Bunraku puppets in Osaka

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Summer came, the humidity rose and the termperatures became unusual in that days were 34. 35. 36 instead of just 30 but alas the humidity sat between 80 and 95%!!!!



So have wonderful friends come to visit. Two things collide happily - its summer and holidays for Japanese people and lots of those who live in the northern hemishphere and holiday in their school summer holidays in Japan so there is lots of entertainment; and Jacinta could join in the fun, somewhat free from work but not completely on holidays as Australian teachers would be.



I've never managed to be in the right place at the right time to see the internationally famous puppet company based in Osaka called Banraku. They do travel, but we managed to go with my friends Ea and Molly.



For readers as old as myself, don't think of Punch and Judy or even the small framed curtains with small window sized stages seen or made by us in our childhood or youth. If you've been to Shonburg in Vienna and seen the castle puppets or even the Vietnamese water puppets, your images are not heading toward this wonderful company.



As with many traditional Japanese artforms, Banraku is extremely old and performed only by men. Because the roots of the performances are based centuries ago, the stories performed are patriarchal and in this case, have a moral to impart as well. That aside, the technical skills, the exquisite staging and the theatrics are worth the commute to Osaka then the packed subway to find the Banraku theatre.



I'm also glad to say that there were very little people. middle sized people and larger people, all of whom laughed and were thoroughly endgaged in the performance. We were given (in Japanese of course) an introduction to the actual puppets and the three puppeteers who work them during the performance. It was really informative and helped us understand how the theatre worked. In a nutshell there is a chief puppeteer who has had lots of experience. He gets to be in overall charge of the puppet and has manual control of the torso and head through the puppets right arm. Next senior is the puppeteer who looks after the left arm of the puppet - it gestures far more than the right arm. Then the newer puppeteer had the job of managing the legs of the puppet and when the puppet changes direction he has to slip quickly between his colleagues so there is a seamless action by the puppet. Its hard to believe that while three grown men are manipulating one puppet and sometimes there are more than three puppets on stage at once, as an audience member, I'm glued to the puppets and don't notice the puppeteers who are visible, just lost in the background of the performance as highly skilled professionals.



So although the plot was simple, a boy had to learn how to play a drum and win a competition at a festival to enable his friend to go to the heavens, all 4 of us big people were engaged in an hour long drama with learning drums and ridiculous plot to an astonishing finale where the senior puppeteer with his puppet sat on a grey cloud that erupted out of the understage just by our row of seats in a froth of smoke and ascended graciously to the ceiling of the theatre then floated out the back door of the 'gods' to uproarious cheering.



If ever you are in Osaka and have a spare hour, I recommend you take in a performance.

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