ENGEKIKAI (Nos. 6 and 7: June and July 2020): COVER AND CONTENTS

Kabuki Woogie is devoted to a variety of kabuki-related subjects. It began with a series of essays, including photos and videos, of a research trip to Japan in 2010, subsequently added my 25-chapter history of the first Kabuki-za, and then began a series of covers of and selected photos from Japanese books about kabuki from my collection. 

Kabuki Woogie also posts monthly covers of the kabuki magazine ENGEKIKAI, as here, with details on their contents, and, when available, essays by guest contributors, including papers delivered at conferences and the like.

One can poke around in its archives to find past posts.

Ichikawa Ebizō XI. Photo: Shinoyama Kishin.

Kabuki Woogie is happy to return to posting cover images of Engekikai, the monthly kabuki magazine of record. Sadly, as might have been expected, Engekikai was unable to continue publishing on a monthly basis because of Covid-19, which, as elsewhere, either completely put theatre production on hold or allowed performances only under very limited circumstances. Thus, we see here an issue covering two months, not one: June and July (#6 and #7). This was mailed to me from Tokyo the first week in August but arrived about two weeks ago. Apparently, mail like this has to go through rigorous custom procedures necessitated by the pandemic. A second issue, for August and September, arrived in the same package and will be revealed here in another week or so.

The near-cessation of live kabuki performance led the editors to change their standard policy of multiple articles and interviews related to recent activity, supplemented by exquisite pictures of the previous month’s performances, to a brief piece about the actor Ichikawa Ebizō XI . This is followed, under the title “Kabuki Haiyū kara Minasama e” (“From the Kabuki Actors to Everyone”), by a list of all practicing kabuki actors, followed by an album of brilliant photos focusing on each of them. The back matter, however, contains the usual valuable data and news about kabuki during these stressful times, but also includes leading actor Matsumoto Kōshirō’s running series “Kōshirō’s Thousand and One Nights” and a detailed overview of a famous play, in this case Gotaiheiki Shiraishi Banashi.

The cover picture shows Ebizō, the extremely popular star who was set to ascend to the name Ichikawa Danjūrō XIII (his father was Danjūrō XII and his grandfather, Danjūrō XII) this past spring. Danjūrō is  kabuki’s most prestigious name, but, because of the pandemic, the three months scheduled to celebrate the name-taking with ceremonies and performances had to be indefinitely postponed.  Here is the handsome Ebizō in one of his line’s greatest roles, Sukeroku, from Sukeroku Yukari Edo no Sakura.