original
Adaptation
Prospero
Purosupero Neviru
a Kowloon mafia boss: ex-British
Officer
Ferdinand
Faadinando Sureido
a Kowloon gang: ex-British Officer
Aeriel
Earieru
Servant to Purosupero
Sycorax
Siira Won
a Kowloon mafia queen
Caliban
Kyarii Won
son of Siira
Miranda
Miranda Nesuta
wife of Purosupero
Alonzo
Aronzo Neviru
Governor-General of Hong Kong
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Synopsis of The Tempest in Kowloon
In 1947 Hong Kong. Prospero, a great Kowloon mafia boss of British
origin, is having factious struggle with Sycorax, a mafia queen of Chinese origin, for
hegemony over the Kowloon gangstar world. He is waiting for the chance of taking
revenge on Lord Alonzo, his former senior officer in the British government in Hong
Kong, who betrayed the British interests in Hong Kong to Japan in 1941. He and his
optically handicapped wife, Miranda, are leading loveless married life.
Ferdinand is a freelance gang, independent of Sycorax’s and Prospero’s factions.
He is a sort of Robin hood that tries to help the poor and the oppressed. His partner is
Anita Lee (there is no counterpart in the original), whose parents were butchered by the
invading Japanese army.
Anita belongs also to a secret faction that seeks
independence of Hong Kong. She loves Ferdinand, but would not tell him.
Getting involved with factious struggle between Sycorax and Prospero,
Ferdinand is forced to become a member of Prospero’s faction, in order to protect Anita,
who is under Prospero’s power. Prospero immediately recognizes that Ferdinand is his
former fellow officer who fought against the invading Japanese Army with him, but as
Ferdinand has lost all of his past memories before the fall of Hong Kong, Prospero
determines to conceal the facts to Ferdinand. It turns out that Prospero, Ferdinand
and Miranda were in the love triangle relationship in 1942, Miranda more attracted to
Ferdinand. Miranda, who had become optically handicapped during turmoil caused by
Japanese invasion, out of despair of Ferdinand’s disappearance, consented to become
Prospero’s wife. Because Miranda cannot see, and Ferdinand has lost his memory,
they cannot recognize who they are.
Lord Alonzo comes back to Hong Kong, to assume post of Governor-General.
Successfully concealing his past crime of betraying the British interests to Japan, he is
leading prosperous political life. Yet personally, he is in despair because his sole son,
Ferdinand, is missing. In the meanwhile, Prospero brings Sycorax to ruin. She died
agonal death. Caliban, his son, swears revenge on Prospero.
Now as the supreme boss of Kowloon gang world, time is ripe for Prospero to
achieve his goals. Prospero tells Lord Alonzo that his son, Ferdinand, is alive. Lord
Alonzo, in order to save his son whose life and death is in Prospero’s hands, admits his
past crime, resigns himself from the governorship, and submits himself to a
court-martial.
Being moved by Lord Alonzo’s deep fatherly love to his son, Prospero
abandons his original plan of gory revenge on Lord Alonzo. His stony heart softens
when he realizes that Miranda and Ferdinand love each other anew, Ferdinand
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partially regaining his memory.
Anita Lee, out of jealousy and her violent love to Ferdinand, attempts to hold a
pact with Caliban to entrap Ferdinand. Ferdinand, realizing Anita’s passion to him and
Prospero’s hidden passion to Miranda, pretends he loves Anita rather than Miranda,
and promises Anita to go to London with her, to get away from punishment for crimes
they together committed to save the poor and the oppressed in Hong Kong. Anita on
her part realizes Ferdinand’s true feelings and submits herself to MI5, taking all
responsibility of crimes she and Ferdinand committed together solely upon her.
Ariel, a fairy, holds mysterious malice to all human tender feelings like love and
friendship. He gets furious when he knows that Prospero is going to stop his revenge
upon Lord Alonzo halfway. While Prospero begins to seek reconciliation and peace
rather than revenge, Aerial wants violent spectacles of bloodshed and revenge to be
enacted thoroughly.
Prospero dissolves his mafia family, and is about to leave alone for London to
seek calmer life there. Caliban shoots Prospero to death, cursing him in Chinese.
Ariel pledges allegiance to his new master Caliban.
Miranda, who has recovered
eye-sights, and Ferdinand, who has recovered his past, leave Hong Kong to London.
Gender bending in Takarazuka Shakespeare
In 1999, Takarazuka performed a series of Shakespeare’s works including Much
Ado about nothing, Twelfth Night, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Winter’s Tale, Romeo
and Juliet, and The Tempest [see appendix 1]. Many ex-Takarazuka otokoyaku
actresses performed various roles in Shakespeare’s works, including Taichi Mao’s Viola /
Cesario in Noda Hideki’s Twelfth Night. [see appendix 2].
In Shakespeare’s days all female parts were played by boys, leading to various
levels of gender-bending. In plays like As You Like It and Twelfth Night, where girls
disguise themselves as boys, the boundary between girls are boys are, as it were, doubly
crossed. In the case of Viola / Cesario in Twelfth Night, a boy actor plays a part of a girl
who disguises herself as a boy. Similar, but in reversed, gender-bending occurs in
Takarazuka transvestite theatre where all male parts are played by actresses in men’s
clothing.
Takarazuka Shakespeare surely offers some chances of questioning and
de-naturalizing sex, gender performance and gender identity.
Perhaps Takarazuka
might be said to come close to camp gender performance of drag kings and drag queens,
even though it is also true that Takarazuka can be described as a transvestite theatre
for heterosexuals by heterosexuals.
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Reversed Orientalism? --- Kowloon represented in the adaptaion
How is Hong Kong represented in the adaptation? In the adaptation, Kowloon
is represented as a slum full of murderous crimes, gun-fights and drug-dealings.
Kowloon, a city of darkness, seems to appeal to Japanese imagination in a particular
way. In the adaptation, we have curious scenes where some Chinese letters on neo
signs go upside down, as if they are written by someone who cannot recognize Chinese
characters properly. This curious scene, where Chinese characters are used not as
meaningful letters but rather as fantastic hieroglyph, reminds me of bizarre scenes of
Los Angeles China town in Blade Runner. Or, it might be argued a closer thing to the
adaptation Kowloon scene is a scene from Japanese animation titled Ghost in the Shell
The director of the animation, Oshii Mamoru, seems to be knowingly quoting Chinese
town scenes in Hollywood movies like Blade Runner.
Or, Kowloon in a Japanese
playstation game titled Kuuron geit (Kowloon Gate) strikes me as even closer to the
adaptation’s Kowloon.
Japanese cultural products at the end of 20th century representing Hong Kong
seem to me to be intended as ironic quotations from, and parodies of the Orientalist
images of Asian cities in Hollywood films like Blade Runner. In this sense, the
adaptation can be said to appropriate not only Shakespeare, but also the Orientalist
images of Hong Kong. Parody of Orientalist images seems to be implied, yet whether
the Kowloon slum scenes in the adaptation can be said to be free from its own version of
Orientalism, to see Kowloon as chaotic city of darkness and crime, is, obviously, quite
another matter.
Sycorax curses Prospero in Chinese
A possibly “pro-feminist”, plus, post-colonial element of the adaptation can be found
in the fact that Sycorax appears on the stage and curses Prospero in Chinese . In the
original, Sycorax has been dead much prior to the beginning of the story, and she is the
most demonized, marginalized figure, because of her gender, of her rumoured
association with black magic, and her ethnic origin (she is said to be from Algiers) --- she
is erased out of existence and totally silenced. In the adaptation, however, Sycorax has
an overwhelming presence, as a powerful opponent to Prospero and as the tough single
mother of Caliban. It is significant that only Sycorax and Caliban speak Chinese when
they curse Prospero, even though just so briefly. All other characters, and Sycorax and
Caliban except for these scenes, speak Japanese, which stands for English.
It would be safe to say that Sycorax and Caliban are represented as Chinese
who rebel against, and seek independence from Prospero, the British colonizer, and that
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they are depicted as deserving some extent of sympathy from the audience. Anita Lee
(we have no counterpart in the original), whose parents were butchered by Japanese
Army, is an anti-colonial activist against British Empire.
She is also depicted in
favorable light, especially in the scenes in which she submits herself to MI5, in order to
save her beloved Ferdinand, taking all responsibilities of crimes they committed
together solely upon herself.
The adaptation seems to be trying to make itself a
post-colonial critique against the British colonization of Hong Kong, by making Sycorax,
Caliban and Anita Lee figures deserving the audience’s sympathy.
Yet I hesitate to call the adaptation the post-colonial Tempest for several reasons.
Most seriously, I hesitate to call the adaptation post-colonial because of my uneasiness
about the adaptation’s almost total erasure of Japanese colonial violence in Hong Kong.
No Japanese appear on stage. As the adaptation is set in 1942 and 1947, just around the
time of Japanese takeover and 2 years after its evacuation, it is not unnatural that no
Japanese appear. Yet in my understanding the time setting, 1947 and 1942, is
deliberately chosen precisely in order to make the Japanese audience in 1999 not keenly
aware of the historical facts of Japanese colonization of Hong Kong.
Conclusion
The Takarazuka Tempest is a play divided within itself, between being a political
play criticizing the British colonization of Hong Kong, and being a flimsy, apolitical play
about Hong Kong represented as an chaotic, hybrid city where everyone seeks one
night’s pleasure forgetting serious things like colonization
As it appropriates
Shakespeare’s Tempest, it tries to criticize the British colonization of Hong Kong by the
very means of the British Shakespeare’s authority; yet, at the same time, it erases the
memory of Japanese colonial violence in Hong Kong. The adaptation was performed in
1999, 2 years after Hong Kong “handover” to China . As such, it reflects nervously
complex feelings on the part of Japan about the past, present and future of Hong Kong
in its relation with Japan.
Appendix 1.
Takarazuka Shakespeares at Bow Theatre, 1999-2000
The Winter’s Tale
Edo period. A Kabuki tycoon becomes suspicious that his
wife might be committing adultery with another Kabuki
tycoon
Much Ado about Nothing A love comedy of an American rock’n’roll star and a rich
heiress
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Romeo and Juliet 99
A (almost) straight performance
Twelfth Night
A (almost) straight performance. A Takarazuka otokoyaku
actress plays the part of Viola/ Cesario
Yume, Shakespeare
With a play within a play based on A Midsummer Night’s
Dream
Say it Again?
Based on The Two Gentlemen of Verona.
Epiphany
Based on Twelfth Night.
Meiji period.
A daughter of
Kabuki tycoon disguises herself as a boy
cf. 2003 Takarazuka performance partially based on Othello
Lighting at Noon
With a play within a play based on Othello
Appendix 2.
Other performances of Shakespeare’s works featuring ex-Tarakazuka
otokoyaku
Noda Hideki’s Twelfth Night, featuring Taichi Mao, ex-Takarazuka otokoyaku
(1988)
A Musical Twelfth Night, Featuring Taichi Mao (2003)
Kurita Yoshihiro’s Hamlet, featuring Anju Mira (2003, 2004)
Bibliography
Books and Articles
Takarazuka: Sho-hi syakai no supekutakuru [Takarazuka:
Kawasaki Kenko.
Spectacles in the Consumer Society]. Koudansha, 1999.
Ohtani Tomoko.
“Takarazuka, Shakespeare, Globalization.” Yuriika, vol.33, no.5
(2001). Special feature issue on Takarazuka. Seido-sya.
---------- “Juliet’s Girlfriends: The Takarazuka Revue Company and the Shojo Culture.”
Minami Ryuta et al., eds. Performing Shakespeare in Japan.
Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2001.
Robertson, Jennifer.
Takarazuka: Sexual Politics and Pupular Culture in Modern
Japan. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
Washitani Hana. “Shirai Tetsuzo to ‘Toho kokumingeki’ ---‘Takarazuka identity’ no
keisei to Orientalism” [Shirai Tesuzo and ‘Toho kokumingeki’ --- formation of
Takarazuka Identity and Orientalism]. Yuriika, vol.33, no.5 (2001). Special
feature issue on Takarazuka. Seido-sya.
Watanabe Hiroshi. Takarazuka kageki no hen’yo to nihon kindai [The transformation
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of Takarazuka in the midst of the modernization process of Japanese culture].
Shin-Syokan, 1999.
Magazines
Brutus. Vol.22, no.20. Special feature issue on Takarazuka. Magazine House, 2001.
Kawade Yume Mook, Bungei Bessatsu, Special feature issue on Takarazuka. Kawade
Shobo Shin-sya, 1998.
Takarazuka: The Land of Dreams. Exposition catalogue. Suntory Museum. 2004.
Films
Takarazuka performances of Shakespeare’s works
Say it Again?, Tempest, Twelfth Night ,The Winter’s Tale, Romeo and Juliet 99,
Lighting at Noon available at http://www.takarazuka-video.com/
Longinotto, Kim and Jano Williams. Dream Girls. ASIN： B00005R8M7
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