Asian Theatre Journal 1.1 (2002) 250-252 

Concerned Theatre Japan: The Graphic Art of the Japanese Theatre, 1960-1980 (CD-ROM). By David G. Goodman. Krannert Museum and Kinkead Pavilion. Champaign: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1998. $34.

Tokyo of the 1960s and 1970s is David G. Goodman's Paris, his "moveable feast." Experiencing Goodman's CD-ROM, Concerned Theatre Japan: The Graphic Art of the Japanese Theatre, 1960-1980, is like dining with him and being well satisfied. I suspect that many theatre scholars have been either too busy or too entrenched in traditional methods to make better use of new electronic media in teaching and in presenting their research, especially in light of what may be the most attractive and effective way to convey information for the use of students and other scholars. Goodman presents a shining example of what to emulate and build upon. He and his digital team have created a beautifully graphic and informative digital record, a work of art in its own right that will provide others with not only an excellent reference work but a tool for the expanded classroom experience.

Seven years in the making, this CD-ROM--inspired by the short-lived but memorable journal Concerned Theatre Japan, which Goodman founded and edited--features a collection of more than seventy posters documenting modern Japanese theatre of the 1960s and 1970s. These posters were a component of the touring exhibition of the same name as the CD, originally mounted at the Krannert Museum of the University of Illinois during the winter of 1998. The works represent modern Japanese art itself: visually stunning designs indicative of the zeitgeist of postwar Japan and issues of postmodernity. In these iconic posters, images of pop culture, rock music, consumerism, Japanese history, and American political and commercial hegemony--as well [End Page 250] as advertising strategies, obsessions with the West, and the essential loss of Japanese spiritual identity--are all woven into stunning tapestries of paper and ink. Concerned Theatre Japan as an interactive CD-ROM continues Goodman's work on documentation and analysis of this period with layered images, video clips, text, essays, and a lavish virtual museum of poster art of the Japanese underground theatre (angura).

The experience of entering this CD-ROM is quite dramatic. That is to say, it embodies the hushed excitement and expectation of attending the theatre. A deep black frame fades into a textural brown that opens elegantly, with bold taiko (drums), a woman singing "I fell in love with a man with no chin," and her stage whisper: "cheezu o hitosara (a plate of cheese)." Then comes a stentorian silence. With a wave of the cursor, the left-hand contents unscroll.

The obvious first choice seems to be to click onto an overview of the period. The viewer learns that the 1960s in Japan was a time of unprecedented theatrical renaissance. At the cutting edge of the avant-garde was angura, rebellious spawn of the shogekijo (little theatre movement) and gutai (artistic forerunner of American "happenings"). It was a time of remarkable collaboration. Members of Suzuki Tadashi, Betsuyaku Minoru, and Ono Hiroshi's Waseda Little Theatre; Satoh Makoto, Kushida Kazuyoshi, and Saito Ren's Black Tent and Freedom Theatres; Kara Juro's Situation Theatre; Terayama Shuji's Tenjo Sajiki; Maro Akaji's Dairakudakan--all shared their political and artistic aspirations in close camaraderie with graphic designers Yokoo Tadanori, Tomita Shin'ichiro, Kushida Mitsuhiro, Hirano Koga, Oyobe Katsuhiro, Uno Akira, and others. Although the posters had little marketing effect for the productions they advertised, they were performances in themselves--stunning montages of alternating social imagery and historical moment, East and West, eroticism and the agonized flailings of the impotent. Their posters are alive with color, text (as in newspaper ads), and movement. There is no shying away from the grotesque, masochistic, and misogynistic themes of the art and the theatre of the period.

After years of subversive social exploration, Japanese theatre groups were ideologically dismayed when large new corporate-sponsored venues (such as the Seibu Corporation's Parco Theatre in 1973) created a demand for a good supply of nonoffensive shows--effectively co-opting the avant-garde movement. Because of the general success of such new theatres and the commercialization of Japanese society, theatre of the 1970s split into the wordy and the wordless: commercial entertainment acting as comic voice and ankoku buto (dance of utter darkness) as silent depth. By the mid-1970s, violence fomented by leftist radicals had alienated both artists and patrons of the political avant-garde. Posters became correspondingly less issue-oriented and more in thrall to the direct commercial success of the productions they advertised and the economic realities of cheaper lithography methods.

The avant-garde emitted its death wail in Hirano Koga's poster for Black Tent Theatre's Buranki-Goroshi Shanghai no Haru (The Killing of Blanqui, Spring in Shanghai, 1979). Across the top was the slogan: "Theatre, don't die! We need you!" Despite extraordinary effort and energy following the 1960 AMPO defeat, disillusionment was, once again, the watchword for this [End Page 251] period's theatre. From the ashes rose artists who went on to fuel the postmodern energies of the years from the 1980s through today.

In this CD-ROM's contents menu one encounters a brief introduction that allows a rare glance at Concerned Theatre Japan's eight covers from 1969 to 1973. This was a wondrous and difficult venture into creating Japan's first and only English-language Japanese theatre journal. It is followed by the requisite policy statement regarding Japanese name order. Next come acknowledgments, an overview of the period, and portals to the troupes, the posters, a timeline (1960-1983), and actor, playwright, and graphic artist biographies. Further down the list of contents, one may click onto two essays: one, by Imai Yoshihiro, on the history of Japanese theatre posters (dating from 1860, the year lithography was first introduced to Japan); and a six-poster commentary by Thomas G. Kovacs. There are excerpts of three plays: Zo (The Elephant, 1962) by Betsuyaku Minoru; A: no Kojiki from John Silver: The Beggar of Love (1970) by Kara Juro; and Ismene (1966) by Satoh Makoto. After that come indexes of Images, Posters, Text, and Video for quick referral outside the main body of the information. Finally, there are credits and a useful bibliography.

Sporadic and well-selected video clips are judiciously included, which makes expert use of this electronic genre. (After all, if you only want to view text, why not simply read a book?) I was particularly drawn to the play excerpts, the buto work of Hijikata, and the historical footage of the erection of the Black Tent, shown to the soundtrack of The Dance of Angels Who Burn Their Own Wings (1971). The CD-ROM's maneuverability is user-friendly and satisfyingly interactive. One minor quibble is a slightly tight format that sometimes frustrates movement between portals of interest except through the table of contents (which then means having to scroll through to a given point). More hotlinks might have remedied this. Those who wish to see the works displayed, minus the technical goodies in tactile paper format, should obtain Goodman's highly readable Angura: Posters of the Japanese Avant-Garde (1999).

The proverb mitsugo no takashii hyaku made (the spirit of a three-year-old lasts a hundred years) applies here. This project, part of the burgeoning genre of e-books, points the way to an exciting future. For art lovers and theatre scholars, the vibrant poster art shown on this CD-ROM both documents and compels. For those who eagerly have sought supplements to the scripts found in Goodman's Japanese Drama and Culture in the 1960s (1988), this collection is a treasure trove.

To obtain a copy of Concerned Theatre Japan: The Graphic Art of the Japanese Theatre, 1960-1980 (CD-ROM), you must contact the Krannert Museum and Kinkead Pavilion, College of Fine and Applied Art, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 205 Kinkead Pavilion, 500 East Peabody Drive, Champaign, IL 61820. You may also call the museum at 217-244-0619 or e-mail mmckilli@uiuc.edu for more information.