 Oh, everybody. This is the fifth session of our weekly Segal Talks. It's Friday already. And my name is Frank Henschka. I'm here from the Segal Theater Center in New York City at the Graduate Center CUNY. And we have been holding talks this week with our theater artists from New York, but also from around the world to see what is on their mind, what's going on, to make sense, and what they think about making arts in these times of corona. And we had, in the very beginning, Taylor Mac and Kirsten Martin from the Art Center who introduced us to the brilliant idea of tailors of trickleupnyc.org, a kind of Netflix screaming platform where you pay $10 a month, and then the money will go to New York artists to support their work, and you have access to over 40, 50 videos. And of course, the library will be growing, and it's a great way to put it together. And both of them shared their work and their life and spoke to friends and colleagues from Hong Kong and China, Moqtiu Yu, and Shu Yi Liao, and a choreographer and Han Shen Fan who spoke about their situation in Hong Kong and in China and China where it seems to be getting better, but a lot of work still will be going online in Hong Kong where there are so many worries already about the role of the artist in their time and in their society, how that will change when that is over, the hurdles they will face in their strive for artistic freedom and work. We had the great also Thomas Ostermeyer joining us from Berlin, and Thomas was calling us from his apartment in Schöneberg and telling us to use the time to prepare, especially also for young artists to read, to know. They said it will all be over at a certain time. There is the next generation of theatre makers will be coming and this is a moment perhaps to think about what we are doing. Also, he said, make sure this is not a fatalistic thinking comes in, this makes no sense. There is no bigger meaning, no bigger picture. We should not become in any way affected by it and stay sober and just say this is something we have to deal with and we will, but still it's a time to think about life and death. He said theatre is always on the side of life. We both incorporate as the great young cot said theatre is that space between the living and the dead, but we celebrate both. And now we don't have what we normally have, life encounters, we don't have bodies on stage, we are confined to our home, so everything that theatre is about is not happening and we have to find a way to deal with it. Yesterday we had a great Marco and Hermana from Teatro delle Albe in Ravenna in Italy. They say they live like monks, they get up at 12 noon, work for eight hours on their reed, right? And then watch four or five hours videos and films and talk and eat and they have been doing this for two months and they say they also feel it's a little bit like a field of a farmer which now has to rest a little bit and has to air and that's also trying to reinvent their work or they're terribly missing, being on tour, going out where they are supposed to be. And with us today we have one of the great masters of contemporary theatre and performance globally. This is Toshiki Okada, who is his great company, Shellfish, who has been many times at the Seagal, we are collaborators, one of the first times, I think he came to the US, the very first one actually was at the Playwrights Exchange and he has really put a stamp on the contemporary work that is of significance for the global community. He acts locally but he thinks globally and works globally and I think we are very fortunate and happy to have Toshiki here with us. He also moved his family away from Tokyo after the Fukushima event and his work has been engaging with the ideas of perhaps of an end of time disaster, ecological disaster, now what we have to focus on. And so Toshiki, welcome first here, what time is it now and where are you? Yeah, it's 1 a.m. here in Japan. Yeah, usually it's time for me to go to bed but now it's my pleasure. And where are you right now? Are you in Tokyo? Are you in your family's home? Where are you? Yeah, now I'm in the city of Kumamoto, which is far away from Tokyo, where my house with my family is. So who is with you in your family right now who is in the building? Yeah, my wife and two kids, the 16 years old boys and the 20, yeah, the 20th, 12 years old daughter. Yeah, my daughter is going to enter junior high school. Yeah, yeah, because April, it's the time they're back to school in Japan. Yeah, but yeah, seemingly the school is still being closed for a while. So I'm not sure if her entrance ceremony will be held or not next week, I don't know. So how do you spend your days now? Well, what do you do? You were one of the great directors who directs and travels. You just were in New York at the Skirball and Jay Wegman got you there with your latest work. They said, even got stuck and caused them to a little crisis. Yes, yes. You were lucky to have that shown just before the curtains fell down. So what are you doing? How do you spend your day? These days, yeah, like many people, I'm also stuck in to my home, but it's good for me as a writer, yeah, because it's good to write some things. Yeah, so I'm almost always struggling between me as a theater director who has to go out often and me as a writer who needs to isolation for a while in a way. Yeah, so yeah, most of the cases I have to be more director than a writer. It's, yeah, I like it, but at the same time, it's a problem, but yeah, these days, it's special. Yeah, because it's, yeah, I can be, I can be in a very good situation as a writer. Yeah, it's interesting. And yeah, and I'm writing and cooking very much every day. Yeah, that I was supposed to start the rehearsal for my next project, yeah, from next week. Yeah, but we already, so in order to realize that that I would go to Tokyo to rehearse, but we already decided to change the rehearsal online. So yeah, I'm going to stay here in Kumamoto for a while. So yeah, I'm not sure when I'm going to go to Tokyo. Yeah, so before we come to your online rehearsal, so how do you write? What time do you get up? Do you write at the computer by hand? Do you have a writing room? How does it work when Toshiki Okada writes? I'm doing both handwriting and writing on computer. It depends on, yeah, my feeling. Yeah, but most of the cases I'm writing on my laptop. Yeah, but to elaborate, yeah, I like to do it in handwriting. In handwriting? Are you doing it in the mornings, in the nights? Yeah, I'm morning person, so I'm not good at waking until late at night. Yeah, because, yeah, yeah, late afternoon, yeah, I usually am exhausted, so it's not already time for me to write things, so I, yeah, yeah, I, yeah, often write things almost. So you have the morning. You're close to a window, what do you see when you look out of your window? Now, yeah, there is a tree, some trees by window, but now it's very mid, yeah, over midnight. It's all midnight. Yeah, it's just dark now. So what do you write at the moment if you can share a little bit? What's on your mind? What are the sentences? What is the work you're writing right now, like yesterday or today? Yeah, my next production is kind of my own way of no theater. It's kind of my own way of no theater, you know, no theater is an ancient performing arts style in Japan. Yeah, it's kind of a musical play. Yeah, I like the concept of no theater because, yeah, in original no theater, it has a very good way of having the character as a ghost, yeah, which I like. Yeah, because the putting protagonist character as a ghost can help, can help make the story kind of a political because of course ghost is some human being who died already and that the death has of course some specific reason. The most of the cases, the reason of someone's death is relating to some political or social situation like war or, yeah, such as war. So then if you can describe someone's death, yeah, and in original no theater, the one very interesting thing is that the ghost can tell how they died by themselves. It's very interesting, yeah, because human being cannot do it, of course. Yeah, only ghosts can do it and they do in no theater, which I like. Yeah, so now, yeah, I like to, quote that kind of style that no theater has. So now I'm writing my own way of, contemporary way of no theater. The one protagonist, it's, you know, the architect, female architect Zaha had it. Yeah, the she, as she, was supposed to be designer of a new stadium in Tokyo for Olympic Games. Yeah, this year, yeah, but as you know, it was, yeah, it was postponed already. Yeah, but she, her design once was selected and she won the competition. Yeah, but after that, her design was canceled due to so many other problematic process. So, yeah, and after her design was denied, she passed away. She passed away? Yeah, she already. Yeah, so that's why I'm thinking about putting her on the protagonist of my way of no play. Yeah, these days I'm writing a text for it. So the protagonist of female designer architect who design was rejected for the Tokyo Olympics that got canceled anyway. She died and she comes back as it goes. Did you have that idea already before the Corona crisis, the COVID-19 crisis hit? Yeah, that idea of putting Zaha on the protagonist of my no play, yeah, it was what I already had, of course, before that pandemic situation was coming. It has nothing to do with it. So, how is your mood? Do you feel as a creative artist as you are? Are you influenced by this? Do you feel that situation is having an imprint of your work or do you feel, no, I'm still working as I always did? Yeah, of course I'm affected in several different ways. One, it's, yeah, as I mentioned, now I already had several days of online rehearsals. And yeah, it was my first time. I never tried online rehearsal before. Kelly, how do you do online rehearsal? Yeah, by far I did just doing workshop with actors. It was his or her first time to work with me. So I need to share, we need to share my idea while creating theaters. Yeah, so, yeah, I was afraid if it works online, online rehearsal works or not, but maybe it does. So how many actors and they are all at home in their room and you have them in a Zoom meeting or how does it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. How many people? Yeah, it was kind of Zoom meeting. By far I did online meeting just with only one actress. So I don't know and I'm curious about what happened if the, yeah, several actors joining at the same time. So right now you do one-on-one meetings with the actors about the role you are creating, especially specifically for the actor. Yeah, but in a way I feel that Zoom meeting might be better to have the atmosphere as a discussion. Yeah, but I don't know. I don't know if it's like. So you mean the atmosphere of a Zoom meeting adds to the message and the content and the general atmosphere of the play? Yeah, yeah, yeah, because in the screen everyone is obviously equivalent. So there is no kind of hierarchy of like director is top and like this. So yeah, and everyone can see that any other person is talking or doing something. So it seems flat in a way. So I hope it works to make the atmosphere of rehearsal kind of flat equivalent or democratic. That's an interesting thought. I never thought about it. That Zoom in a way adds to democratic distribution of artistic engagement in company meetings because everybody has the same space on the computer at the same time, hopefully to talk. And I know Rene Polish in Germany who is now taking over at the Volksbühne after Kastoff. He'd always said that people write so many plays about revolution and changes, but the way they produce their work, it's dictatorial authoritarian. There's the director who says he even changes this and that from the writers, whatever. But there's no, if you don't have a kind of a democratic distribution of work on stage, how can you advocate with your work? What ultimately the artistic goal is. So he distributes text to the actors, the actors write text, he arranges them and puts them up. So that's an interesting thought that perhaps Zoom will introduce something that after the digital machines entered of light and sound and created equal distribution of things we see on stage that now Zoom will actually perhaps add something and never thought about this. So do you give actors already lines over the internet, over the Zoom? Do you have send it to them upfront and they speak a monologue for you or how does it work? By far, I did just doing a workshop and my way of the workshop is always the same. Tell us a little bit. Maybe not all of our listeners do. Yeah, of course. I'm always asking actors to tell how your current house or the house you used to live is like. So if you ask that you are telling your house like the entrances here. Tell us about your house where you grow up. There's always and the bathroom is on your right side like this. So when you're talking about your house almost spontaneously you have to move your body like this. And I'd like, we'd like to see why you're moving like this. Because when you try to talk something when you're talking about your house you have to have the imagination that house in your mind. And that kind of imagination can make your body move like this. So my basic and the first idea is how much imagination can make your body. In other words, the imagination can choreograph you. So I like to find movement based on that kind of ideas. So I need to... So you see the gestures the actors make and then transfer them to lines. So is it a ghost-like presence that already of an actor on your screen is the person already? Is it real? Is it not? Is it a ghost? Even if he's alive? It's interesting. I've never thought like this. But at the same time I almost always feel the similarity of the idea of a ghost and the idea of an actor's idea of theater. For me, theater is putting something imaginary on some physical space. So the materiality, reality that kind of fiction or the imaginary things can be overlapped on the physical space or the materiality. So the experience of both the materiality and the imaginary fiction for me it's theater. Yeah, that's great. Marvin Carlson's great book on ghosting and how closely it's related to that we sit in a dark room and the light goes off and the Greek army supposedly is right side on stage or not. We imagine it. We get people who no longer exist talk to us with someone who's living. We believe it is something that perhaps opens our minds and creates a space for imagination and rethinking the Japanese tradition of ghosts in the no place which is so significant. So it is a ghostly time in a way also. Do you feel and Peter said our reality is no stranger and think about that perhaps we have ever thought how can we create theater that deals with this? How do we react? How do you think theater artists can or should react to it or you as an individual artist? Yeah, I think always always reality and fiction support always Of course now things seems to be much clearer how reality I can understand if you can see reality that seems to be much stronger than fiction but for example I think we can think like this that of course virus is visible. We can see that. So if we are afraid of virus it means we can have some fictional imagination otherwise you can see any virus around you. So I think we have to manage taking balance between reality or fiction or in other words we have to have some imagination and you can care of how what is taking your imagination I mean for example it's different story but for example terrorism terrorism is one way to control your imagination in fear so but sometimes we have to we have to care we have to manage the way of using my imagination in different way I mean otherwise my imagination is taken only by fear so then we need to find alternative way of taking your own imagination so in my way I believe fiction is a very strong option and if you have some imagination which is good you can manage you can manage things so it's what's happening all the time always but in these days at age of coronavirus it's good in a way it's good for everyone including artists to contemplate that kind of idea in comparison with ordinary days so I believe something new and something stronger new idea can be appeared due to this situation how is the mood in Japan on the streets in your town or I don't know if you work shortly in Tokyo how do you describe it among artists how is it now I'm not in Tokyo so as far as I heard or I read or I see the information from media people are very divided some people are very careful but at the same time there are so many people who are going out as usual because the government government is not ordering or withdrawing yep unlike Europe or state tell us a bit you gave a strong critique of the Japanese government after Fukushima you decided to move out of Tokyo because of that and your work engages with these and vital environmental questions also is that corona is that do you see that in a strain in a chain of events that will and should have happened that you kind of said I'm going to get out of Tokyo I'm going to move there to have my family safe early on but I will focus in my work to highlight this so is your work influenced and what's your idea about all of this what are your thoughts? yeah these days I often compare how the days were after Fukushima disaster and their current situation yeah of course there are some similarity but at the same time there are so many differences in a way yeah the Fukushima nuclear power plant incident was very big event for everyone but of course for me too yeah because we decided that a big change we moved we changed our place to live but then we were very afraid of the influence of radioactivity especially to my kids but at the same time I had to I had to see so there are so many people who had different ideas from mine yeah there are so many people who didn't care about that so I had to feel a sort of tension of my mindset and other people's mindset it was very strong and it made me exhausted very much yeah I wonder how it is, how it is now it's similar or different because now I have no chance to compare because I have yet to visit Tokyo area but if I were go to Tokyo maybe I'm going to experience something similar maybe how did the Fukushima disaster change your work as an artist the biggest one for me it was like it made me realize the sense of division in society in fact, to be honest I've never felt like this before Fukushima incident happened it was very big for me and since then I started to work based on that kind of sense of division in society which play was the first one you did after? the first one is the play the title was current location current location was almost direct description about that kind of sense of division tension between people who have different ideas about current situation to talk about the political do you feel an artist has a role to play in the society and the political side how did the government react and how you reacted towards is there something you feel is a responsibility yeah unfortunately I don't think of my government as some agent who can take responsibility so we have to we have to make my way by myself of course and as an artist I feel I have to I have to make some fiction as I mentioned because for me fiction can be can be alternative reality or fiction can be something that is that is that enable make tension between reality or the yeah if you can have some some fiction and the fiction work can work in a way in a way that is that can be kind of library to yeah, reality yeah that kind of way of thinking came to me after after Fukushima incident it was it was another big change happened to me and yeah the Fukushima incident gave me where were you of the day of the Fukushima incident when it happened then I was in my house with my family then my house was kind of suburban Tokyo so it was it's a bit interesting story the big earthquake happened it was my son's birthday so that's why I was in my house otherwise I would be different place because my company was supposed to show my piece in different city but I asked the technical directors to make my arrival day there a day later or two because I wanted to be my family then then the earthquake happened but it was good I could be with my family and the next day I joined my company it was local city and then it was it was on the television in the dressing room in the theater we watched the explosion of the nuclear power plant in a way perhaps for the world something maybe not on the scale of the nuclear explosion but right now what is happening is this kind of global disaster so I know you then went on with your work and the play was selected for the theater in Berlin did you bring your experiences your sensitivities from that time of disaster and the time of death experience as the virus is among us everywhere in every community it is we cannot pretend it's not it's almost like radioactive emissions did you bring that to your work in Munich tell us a little bit about the work you did there and if you felt that there is something that formed you that also became part of the tools yeah I made four pieces in Munich and Kammerspiele so almost all of four productions had a subject which that relates to problematic situation in Japan yeah yeah okay the one thing is precarious labor situation the next one is the labor situation work and labor working situation and the next one is how how economic situation in Japan was going south since yeah since decades yes or the next one is Japanese people Japanese people's tendency who are not interested in having sex but my latest one is the subject of it's called hikikomori hikikomori means there are people who are withdrawing in a house they are not interacting with society which is of course an interesting subject and I wanted to bring that up there's also the play of Yuzhi Sakati on the attic young people also who do not leave the house and what it means to the mind but right now at least in Europe and in the US people cannot leave their house tell us a little bit about that work what you do and what you see what it means and what it stands for that people voluntarily already didn't leave their house but it had consequences for their lives hikikomori problem I think the biggest reason why there are so many people who are not connecting to society is because there are so many pressure in a society so in a society so once you fail or you confront with some very strong pressure so it it can discourage you so I totally I totally understand that so many people giving up they are giving up to keep the interaction with society so they are putting themselves into inside I remember your play and joy where you played with that idea that if you are 30 you don't have a steady job yet you are an outcast you have failed your life many of them go back to their homes don't have contact with the outside world somehow in a similar situation it is devastating to the mind but also a sign of a society where things perhaps are not handled do you have trust in your government at all as an artist tell us a little bit of you I don't as I mentioned they don't seem to take any responsibility so they don't propose any any practical idea by far for example the government they they recommend not to go out or weekends but they don't say anything about how about weekdays because they can't guarantee any money if they don't go to business on weekdays so even now even now in Tokyo there are many people packed in train it's terrible so I can trust you are really right somehow it seems like in China it's relaxing in the middle of it in Japan it hasn't fully arrived yet you wash your mask stay at home another tsunami it is already there it's a big question how do you keep yourself busy what do you read what do you watch what music do you listen to one is the original original text of no place say again original no text so you go back to read the 400 yeah to be inspired but I read some books for example one is it is shock doctrine and read by Naomi Klein it's in our perfect time to read it it's interesting and some Japanese philosophers book it was read more than 50 years before but it's what he was writing is still very critical it seems like what is he thinking about it's how the Japanese way Japanese society's way of making decisions is complicated or how they are good at avoiding to responsibility it's very complicated but it's still very working I can read it as what's happening now you said you do a lot of cooking what do you do what are your favorite things to do do you yeah a couple of days before very nice vegetables came to house it was coming from a very good farm it was a very organic way without any chemicals in very natural ways it was very good nowadays I'm cooking as simple as possible because vegetables come out and how do you stay in contact with your family are they safe where's your family almost all my mother she's living in Yokohama it's part of Tokyo now I'm not with her but I'm often contacting and she's still fine but she's already in her 70s usually when I'm working in Tokyo I'm staying at her place but if I'm going to Tokyo to work soon maybe I will have to find a place for me to stay this time I don't like to go to her place you don't want to bring anything so tell us at the end of our time for young artists, young directors, writers what do you think they should do now what is the thing to do at the moment I'm excited in a way these days because now it's a good chance to find a new way to find a new theater for me as I mentioned, theater is the way to produce some fiction and put that way of putting some fiction on some physical space on some materiality usually the theater can be done in theater but I believe that kind of frame of thought about theater can be realized in a different way from the ordinary way of theater now I'd like to think like this hard I want to find some new way of outputting the theater and if I can have something to tell young artists I recommend them to think like this and find something new as Brecht said new times do need new forms of theater without changing something you have to come up with something new and this is a time I found what Brecht said 100% right thank you so much for staying up so late it must already be 2 o'clock in Japan and the ghosts which for sure exist come and visit you or might be around you now they might have been listening to the talk and maybe gave you a good idea this brings an end to our very first week here on the Seagal Talks we would love to thank Hal Round for being such a generous and great host and for doing this my Seagal team and the great Jackie to help us out here we will have a week we will have people from Egypt Germany again we will have Meredith Monk with us from Burkina Faso so really taking a view around the world so please do stay tuned we had listeners from 17 countries we hear so much from politicians at the moment medical doctors they are very distinct to listen here from artists which is very important they also have a voice and a very significant one as you have been early warners so thank you also to all of our listeners out there I know times are complicated difficult and also everybody is very busy so much is going on online so it's a big honor for us to have our Max initiative tricklabnyc.org one of the many many ideas there are many many others and we will have a whole week dedicated also to New York artists coming up so again thank you so much and Toshiki sleep well and trust everything will go well and right rehearsals might add something that was not there before will be interesting to see and if something that might also change your way of working that you said there was something in there nobody knows yet what is about to come and so this makes it for interesting times so good night to Toshiki and thank you to all our listeners and we all hope to see you on Monday go to seagullcenter.org for the updated programming or to a whole round thank you very much