All the World's a Stage ... Even in Japan!

Hiroyasu Yamaura. Photo by Brett Homenick.

Yesterday (Monday, February 12), I attended a special performance written by and co-starring Hiroyasu Yamaura. It'd been quite a while since Yamaura-san's last performance, so it was a wonderful opportunity to visit with him again.

Hiroyasu Yamaura. Photo by Brett Homenick

The play's title could be translated as "Counseling Macbeth and His Wife," which, I'm sure you can guess, is based on the Shakespeare play. In this version, King Macbeth and Lady Macbeth visit a psychosomatic clinic to deal with their various issues.

Hiroyasu Yamaura. Photo by Brett Homenick

In a funny twist, the counselor was played by Yamaura-san himself. It's always a lot of fun seeing Yamaura-san act in the plays he writes, and this time he's basically onstage the whole time.

Hiroyasu Yamaura. Photo by Brett Homenick

The staging was quite intriguing. The actors were always facing the audience, yet they were supposed to be speaking face to face. Obviously, you can't have an actor with his or her back to the audience when delivering lines, so I thought this was a clever workaround. So long as you bring your suspension of disbelief, it's not that distracting.

When I entered the venue, Yamaura-san, who was already seated onstage from which he would perform, got up and approached me to shake my hand. Naturally, when he offered me his hand, I stood up to shake it I'd already told Yamaura-san about my plans for March. Since the show was still being set up at the time, he didn't have much time to chat, but thankfully there would be ample time afterward.

Yamaura-san ended his performance by quoting Shakespeare's famous line, "All the world's a stage," in Japanese. After the show, Yamaura-san asked me how to say the line in English, which I told him. 

I asked Yamaura-san to sign some postcards from the Godzilla Store with a lobby card design. He was a bit curious and asked me about them. He was surprised to see that they were just postcards and to hear how cheap they were. They certainly do look impressive!

Yamaura-san informed me of the sad reason he took a break from doing these shows, which was depressing to hear. But he pointed out that he still has many friends in his social circle and that writing still gives him purpose. I was overjoyed to see Yamaura-san doing well and doing what he loves.

Many thanks to Yamaura-san for spending those precious moments with me after the performance!