 So, welcome everybody to the MAP, the theater center here at the Graduate Center of CUNY. My name is Frank Henschkon. I'm the director of programs and executive director. All you long as you know, we have significant programs, programs that hopefully inspire programs that support our mission, which is to support and bridge academia and professional theater, international and of course American theater, but what we are experiencing now for the next two days I think is one of the highlights of our entire year and perhaps you know also looking back over the decades, it's a follow up to our very first Japan playwright project where the young Toshiki Okada came, I think the first time to the U.S., maybe one of the first times out of Japan and this time we cooked up a second version of it. It all started with Aya Ogawa, the brilliant translator from the Japanese but also a performer and director who just participated in our prelude festival with her suicide forest and Aya said it's time we do something again, plays are out there, playwrights, not everything travels and they are very significant artists working and we need to hear their voices and what could I say, so of course let's do it and it's a very big undertaking, took us a year and a half of work of thinking how to do it. We had an advisory board in Japan to suggest plays in the advisory board here in New York to look through the plays and we had to contact the writers to see if they could come. We had to find great New York directors who really connect to the work and it's a labor, I think, of true appreciation of a global community who work in theater, happens locally but we all have to think of it globally and perhaps a play in Japan and Belgium or in South Africa might have more to do with us in a play which is written next door. So we need to hear all the voices and if there's also one partner we have to thank, it is the great Japan Foundation and Koji is here from that, Japan Foundation again has supported this highly unusual project even before we fully knew who the artists would be because we really selected them and they trusted us and we still get them in in the review time but still it's highly unusual that they also said please do go ahead, we know what you guys are doing and really thank you and it's a great, great thing you helped to make happen. I think when we joined forces like this we was legal and then you helping us bring to the people of our good things happen and so now it's the day so I really can't believe it, I'm very excited, very nervous also because I know these are significant artists, I know how much work went in from all the directors and we also thank Yoko Shoya from the Japan Society who is here, was also on the board and many others who are here, John Gillespie and so many friends so it's unusual to start at two o'clock on a Monday afternoon in New York but it's the only days we could get, the only times the playwright could come, all three of them came, one could not join us, Kuro Torino unfortunately couldn't get out of rehearsals, was very close to fly in just for an afternoon but then his manager said you're out of your mind and I forbid it. So again thank you so much for coming, this is a most significant program and I hope it will lead too much more, we hope to maybe create a festival to show these plays in repertoire again as we did with the first one and so let's see, so maybe all the playwrights who are here and who from Japan maybe put up your arms so who were, yes you're over there and who else and so let's start and maybe we ask the director to give a short introduction also about the play, about the work and of course we as a talk away, she's over there so she's the writer, they came in on Sunday or Saturday so it's a very big moment, it's the first time you're also in New York, in the U.S. as a child you said you were here as a young kid so it's a very big moment so thank you for coming and again if you have a cell phone now it's the time to take out and double check and tonight after the third reading, after the second reading we're going to have a reception in the after the third yeah in the archive bar around the corner it's printed in the program in case you want to come back again thank you all for coming and may the games begin as we say and here we go thank you hello my name is Christine Harunui I am a multi hyphenate theater maker and the great pleasure of showing up today as a director for Satoko Ichihara's play Favonia's Fruitless Fable this is my first time meeting Satoko right here I feel nervous and excited and very honored to have worked on this play as a stage reading there are some incredible images, incredible wild chaotic images throughout the play that I worked with a projection designer Matt Romine to kind of expand and show, share with you guys today and starring in the stage reading will be Chiwen Chang, Max Cosmo Kramer and Kio Kamisawa on stage directions so without further ado Favonia's Fruitless Fable, Kemiko Fumowa by Satoko Ichihara, English translation by Aya Ogawa winter night this is a back alley it is them and nothing can be seen clearly there may be something hiding or on the other hand they may not there's nothing different about this play during the day children use this place to play house or war and transform the space into a house or battlefield it is night and me walks the back alley alone me might be a Favonia or Favonia's Fruitless Fable or Simeina the audience may see me as Favonia or Simeina there's nothing different about me one invitation to Bellatio I was walking down the street at night to buy new pumps because there was a rumor that real leather pumps were sold in the back alley late at night my pumps were fake leather fake leather is good in the rain and low maintenance they're light and cheap but I would buy fake leather pumps and wear them and throw them out wear them buy them throw them away over and over but it was time that I experienced the softness and quality of real leather suddenly mis consciousness seemed to drift far far away a superior of her office Hiroshi answers this is the office where me works yo you changed your hair no I haven't you haven't no just look like I have not really not really she got a better hairstyle uh-huh you're cute oh uh-huh you're a real Favonia oh I don't care you have too much huh don't lie why are you lying what are you saying oh I don't know are you or I'm a real Ico right oh yes are you or I'm a real Ico yes lots of most girls think are you or I'm a real Ico you're right are you or I'm a real Ico you could you know I know all my house chores makes my mind really sharp I put water in the hot water maker and click and let's switch while the water boils I push the button on the washing machine I use a tachanino on the one rinse cycle I put rice and water in the rice cooker on the no wash speed setting and push the switch by then the water's boiling I'm gonna make tea the tea is hot so I slowly blow on it as I drink that always makes me want to go to the bathroom so I go to the newspaper in the confined space of the bathroom I can really focus oh this information about the Japanese economy it's absorbed into my mind when I read with such focus time passes then the laundry's done with the chime beep beep beep when it rings I flush the toilet hang the laundry out to dry I hang my socks out first socks come in pairs black or black or gray so I hang each pair to a pin that way when I take the laundry and throw out in pairs then I hang underwear and the heat tech and other clothes that aren't in pairs but then the rice will be ready so I prepare the natto fermented soybeans beep beep beep I love natto if I were asked what I'd like for my last supper I might say I want to eat natto I put over in my natto Oprah's science that's good for your body it keeps you regular you should put over in your natto also yes yes yes I eat a lot of Oprah too you told me too my mother always told me to eat it but in a book I read recently it said if you eat too many slimy foods it'll actually make you constipated and other adverse effects too much is not good for your digestion same with mushrooms people say mushrooms are good for your body but if you eat too much they have a component that makes your personality very arrogant yeah yeah yeah yeah shut up let me finish don't try to choke me because right now I'm only talking all you gotta do is not and chime in with uh-huh if you're an ordinary person you just relax right now your job is to not you're on uh-huh duty I just showed you how to do it nobody's talking about mushrooms anyway I didn't do that about mushrooms the importance of eating things and moderation is something everyone knows already I'm not stupid are you implying that I eat too much mushrooms I don't eat too much I eat them in moderation why do I have to hear about mushrooms for a woman like you what are you an idiot I can't enjoy such ordinary conversation everything you try to talk about I can take from your first word I already know everything from your second word I read my response based on what I post to your point being and I'm basically always correct textbooks would like that for me in middle school I only studied for a month and got into the best high school in my hometown whenever I read the first sentence in a textbook I already knew what the rest of it said but college admissions were a different story elite universities had different standards for language I barely studied language because language was Japanese and I've been speaking Japanese since I was born I didn't have to study it I can understand the language standard for my fallback school but the really elite schools had much higher standards I was surprised by that difference but in the end I had to study it so that was that in the end who cares about university wait for the bathroom in the morning you're cute up close real leather real leather real leather me full stop after a while then comes to their seas in the back alley real leather gets better with age it conforms to the shape of my feet and becomes a perfect fit not only that that small mix heal themselves naturally like living skin it's a miracle it's as if they're an extension of my body take off the fake leather and wear real leather to become a new me then I'll the urge to find real leather pumps when we get stressed out is the way of women in this world to the other me I will be meeting my other self the fact that we each have another self that exists in the world is something that only some people know fighting one's other self at times results in murder that is also a known fact it is also said that the surviving self must eat the flesh of the dead self they say that makes the surviving self strongest and that her flesh is incomparably delicious but all of this is taboo so the media never reports them they're different from doppelgangers their faces don't look alike people's faces are changed by their way of life people with twisted personalities have twisted faces people aren't born ugly they become ugly but is it really that bad to have a twisted personality sometimes I wish people thought I had a bad personality I'm a straightforward good person so I have a straightforward face but sometimes I wonder why my face is so neat when I look at it in the mirror at night anyway I've gone off on a tangent apparently one's other self is born and it splits off at some point around puberty it's a self with other potential a lost self a self that has lived another life that you may have lived that's the kind of life the other me is living they say I can be me because my other self exists without her people wouldn't be able to tolerate me and the same goes for my other me because of my existence my other self is able to tolerate her own existence we make each other's existence possible so they say however everything I've told you up till now is all a hypothesis these things are not certain since the topic is taboo world world why research has not advanced in any country the other me me too entered explicitly oh excuse me have you seen real leather pumps being sold right here yes I came to buy real leather pumps they sell pumps one alley over but they're fake leather and terribly made they'll make your feet bleed your shoes will be full of blood my friend who's a ballerina wireless comes and now she can't dance that's horrible these days there should be more and more women looking for real leather pumps I live nearby and I'm frequently asked what's the story there are rumors about women haven't you heard what no so that's why but why is everyone looking for real leather pumps everyone longs for them especially women they're they're soft and quality I'm a woman that I don't understand at all wait you don't wear shoes I'm already wearing shoes no you're not wearing real leather pumps what are you talking about you're that's dangerous you'll bloody your feet yes I know that they will heal and grow stronger and stronger all of us humans are born wearing real leather pumps why would you wear real leather pumps over your real leather pumps why would you bloody your feet wearing man-made pumps if your feet are going to get bloody anyway let them get bloody wearing your own real leather take care of your real leather pumps you're beautiful really thank you let's not murder each other I'm stronger than you in every respect I'm the one who has not lived feebly I have lived listening to only my own voice your arms are so thin in the sixth grade my armpit hair was already thick I shave and shave but they grew back thicker I couldn't participate in swimming class I plucked out the hair but that made me bleed I begged my mother to take me to a permanent hair removal place didn't I you went but I did it that is where we split apart and I was born I'm very popular with my makeup is haphazard and I cut my own hair I'm not particular about my clothes once I asked a man I was with why are you with me he said I don't know what you mean you don't know I said then after some thought he said you kind of smell good apparently I smell good hair locks and smell isn't the smell of sweat a natural perfume pheromones my body has more pheromones and women and shade are you popular with men I'm pretty popular I'm sure you're wearing man-made charm that's nothing it's like showing men the word woman and attracting them to you look a woman all I have to do is make eye contacting meow and they meow back that's it why do you want to be popular loneliness that brings people together is still loneliness life is much more fun than that you that's right it's me I was drinking by myself out of bar I was thinking it's my night they have it to nurse the glass of whiskey some I think it's pretentious but this is my nature I'm saying I like to drink whiskey every night to a teller at Mizu Ho Bang and the young girl said that's so cool it isn't cool I'm not being pretentious Haruki isn't being pretentious he's pistachio and croissant because that's his nature that's Haruki and this is me I told the girl she was shocked you know Haruki were on kami everyone has their own nature I am all natural wait what was I talking about yes so the other day I went into a bar I've never been to there was a woman like me drinking alone she ordered several scotch whiskeys so I asked her do you like scotch she said yes I do but there are so many kinds of scotch with so many different flavors oh yes fruity sweet oily we really hit it off and talked about different types of whiskey I met her several times at that bar after that one night we decided to grab a bite because we were hungry we left the bar and walked there was a sign for a capoeirae club it was a collage of a lot of photoshop girls she looked at it and said and I had a strange feeling yes it was just a strange feeling then we went to I think a barbecue girl place we ordered some meat and since I like garlic I ordered three orders of foil wrapped garlic she was surprised she said your mouth will smell it's fine the crime's not I'm buying crazed garlic so I must accommodate otherwise poor me yeah so I ate garlic and she ate meat sometimes I ate meat and she ate garlic that night we missed the last train she let me stay in her apartment I used her shower and when I came out the room was dark she was lying down on the mattress next to the window there was no other place for me so I laid down my back towards her then she slid her hand in between my thigh me too sliced her hand in between me's thighs after a while she came on top of me her full breasts pressed against my they bounced against each other and then she reached down and squeezed my breasts me too takes me's hand and makes her scoop her breasts from below and covers them it's quite a night yes so why are you telling me all of this I don't know just talking just telling about something to happen what am I supposed to get from that I don't know it's not for me to decide it's your choice you're free to feel however you feel in fact you can receive that freedom or not you're free you're free to buy a man made real leather pumps or you're free to wear your own real leather pumps it may be fun to live like that that's my choice but I will live wearing my own real leather pumps since I'm going to be bloody anyway I you that's right it's me you want to get a drink Sarah in a bar you had huge breasts like they have in those erotic mango man yes that might be nice but big breasted women are obsessed with their boobs and they're usually ugly they wear short shorts and tight tees and they trap their purse straps between their boots and stupid men get caught by them that's why they're obsessed with boobs and men one day their boobs will sag I guess that's just how it is good it's all right it's still a privilege big boobs are great I guess I wish I were popular I thought you said you were popular oh I am pretty popular what do you do as you can see I'm just a regular office worker oh I envy you anyone can do it what office work yeah I envy you wait is that your uniform yeah this office worker just making copies and shredding paper all day spend the whole day without a thought I can't believe you can really live like that I'd love to spend the day like that I would love to stop thinking I envy you and my boobs would be huge my boobs would sway as I walk and stupid men would make fun of me hey Holstein whose only merit is being cute go make some copies I'll listen to their talk yeah yeah I'm married one of them a mindless office worker I wonder how wonderful me too approaches me the air is tense there might be a murderous battle when me now has a huge text they take people all over the world to shrink the liquid that comes out of your body mooing you pervert they call cows and produce lots of milk super cows mooing I too want to only listen to my voice I ought to live wearing my own but I read magazines and I study the fashion trends military mix non-par on time court that I buy them some nights before I sleep I chant I will get married I will get married I will get married but quickly I forget and stop though I swear secretly to repeat this ritual until I die mister's dancing as if like a marionette she's being manipulated by some invisible force I am being danced by someone someone is making me dance me allows herself to dance fully in fact I will dance yo spare your suddenly enters hey you want to go karaoke have you been out all night no you a whole side moo moo moo me raises spurious pushing her breast into him spurious shoves me away me falls to the ground face down pathetically spurious loves me's but look as if to say stand up me stands up on all fours like a cow and begins to crawl clumsily spurious approaches me loosening his belt me and spurious disappear three a meaningless fight me enters as if she has been hurled onto the ground face down in a pathetic state I was walking down a street at night by new pumps there was a rumor that real leather pumps were sold in a back alley late at night my pumps were fake leather these days the world is full of fake leather pumps why is that every shoe store sells fake leather pumps these days all the women who walk the streets are bleeding from their heels they question these circumstances but can't do anything they say oh I'll let her but somewhere they wanted to experience the softness and quality of real leather suddenly means consciousness seems to drift far far away spare your enters drunk with my office superior Hiroshi after we did karaoke all night we made out I gave him a blow job and then we started to go steady the way Hiroshi speaks his appearance and his face I didn't like any part of him I hated all of him I knew well I should drink in moderation but I always ended up saying well whatever and drinking too much hey oh I'm sorry I haven't said anything oh um hey you know socks come in pairs black with black or gray and so on so clip them in pairs when you hang them to dry that way it's easier when you take them along you ignore the pairs and hang them casually so the person falls along with me I took her a lot of trouble if you took more responsibility and took it along with yourself I'd let it go I do have that much in hands but you don't you lie around and you eat boogers or you're like sweet natto so disgusting just looking at you you're a woman so you're used to stockings that connect both your feet you know what it feels like for me for men whose socks are separated you just stuff your face with sweet natto I have word socks you know when it's cold and inside I merge a lot of peaking stuff the fuzzy kind the thick rib socks don't worry who cares when they eat one sock of pork that's not what I'm talking about right now I was trying to send a message about being more considerate of using socks as an example but using get that at all that works about socks about wearing thick socks at winter what are you a fool give me back the time I wasted talking about this that's what I have to say to you Roshi what you say it's hard to understand is it my fault am I stupid shut up you and your talk you're trying to tell me to be more sympathetic towards you listen to yourself I'm putting in so much work to converse with a fool like you and you're trying to turn it around in your foolish way before you tell other people what to do do something about your own idiocy that's what I have to say to you don't you know don't make fun of fools what the hell are you talking about I give up are you fucking crazy I did call you a fool but I wasn't referring to the archetype of the fool it was a convenient word when you're all hung up on that word just like with the socks you've been hung up on the weirdest details you've been hung up on my calling you a fool you defend the fool actually had wisdom I wasn't making fun of the fool in fact I wasn't even talking about the fool I was just using the term image generic sense when you said I was horrible you were really just upset that I called you a fool you must have realized I was saying you and not the fool were stupid but you were distracted by the fool and wasted time defending it are you kidding loser by the way possessed wisdom when he used his weight but his daily life was full of holes and that gap created his charm he's a charmer that archetype so calling the fool foolish is not making fun of him it's coming from a place of love and familiarity does that mean you find charming too I'm familiar shut up are you kidding you're not turning it off crazy part two the way you suddenly forced the conversation in that direction really disgust me please listen to what I have to say the way you talk enrages me why are you so condescending you're always distracted by what's in front of you before you get upset about the way I talk can you just listen to what I'm saying let's be rational me starts smacking the area around her with her shoe just trying to squash her she hits barrier several times she beats him with increasing hatred spirit that hits her back so angry that you look like a cockroach to me Hiroshi that's terrifying I can't believe anything even myself but Hiroshi you're not angry and then you pretended that I look like a cockroach you hit me out of mallet are you crazy part three you're a hopeless loser I could just say that I saw you as a cockroach too you didn't say no way would you slap a cockroach with your bare hand I can say that I too hold such violent emotion that yes I would slap cockroaches with my head you're horrible you thought I was a cockroach I'm not a cockroach you mistook your loved one for a cockroach Hiroshi you're insane that's horrifying superior suddenly starts doing a slugging dance you know I didn't lose let me just say this you said I was condescending but I have solid grounds to brag right here I have a giant cock as you know in other words my giant cock is the grounds I have a giant cock I have a giant cock I have a giant cock my grounds for bragging lie in my giant cock when I failed my entrance exams that's what I chanted women who have giant tits have them where everyone can see they use their giant tits when they're in trouble to overcome crisis all they have to do is push them together it's not fair I wish I could use my giant cock to overcome crisis but my giant cock is down here it's hard to make it stand out my ex-girlfriend who was beautiful and had huge tits got married and had a baby and she sent me pics of her kid are you kidding the kids have the kids not cute at all shitty brat with the fucking fucking crazy she used to be heads over heels for me every time she sends me pics I chant I have a giant cock I have a giant cock on the way to mcdonald's there's a shitty boutique the shitty smelling old ladies in the neighborhood go there for owl prints leopard prints dog prints all shit colored bomber colored clothes all tunics and other shapeless old lady clothes laid on these tiny stores disgusting their old ladies inside the boutique with heavy makeup caked on their faces like nomads with putrid breath eating lips they're selling weird clothes they're putrid friends soy in the town with their putrid breath who the fuck do they think they are and even then I chant I have a giant cock I have a giant cock and as I chant my giant cock climbs up my body our only skin-tied tops from now on the shape of my feet and becomes a perfect fit not only that because moments heal themselves naturally like living skin it's a miracle that this is as if they're an extension of my body take off with fake leather and wear real leather to become a new me and see using the back alley when I get stressed out the urge to find real leather pumps that's the way of the women in this world or crossword of a queen puzzle man appears he's holding the head of a female dog the dog's mouth is a big gaping hole the man is trusting his giant cock in and out of the dog's mouth this right here when there's this rock solid fit my confidence that with a zero percent begins to recover because of the my giant cock I never tried that hard at anything I failed at many things and have had my share of struggles at times like that I fit this here rock solid and my self confidence comes back that's how I've lived up to now so there are benefits and disadvantages to having a giant cock they come balance each other I met her a month ago at Y-Mobile when I was drunk I dropped myself home I reported it to the police but after a month it still hadn't been found so I went to Y-Mobile to look into other options um I got drunk and dropped my phone yes that happens what should I do let's switch you over to a new device and make sure your lost phone can't be used so that's what happened I have been using a flip phone so I thought I switched to a smartphone how do I use lying and one thing led to another and that's how she arrived here at my cock the blade shield was the crossword of dreams in my case I would do it without kissing or any other work plate and put it in her mouth straight away no penetration on pillow talk afterwards either we're just Malaysia white salt that is why it means so much you know I think me a savage beast to do this with my giant cock but I am just human I live with my mind I am proud of my humanity I am so human I'm headstrong rock solid when writing rock solid doesn't feel good to me here shoving a rock solid thing into something else is just terrible I'm rock solid now but I usually start out soft and get rock solid inside the mouth that's why rock solid means so much if I go straight out of rock solid she she's surprised she's scared off she might even call the cops so I have to assess her can I go for it or not in the end I just go for it I have a giant cock I have a giant cock I I chant and when I get to make my move rock solid it's like yes she may hesitate but ultimately she put me in her mouth and I cheer for her good job you're doing great she's encouraged by my cheering and she gets into it and so do I thank you thank you you're amazing you're a major leaguer sometimes we hit a lull in the middle and she starts getting rational why am I doing oh look at my split ends maybe I should try silicone free shampoo hey in a hurry I cheer her on harder good job it's not scary stay focused keep going oh oh that's across my mind that's how fully she was the crossover of the dreams recently a disembodied spirit has been coming to me to give blowjobs I don't have to plan a time and a place I can get a blowjob anytime I want I don't even use my new smartphone who needs it your own mind is the best can you see man can do anything as long as he has his mind I'm so human I'm headstrong rock solid is that a cat oh the cats do live in these back alleys but you are you okay yeah I'm getting a cold yeah I bet holding that cat would be warm like a hot water bottle I want to pet the cat but you yeah all right you're kitty kitty come here you're kitty kitty meow meow kitty kitty kitty won't come out I'm sorry if I have more money I buy some dancing beast and draw it out all because of this I'm sorry I wish you could warm up with that cat well the cat is crying so close but I can't reach it happiness is so close but I'm powerless making money here God I cannot reach the cat how did that become such a man if I am reborn a study hard to become a hiring man then I think that's all right meow meow kitty please come out don't fix the cat to come out mom also sitting together in a hurry man and dog keep begging the site of them is horrifying me unable to bury any longer comes out of the shadow um I'm sorry I was pretending to be a cat hey hey mom violently grabs me it wasn't the cat the moon and the back alleys I was walking down the street at night there was a rumor that real other pumps were sold in the back alley late at night finally tonight I will get my hands on real leather pumps at the end of this alley there will be a concert and there apparently they will be selling real leather pumps cheap at long last I will experience the joy of getting real leather pumps I'm there gathered with many other women with one strange thing to see so many women filling the alley everyone is wearing fake leather pumps of course I am too but tonight will be the last I found out about tonight's concert on my smartphone me takes out my smartphone from her pocket and pulls up an image of malmaisie this is the famous chinese singer malmaisie he's like the elton john of china tonight he is going to sing his song the sun and the cobbler on main street it's his response to the moon and the back alley merchant the moon and the back alley merchant is a well-known song but for those of you who don't know it it was broadcast as part of a children's program called let's play with chinese the song was in chinese so I couldn't fully understand what the accompanying animation showed a back alley with soup dumplings and chai buns and shrimp dumplings floating around and as a child I thought the song was about selling dim sum in the back alley when I read the actual lyrics on the website I found out there was a disparity between the lyrics and the animation the back alley merchant sells real leather pumps pumps in rainbow colors red orange yellow green blue indigo purple all lined up what a beautiful sight but only god knows those are fake leather pumps nobody notices how their heels bleed and weep as you can see this song is about pumps not dim sum some chinese-speaking people made a fuss about it why is the animation about dim sum horror tremors yes and women who heard the moon in the back alley merchant began to go to the back alleys to buy real leather pumps we've been brainwashed horror tremors yes I myself was completely brainwashed I can't believe myself I can't believe this world horror tremors yes and apparently the brainwashing of women using songs like this is spreading all over the world horror tremors yes but why brainwashed women there was a big conspiracy Mao Meiji's manager this is a japanese person imitating a chinese person the imitation is not of an actual chinese person but a caricature of a chinese person as presented in a japanese media the gathering it is packed with women everyone welcome thank you for gathering I am Mao Meiji's manager nice to meet you you all come here very clever only children person can come here those who listen to Mao Meiji's the sun and the cobbler on the main street the sun might shine down on you and warm up your body and deprogram your brainwashing from the moon at the back alley merchant everyone your real life begin tomorrow I'm sorry Mao Meiji cannot come tonight upset stomach what calm down everyone but it's all right in fact I wrote DVD it has same effect it will deprogram the moon and the moon back alley merchant what really cool thank god oh good yeah but before that we sell real leather pumps oh my god my associates margot is from an italian shoe making school master piece made by two percent elite craftsmen so wonderful so wonderful these are authentic fits like your own skin your heels nobody no way every night polish them with nutritional skin cream you know you're not let go of these shoes all your life nutritional skin cream is 20 thousand yen per bottle but today I offer special set what really this is a super special set sale you put cream on your face every night right yes I do this cream has everything coenzyme collagen jojoba oil placenta everything it's best for human skin too it makes skin very soft soft and soft no wrinkles scratches heel right away soft soft like a woman soft really I wanted how much is it that's a real question cheap one million yen I am what is it expensive this deal later million yen right how long you force to dance don't you want to walk in a real leather pumps down main street in sunlight I want you of course we want to did you see website why their leather pumps disappear from Japan why they all fake leather why you all plain washed you forgot everything you dare answer oh but for profit right cheap fake leather pumps don't last long they scuff easily and they're stiff they hurt your feet and make them bleed they're ruined quickly so you have to buy new ones right away and shops only sell cheap fake leather pumps so we're forced to buy cheap fake leather pumps again since they're cheap and fake we treat them poorly and they get ruined it's a downward spiral yes I so as we live like this we start thinking we want real leather we walk the back alleys in search of real I mean we're rain washing to walk in the alleys so we do and we wear out our cheap fake leather pumps and they get ruined even faster and we have to buy another pair yes you spend three five million yen on fake leather pumps in your lifetime but you think a million is cheap follow money to buy stop buying pumps you save money your feet won't bleed take big bets only good things and yes it's to dominate women because of these pumps we never have any money so we flirt with men to make them treat us to meals and the alleys there are perverts many women are victims of sex crimes above all women lose their confidence when they wear fake leather they spend their lives hoping they will have real leather someday so wearing fake leather now feels incomplete and they lose confidence they search and search but cannot find real leather and myself without real leather continues when humans live in scarcity we tend to want to believe that the person we meet in the alley is our other self and this can lead to murder 30,000 yen on me is it okay if I pay the restaurant a payment plan yeah he takes the money me takes all the pumps and puts on the new pair that the manager had prepared she savers the fit and the sensation of the shoes it is great after all I can finally wear these real leather pumps I am complete that's right that is because women are by far in superior organism over men women are smart and have communication skills we do lose our rationale sometimes but we have an intuitive understanding of what goes beyond reason we have elastic minds not just our minds but flexible bodies too we have a charm that enchants men the only thing that men you beat women at is brute force that is why men have used brainwashing to take away money from women and strip our confidence men are terrified of women and women hate men men can sense this unconsciously which deepens their fear and makes them want to control women even more and this makes women hate men even more men played at murder as children we women played house out of love and inventiveness it is the end of the era of men men acknowledge your defeat gracefully then women will stop hating you okay play dvd and uh also many incidents and bodies and yet I could not stop myself from walking the hours the other me me too and her heels making a passive sound against the ground are you going to buy a real leather pump yes I heard they were selling them in the back alley me that's me that's me well what are you doing just like that I became an office worker I've never worn a uniform before in grade school in middle school I wore my own clothes I had a uniform in high school but it was the color of green pepper I just couldn't accept it so my friends Ami and Calvin with masaki gathered signatures for a petition to gov rid of the uniform policy I wonder what they're up to now we were so young and bold and cute we had fun with fashion trends we celebrated our youth we picked up guys and toyed with them we didn't know what to do with our bodies they ran away every time how I miss those days so I never had a uniform my whole life but what I'm at you the other day I thought I wanted to try wearing a uniform I see how unexpected I didn't think you'd ever wear a uniform because you value freedom so much but wearing a uniform is a different kind of freedom also if I'm really honest I don't really like whiskey either I want to be cool in front of you I went home folks own Barrett I put on airs I couldn't get over it for three days I actually like Kahlua and milk it keeps me regular here am I boring you are you okay me yes me it's me I said some pretty pretentious things but actually I was always very insecure meeting you I realized that that I was always acting tough me you're pumped yes they're fake leather I wear these pumps and breathe from my heels and put on band-aids at home and wear compression socks and take vitamin C to prepare for the next day but I don't have any money before I started working at the office where I am I was looking for work to buy these pumps I had a part-time job selling cell phones for Y-Mobile I wanted to sell phones I'm scared of SoftBank and Dokomo but I thought Y-Mobile would be okay there I didn't know at all what I was doing but I learned how to use line and so what's the move stop it me I don't want to hear such snobbish stories from you I'm in charge of all things snobbish I could tolerate myself because of you but now I feel like I can't tolerate myself anymore the Russian playwright Anton Chekhov said if a rifle appears on the stage it must go off in other words if the fallacy appears on the stage it must ejaculate especially if it's a giant car that's why since I'm a woman I must agree breast milk especially because I have huge tits that's the way the world works the stage become bright and me too is scantily dressed she has enormous breasts and from between her big breasts grow a huge ballast in her uniform pocket she has a hot dog fun I exchanged information with the male Y-Mobile client online and I put his cock in my mouth the first time was after work we met to eat ramen I think he had asked me to go out for ramen we were going to meet in front of a convenience store I was hungry so I bought a hot dog bun it's only a hundred yen and pretty filling do you know they're delicious they have margarine inside hot dog buns are the best cheap and delicious so when I had the bun in my mouth the man showed up and saw me and said if you don't you won't be able to eat ramen but I said ramen alone will fill me up I thought I heard my appetite with this bun the man thought oh and in the battle with convenience store I took his giant manlet in other words a giant cock and put it in my mouth since then I put his giant cock in my mouth every night I have a giant cock for a nightcap not whiskey I'm sorry I lied and then one night in my sleep I just took this man's giant cock for a hot dog bun and it blew off his jelly cock and ate it the man screamed I gave birth to a boy and he had a really my baby milk from my huge breasts I raised him and he called me Holstein hey Holstein give me milk he'd say I do and give him milk he was adorable since he was born my breasts have produced milk the whole time I have too much milk goodness if I don't let it out my breasts get hard and painful do you want some fresh sweet milk I can make it cool and milk me rubs the store on me Tuesday and drums hot to death me exists throwing in me too falling eating the bun I was walking down a street at night to buying new pumps there was a rumor that real other pumps were sold in the back alley late at night my pumps were fake leather I grilled me flesh and ate it like steak little by little every day it was delicious I wonder if this makes me my strongest possible so I'm lying I didn't eat her since I heard about hot dog buns for me I can't help but eat them I have this tendency to eat things that I've seen or heard about other people eating why is that why am I like this when I was a kid I tie a string around some bread and hang it into the gutter to catch crawfish there were tons of crawfish in the gutter and I would catch tons of them I love bread I wanted to eat the bread and felt conflicted about using it to catch stinky crawfish seemed like a good deal for the crawfish such soft sweet white food shouldn't exist in the gutter the crawfish would go into a frenzy and I would catch countless of them on my line I used the bread out of spite I filled my bucket full of crawfish and in the bucket the crawfish began to eat each other I wondered where my bread went I took the crawfish home and kept them in the scorching sun in the yard the water in the bucket boiled the crawfish were cooked they turned a vibrant red and curled up if I had peeled those freshly boiled crawfish and eaten them would I have gotten my bread back the crawfish offered me nothing in return they just took my bread and died selfishly and I had somehow killed someone I wish it were a human tendency I wish I had been brainwashed I wish it had been a gift from God I wanted an explanation for why I have been made to dance like this why am I like this what is fueling my innards right now is a hot dog bun that is the truth it is also true that dancing generates heat in one's body so what makes my body war is not a song nor the sun but myself that's the truth first of all I graciously not only have to produce the festival translated things help us select the playwrights that I can translate so you are a participant of course that but also will help a little bit so what are her reactions what tell us a little bit is really really fun I'm in a little bit of shock right now I can't quite articulate myself try try the video productions were amazing the actors were amazing and they just realized that I'd written a comedy was it a tragedy did you think it was a tragedy actually the audience reaction in japan is much more serious so I thought I'd written something you know quite serious tell us a little bit what was the idea for the work so I actually had a part-time job working in a shoe store and I that's kind of where it started and Japan as you might know is a very male centered society so all the stress that have been accumulated inside me from dealing with kind of the the daily attitudes of men kind of came out in this way was it your first play you won't this is probably about my 10th play so tell us a little bit where do you come from from the writing did you novelist right did you study playwriting what's how did you get to the theater so I started doing theater in high school and I was studying to become an actor and I always thought I would be an actor I never really thought of myself as a writer or director but then in college I reached my final year in college and you know I'd realized that as an actor I had a lot of dissatisfaction or things that I felt were didn't set well with me so that last year in college I gathered some of my friends together and I tried writing and writing a play and that that particular piece was received unexpectedly well and I felt like it was worth continuing so so I did when you write what are your influences who did you look up to what were your inspirations type so when I was an actor I performed primarily in how do you say it's like contemporary but straight kind of conventional plays and I would say that I was influenced by them in terms of I thought those were the kinds of plays that I didn't want to make and I and I was kind of reacting against them and that reaction comes out in in my work I wasn't really thinking about thinking that I would become a playwright and I remember in the early days I had a cell phone and I would kind of keep a log of words in my cell phone and that became the beginnings of my plays so it's so I there's no sense of like oh there was a playwright or a theater maker that I really admired and I was influenced by them and I followed their footsteps or anything like that of course now there are many playwrights that I do admire amazing we've always also flip phone or smartphone for your notes but are you in a way someone could read it as a very political play or very feminist post-feminist feminism play what is your do you see yourself in a line of of writers and concerned with these kind of six issues I actually would not really consider myself a feminist necessarily and I think like many Japanese people I am not particularly politically engaged either so it's not like I'm creating this play to make this kind of political statement or to have this like feminist agenda out in the world or anything like that I'm really just trying to express without kind of falling into any school of thought or any political movement the things that I feel and experience in my day-to-day life just stunning the me too character in the sense how closely connected it is but let's talk a bit about your technique of writing do you write at home on a computer how many drafts do you do do you write all day how what do you how do you create your work so lately my process has been mostly first I will just generate a long monologue and then I'll enter the rehearsal space with my actors and and we'll read it together and I will ask for their reactions and opinions and then that will influence how I continue and we'll develop it together that way so this play too went through a process like that of working very closely with the actors and a lot of the stories that they contributed or their they experienced made their way into the script as well and then with a lot of different scenes and ingredients before me I'll figure out how to piece everything together into a cohesive whole that's such a brilliant dialogue for tense surprising imaginative and very serious and bloody and but also so funny is a all you can can they have in the play but let's talk our two actors how did it feel how did it feel to perform that tax you go ahead I think it's on yeah it was incredibly fun I won't pretend that it wasn't scary but it was very it was scary about a lot I think there's something very precious about performing work that is translated and wanting to honor a piece of text that I'm not able to read an original copy of and the closest understanding I have is the script that I had translated but also after moving past the initial reluctance I wouldn't say reluctance maybe like being timid to to grab on to it there's something so fun about just like playing with something that you don't really know what's going on and again to the actors what did you wrestle with what was complicated and what was easy um I don't know yeah maybe tone sometimes like the tones in the different modes I would agree with max things that were serious or ended up being more fun when we were playing with it but also not being sure of like what is the right interpretation which applies to any play really Christine tell us a bit about the adaptation the process your ideas your vision first off I really want to thank Kio here who was assistant directing and also serving as dramaturg so it was really incredible to have Kio's insight of the play she had read both the Japanese and the English so as we were grappling with trying to understand these cultural tones or these characters that seem to be very specifically nestled in cultural stereotype Kio was kind of there every step of the way helping us decode that or understand that so yeah there was an approach to where we were very trying to be very sensitive to those things and also leaving room to play play a lot I think when I I think when I first read this play again I was really struck by the images and I was thinking how what can I offer this play and I imagined all the like the cock moments being puppeted or done physically and for me this experiment to really place that image in its most clear version via projection was an exciting experiment for me so maybe before we go to audience question to Chivan the last question as a dramaturg did you feel we had to make adaptations for American audiences where there's something you felt you had to mediate that was not so really clear and what was that yeah I also had a reaction when I read the play I thought it was very very serious because there are a lot of situations where women are very oppressed and silenced by men and that is something that I feel very very close to because I was I grew up in Japan so but like when we started play play around I realized there is a surreal absurdity in it and I really enjoyed it but at the same time I really wanted to make sure that there is like there's very very sad and pathetic and also desperate about this play and I also really contemplated on the meaning of like why we present this Japanese play that happens in Japan in America and to the American audience and I was very very interested in how we can make those messages clear yeah I think it came clear very loud and crystal clear and still light like a bird's foot as someone said good poetry is about the characters are dangerous you know they could hurt someone you have a feeling as in Mark Ravenhill he once was here on display and shopping and parking he said my my characters were dangerous you know they most of players he said they could kill the other ones you know what are people talking about I feel this these are strong characters and they have something to say even in that world this imaginary world of the inside and the outside of the imagination the truth so not and that it was this commercial shopping and what's love what's a relationship and the office work I thought it was a fantastic condensation of thoughts which is so complex where we don't really as you might say it's not too easy to to put them into a sense of I'm watching but I felt it's something very very contemporary and I don't know I've been only once or twice it's something yeah Japanese player could see that coming from there and maybe you don't come other places but maybe we have some lights from the audiences and for the audiences we have a time for a couple of questions and and so any thoughts or it can be a comment doesn't have to be a question and anybody has something one and then again somebody else yeah so we start here and maybe say very shortly who you are and then my just one question or one observation I am a grandmother with a half Japanese granddaughter aged 23 I'm very interested in this subject I thought the performance the play everything was stellar from the translation to the incredible acting and to the writing really it's given me a whole new dimension on life I thought it was wonderfully transgressive and very funny because of that the most interesting comment for me has been that you discovered you wrote a comedy which means that you made it a comedy I mean the direction and the actors took it in that direction and I think it really works well here in that in that form and that style and that genre and it reminded me of two things of Karen Benley being transgressive and Jari you know it's it's just it it was exaggerated in that way and and so affecting true and pleasurable I'm Yoko Shioya artist degree director at Japan society I the question to Christine I read that article I read that the play in Japanese that the Satoko-san said to me and then I talked with Aiya when she was working on the translation and as you know we've been doing the similar English translated play reading and then whether or not we would take it display into our next project or not and then that process I was talking with Aiya and then Aiya asked Aiya told me did you see the video and then I didn't see it then when I read the Japanese Japanese play it was I would have said it's serious but then I thought that it would be too shocking probably and so then Aiya told me the world you should see the video it's it's not that shocking thing or or some I don't know exact the conversation I had and then I saw her production in Japan in Japanese and then I laughed a lot I mean probably I'm probably Americanized so so I laughed at the scenes and then so my question to you is that did you see the video before you this put together or you just read it and then I come up with like what the Satoko said as a way of comedy read it I knew that a production a previous production existed but I had not seen it so yeah this was an interpretation directly from the so I loved it but I wanted to know how does it feel if you didn't intend it to be a comedy that you saw it as a comedy here I mean people did even in Japan there are some people who who treated it as a comedy and even though I wasn't necessarily thinking about deliberately like writing a comedy I I'm a lighthearted person and generally I'm aware that I'm writing about some out there things so I feel good about you know good about it maybe about or two yeah um hi Satoko that was really great to see it because I as you know I saw the um the production in Japan and I felt that um the what in both places what fascinated me the most was the idea of me the idea of me and another me and then the other me takes on all these different identities and um it came off differently here but I sort of felt that that was the serious core and with that you could play and in Japan some people were laughing but I think it was an uncomfortable laugh but I think the comedy is an uncomfortable comedy and that that is what's so great about it maybe one last uh yeah uh hi I'm Julia I'm the Chinese actor so my question is why is the song Chinese I want to hear the story behind the Chinese song so as it says in the in the stage directions this is not an actual Chinese person who appears or not actual Chinese actor even that appears but it is um a Japanese uh a caricature of a Chinese person made constructed by uh a Japanese person and to me what I was trying to do is that um this idea the idea of a Chinese person exists in in Japanese culture that's created from the media it's uh it could be a negative stereotype it could be like a you know whatever a variety of of things but um I was interested in having the protagonist of the play being influenced by this kind of uh idea of a person that's not based in reality that's created by the culture around her well how about your piece so I was making a pretty I never envisioned it being um like a real Chinese person I was going for an extreme um version of of what something that constructed by the Japanese society well thank you for coming and I'm close to the end of that first reading I think it was a fantastic start and all the other plays are really significant work also and inspiring so I hope you will have time I know you can see all after all this is New York but um it will be of interest I want tackle to welcome Kenji Matsumoto from the Japan Foundation as I said earlier they are the great supporters Kenji was here also 10 years ago when we did the first exchange he has been a great supporter and friend of the Seidel Center and also um supported this and also a great worker in the field of theater and international connections and so um Kenji thank you for coming and uh to you are those real leather shoes I forget we'll we'll find out and I would say another big applause it was for this really