I went to see a play!

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So on Saturday night, I went to see a play starring my most favorite cutest man in the world... Joshima Shigeru. If you do not know, he is in the band TOKIO. I like them (if you couldn't tell).

SO.

Here is a story about my adventure~

I wasn't able to get a ticket through jticket like I did with the TOKIO con, which isn't surprising as TOKIO is, well, TOKIO, and this has Shige (a younger member of a much more popular band called NewS), so about a billion more people want to see it which means tickets are a little harder to come by. So for that reason, I went through a Johnny's ticket community on Mixi (the Japanese version of Facebook) and lucked out when a girl contacted me about selling me her ticket for Saturday the 4th.

The Tokyo Globe, where the Tokyo shows are, ended up being even closer than the Budoukan (where the TOKIO con was)! I can get to Shinjuku Station for free 'cuz of my student commuter pass, and then it was just one station north on the Yamanote Line. Getting off at the Shinokubo Station, then all you have to do is walk up the road that follows the railroad tracks for about five minutes and you get there~ The girl who was selling me her ticket had texted me the day before saying she'd get there about a half-hour before it started, but I wanted to make sure I could find it alright without getting lost, so I got there about 50 minutes beforehand, so I got dinner at the nearby Family Mart and sat under the huge sign to eat and wait.

Anyway, when Miccho finally got there with her friend, I paid her for the ticket, then she and her friend had me take pictures of them in front of the sign, lol, but then we went insiiiiiide~ and buying goods wasn't nearly as crazy or hectic as concerts! It was just a small little table right past the entrance and there was only one other person in line in front of me. I ended up just getting the pamphlet. Joshima had this "postcard" set thingie, but there weren't even any pictures of him on it (well there was a picture of a baby on one, was that him? I have no idea), so I decided to save my money for something else.

But I digress.
Finding my seat was way easy. BECAUSE THE THEATER IS FLIPPING TINY. OMG. IT'S LIKE... SMALLER THAN THE SIZE OF MY HIGH-SCHOOL AUDITORIUM. Basically if you are on the first floor then it's like BAM IN YOUR FACE. I could probably have gotten to the stage in five jumping steps. Once I saw this and sat down my heart was like BA-DUMP BA-DUMP because I was so happy! <3

The stage itself was so pretty! The majority of it was the inside of traditional Japanese house with a short table and cushions in the middle, a little cabinet off to the side, and then a big set of sliding doors at the back that when they opened, it looked like outside because there were plants and trees set-up beyond it. At the very front of the stage were steps leading to "outside the house" and a little walk-way that circled around to the left of the main stage area where people would be when they were "outside", lol. It was very cute, and the lighting effects in general throughout the play were awesome and totally made you feel like you were in the story with it changing from day to night to flashback sequences and the like.

SO YES. The play starts. And it was totally dark, but then Shige's voice was talking, and it was set-up to be like he was at a councelor's/psychiatrist's with him talking about his past, and then when the lights finally came on and he was sitting there the girls next to me literally gasped, which made me laugh a lot. The entire first sequence was a series of flashbacks to the two brothers played by Joshima and Shige, and their father who is a doctor, and technically their mother too, but it never shows her. The way they created all the effects for the flashbacks through the years was so amazing. Everything was so perfectly seamless and timed so well and it was just amazing directing. They had a little kid's voice-over that Joshima talked to to resemble little Shige, and at once point they even play the voice-over while Shige himself is talking to his father to emphasize how little he was at the time.

And Joshima OMG JOSHIMA. He has to change clothes like a bajillion times! XDDD He starts out in one outfit, but then when he heads off to college there's this hilarious point where he pops out of the door with his jeans unzipped and his shirt not buttoned right, and then he disappears later after having dropped out of college with this hippie-wig and clothes and a guitar and everybody cracked up at that. He wants to be in a band and write his own songs, but the ones he currently has written are winners with titles like "I'm Sorry I was Born". He "teaches" Shige how to play the guitar at one point and Shige is amazing at it because he is better than Joshima at everything which basically crushes Joshima.

And then eventually Joshima and his father get in a huge fight and his dad kicks him out of the house. After he leaves, Shige is informed that their mother was killed in an accident, which prompts their father to start drinking and eventually Shige leaves for college as well. Which then finally brings the play to the present day because we return to Shige talking to the councelor lady and he talks about how he got a telegram telling him something's wrong with his father and he's supposed to return home at once.

SO HE DOES.

Which leads to one of my favorite scenes from the whole thing...
Shige returns home and from the audience we see his dad and this woman in a kimono sitting at the table and drinking sake, and his dad in particular is quite boisterous, which thoroughly confuses Shige as he thought he was supposed to be deathly ill or something. The woman takes the tray and leaves, which prompts Shige to be like WHO WAS THAT? And then the woman comes back... and we see her face for the first time... AND IT'S JOSHIMA.

DYING DYING DYING DYING.

Omg he makes such an adorable kimono-girl, ahaha~ It was the most adorable thing ever! And he kept flipping his sleeves around and around his arms and everyone in the audience was cracking up. Needless to say, Shige's like WTF but then eventually they're like IT WAS JUST A DISGUISE and then Joshima tramples out to change.

The three of them talk for a while... we learn that their father only has one month left to live, even though he feels perfectly fine. Shige remains highly confused and skeptical about the entire affair.

The next day Joshima meets with this random sketchy guy named Shinji who... I'm still not sure exactly how Joshima originally knew him, but he's one of the funniest guys in the play, ide. Also there's this other family friend named Kenichi who's constantly over at their house and eating their food and basically all up in their business that is positively hilarious as well and has to insert his own commentary into everything.

Shinji's character tells us a story about how he met this gorgeous woman and fell in love, so he "followed her home", but when he tried to knock on her door, Shige came out! So then he's convinced there's some kind of tryst going on. He knows the girl's name is Mai though, and earlier they'd heard Shige talking on the phone with this "Mai", so they call her and tell her to come and she says she'll be there in like three hours.

At this point, Shinji leaves and Shige comes back, and then their father returns with this gorgeous young lady in tow that turns out to be his fiance, which COMPLETELY BOGGLES EVERYONE and Joshima and Shige refuse to believe it. Joshima is convinced that she's just marrying him to get the money once he dies, because Kenichi informs him that if the marriage goes through and is official, she would get half the money while the two brothers would half to split the rest, but then apparently Joshima wouldn't get any... or something... because he was like 'ZERO'??? multiple times, which made everyone laugh.

When they finally corner Kaori (the fiance) alone, she explains how they met in the hospital that her mother was at, and they would talk there(?) and he told her a story about the bitter oranges that they grow in their orchard(?) (oh yeah, after Shige left to go to college, their father stopped working as a doctor and started growing these bitter oranges instead) (also also, it's a running joke that everyone thinks they're mandarin oranges (mikan) instead of bitter oranges (daidai), so Joshima and Shige have to correct them), and then he asks her to marry him... also at this point Joshima tells Shige to say something to her, but Shige can't say a single word. And then when she leaves Joshima goes all crazy because he's worried about losing all their father's money and he wrastles with/grapples onto Shige's leg who's lying on the ground and it's the cutest thing ever~<3

...the order everything happened in is starting to get a little fuzzy in my head, ROFL, but anyway at one point Joshima and Kaori talk and Joshima refuses to believe most of what she's saying, and she whispers in his ear one of the main reasons she's with his father that you don't get to hear, but... I think it's implied that she says something about how he is in bed? ??? Because then Leader's like OMMMMGGGG and literally... LITERALLY starts WRITHING ABOUT ALL OVER THE FLOOR going "USOOOOOOOO" until finally he writhes over to the cabinet where he "nonchalantly" opens the drawer where his father's bankbook is, goes "Oh look! It's open!" then sneaks off with the bankbook in his pocket only to be accosted by Shinji racing back from the station to see if his love has arrived yet. Leader tells him to wait on the stoop and runs off, whereupon Shinji also begins writhing about on the ground until Kaori comes back and is like wtf who are you and why are you in my house? lol

Ummm... oh yeah, Shige shows back up, but sees Shinji and hides in the bushes until he leaves, then comes in and Kaori's talking to him but he won't say a single word and just stays sitting out on the stoop. She tells him that they've actually met somewhere before, but he still doesn't say anything, and finally she leaves, but not before seeing that the bankbook is now gone and is all "yappari~" and takes off. Then! Mai finally arrives, and again for some reason Shige doesn't seem able to talk! He just makes all these wild gestures mimicking Shinji who'd been writhing about on the floor earlier. Except then there are voices and Shinji and Kenichi are coming back!! So Shige races back and disappears through the sliding doors. Shinji has been running back and forth between the house and the station a bajillion times by now, so he's dying and out of breath, but then Kenichi's all like ALRIGHT MAI'S HERE, but when Shinji sees Mai he goes "UM THAT'S NOT HER. IT LOOKS NOTHING LIKE HER." Mai is confused at first and then is like OMG but doesn't say anything to Shinji and eventually those two leave again and she goes back in the house, whereupon...

SHIGE COMES OUT IN A DRESS. AHAHAHAHA. Both Joshima and Shige have parts where they dress up as girls, it is so wonderful I don't even have any words~<3 Also the girls next to me gasped again and were all like "OMGGGG HE'S SO CUTE~" We learn that Shige has this "condition" where he absolutely can't even speak to girls unless he's dressed up in women's clothes, and that Mai is actually his councelor helping him to overcome this. Just when things couldn't get any crazier, at this moment his father comes back with Kaori in tow! Everyone's dying by this point, because Shige's trying his best to now allow them to see him fully so they won't recognize him, and the dad's like "ah, is this another one of Tatsuya's friends?" And Mai's like... "UMMM... YES. THIS IS... TATSUKO!"

So they all go inside, and then Joshima comes racing back and is flipping out and asks his father why there's not a single penny left in his account! Then both Isao and Kaori start cracking up because they'd planned this all from the beginning, and actually they'd purposefully taken it all out and now they had it in a safe place in the house(?), but Joshima's still all pissed because obviously there is something going on here and he can't believe that his father is falling for this girl that only wants his money, and then Shige finally speaks up and they're all like WHY ARE YOU IN A DRESS, but they get into a huge conversation/argument which leads to Shige yelling at Joshima that he's the reason why their mom is dead. That after the "accident", the police officer'd given him a note in her handwriting that said she was too embarrassed to live this way anymore, that she'd actually committed suicide.

So then Shige's crying, and then Joshima starts crying and... this was a part that I had a bit of trouble understanding... Joshima goes into a story about him and his mom and something about the beauty contest(?) that had been mentioned in the beginning flashback right before their mother had died, and about his mom giving him money, but... I wasn't really sure what the conclusion was to everything, like... if he thinks it wasn't actually suicide or... I'm not sure. Aggghhh, I need to see it again. But Joshima crying and having a hard time talking because of it made my heart get all squishy. Eventually the conversation gets happier after he's done, so the result of his story must have been positive, right? 8D? And then he's like I CAN'T HAVE A SERIOUS CONVERSATION WITH YOU WHILE YOU'RE DRESSED LIKE THAT.

Whereupon Shige tells everyone of his ~affliction~ with talking to females and how Mai is his councelor, and then at that moment Shinji finally comes racing back!!! And he sees Shige and gets all OOOOMMMMGGG~ He goes up to him and is about to confess his undying love when Shige's just like UM PLEASE DON'T, Shinji's like WHY IS THAT A MAN'S VOICE, and then Shige strips off the dress and wig to reveal his true self and Kenichi commentates from the side with a huge "IT WAS TAT-CHAN" and everyone cracks up again.

Shige starts talking with Mai and the others when suddenly Mai's like... OMG YOU'RE TALKING TO ME. AND YOU'RE NOT WEARING GIRL'S CLOTHES. So he's all OMG I'M CURED. And then they test it out by having him talk to Kaori. It takes him a few times, but then finally he's able to talk, and he asks her what time she was referring to when she said they'd met before. And she goes into a story about how she'd seen him... when their mother died(?) And it's all beautiful and flowery and at the end Shige tells her that he's leaving his father in her care~

Then Shige starts narrating and explaining how Kaori and Isao get married, Isao dies, and then eventually Kaori disappears, followed by a time-skip and then we're back to Joshima and Shige alone in the house. Joshima's like... "well, it looks like she was just after his money after all" (he uses this word, ... "kekkonsa-something" that I assume has a meaning similar to this), and then they start talking about what they're going to do now. Then Mai comes trotting back in and they're like um, why are you all the way back here? She explains how she's quit being a councelor and now she wants to know if she might share the house with them if she pays rent and Joshima's all "SURE THAT'S FINE" while Shige's just like 'bwuh'. And then when she leaves for a bit Joshima turns to him and goes... "OH CRAP, I LOST. Now you're gonna get love before I do too!" Since Shige's beaten him at pretty much everything else in life as well.

When Mai comes back in, she comments something about the color of the mandarin oranges whereupon Joshima and Shige simultaneously are like 'THEY'RE BITTER ORANGES'.

AND THAT WAS THE END.

Gah, my summary sucks so much, I'm sorry. I feel bad about some of the parts that I wasn't quite able to understand/missed, but hopefully I was able to write out the rest of it well enough that you'll still get the main gist of what happened and what it was about. It really was so amazing and I kept cracking up with the audience all the time from the hilarious dialogue and mannerisms and just... nngah. They were all so wonderful together! Joshima and Shige's interactions totally stole the entire show, it was like they were made to play two brothers!

They came out three times to bow because everyone kept clapping, and the last time when they were leaving, Joshima gave the bankbook back to his "dad" and bowed down all apologetic-like. And then once everyone had left, Shige and Joshima peeked through the windows in the sliding doors one last time and waved together and it was flipping adorabbbbllllleee~~~

I feel like my life has been changed now that I have seen Joshima so close in person. He is seriously the most adorable man ever and even more beautiful than I thought he would be and his adorable, adorable voice just~... (*___________*) LEADER, MY HEART IS FOREVER YOURS~ NEVER LEAVE ME.

If you would like to see the news report that I got the pictures from, click here to watch it!

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Photos

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The big sign on the side of the Tokyo Globe advertising the play.

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I took a picture of it with my TOKIO cell phone strap~

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...I got bored while I was waiting...

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My ticket!
The girl who sold it to me had gotten it through the official Johnny's Fan Club, so it was a first-floor seat!

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The girl messaged me afterwards to ask me if I enjoyed the play, and I texted back that Leader was so cute I almost died. 8D

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This is a picture from a news-report about the play. I'll put a few here so that you can get an idea of what it looked like.
This is Joshima with his father and his father's fiance.

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This is when Shige first comes back home to find his father and the lady in the kimono (really Joshima).

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And this is part of an interview with Joshima (on the right) and Shige (on the left), so you can see what they look like.