Shingeki
Shingeki (literally “new theater”) is a word coined in late Meiji period Japan (1868–1912) referring to dramatic works and theater performance styles imported and adapted…
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Kubo, Sakae (1900–1958)
Kubo Sakae was a leading shingeki playwright prior to World War II, and a shingeki socialist hero afterward. His greatest dramatic work is the epic…
Matsui, Sumako (1886–1919)
Matsui Sumako was the first superstar shingeki actress in Japan’s modernist theater movement.
Kishida, Kunio (1890–1954)
Kishida Kunio is considered to be one of the founders of Japanese shingeki drama and one of the most important modern Japanese dramatists. Through his…
Hijikata, Yoshi (1898–1959)
A shingeki director and one of the most important early leaders of the modernist movement in Japanese theater, Hijikata Yoshi was the cofounder of the…
Shinkokugeki [New National Theater]
In response to the growth of shingeki, the actor Sawada Shōjirō developed a form of theater designed to appeal to the urban masses, especially in…
Abe Kōbō (1924–1993)
Abe Kōbō (1924–1993) was a pivotal shingeki playwright and director as Japanese contemporary theatre matured after World War II. Known also as a novelist, Abe…
Osanai, Kaoru (1881–1928)
Osanai Kaoru was a Japanese director, playwright, critic, teacher, theater manager, and translator. A key figure in the shingeki movement, Osanai is credited with moving…
Shimamura, Hōgetsu (1871–1918)
Shimamura, Hōgetsu was a shingeki theater director, playwright, translator, critic, and one of the faremost leaders of the modernist movement in Japanese theater in the…
Bungei Kyōkai
Launched in February 1906 out of a drama club of Waseda University students, Bungei Kyōkai was one of the two pioneering organizations of the modernist…
Ichikawa, Sadanji II (1880–1940)
Ichikawa, Sadanji was Japan’s most popular actor from the 1910s to the 1930s, and is unique in having contributed to the modernist movement in both…
Ichikawa, Ennosuke II (1888–1963)
Ichikawa Ennosuke II was a kabuki actor in the Meiji, Taishō, and Shōwa eras who collaborated with artists in the modern drama movement and was…
Shinpa
Shinpa, the shortened version of the Japanese word shinpageki, or new school drama, was an early Japanese attempt at reforming the theater along modernist lines.…
Soganoya, Gorō (1877–1948)
Soganoya, Gorō was a Japanese actor, director and playwright who created of a new genre of modern comedy called kigeki (also shinkigeki). He wrote around…
Mori, ōgai (1862–1922)
Mori ōgai served as a surgeon in the Japanese Imperial Army, and was a translator, novelist, dramatist, and literary theorist during the Meiji and Taisho…
Jiyū-gekijō [Free Theater]
Jiyū-gekijō [Free Theater], founded in 1909 by the director Osanai Kaoru (1881–1928) and kabuki actor Ichikawa Sadanji II (1880–1940), was established to produce contemporary realist…
Itō, Michio (1893–1961)
Itō Michio’s creative endeavors spanned dance, theatre, and film, just as his career spanned the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans, however, his life as a…
Shuji, Terayama (1935–1983)
Terayama Shūji was an avant-garde Japanese poet, playwright (for stage and radio), filmmaker, and photographer associated with New Wave cinema and underground theatre movements such…
Mishima, Yukio (1925–1970)
Mishima Yukio is the pen name of Kimitake Hiraoka. He was an acclaimed novelist, playwright, poet, and essayist. He was nominated three times for the…
Angura
Angura has been called the most effective fusion of art and politics from Japan’s turbulent years of social protest in the 1960s and 1970s. Angura…
Tanizaki Jun’ichirō (1886-1965)
Tanizaki Jun’ichirō (1886-1965) was a leading novelist, playwright and theorist of the Taishō and Shōwa eras. Although best known as a novelist, Tanizaki’s plays also…
Shōchiku Company Limited [松竹株式会社]
Shōchiku Company Limited [松竹株式会社] is a Japanese entertainment gaint that owns theaters, film studios, production companies for motion pictures and theater, real estate, and other…
Geijutsu-za
The first iteration of the Geijutsu-za (Art Theater) was founded in 1913 by the actors Shimamura Hōgetsu (1871–1918) and Matsui Sumako (1886–1919) after they were…
Kinoshita, Junji (1914–2006)
Kinoshita Junji was one of Japan’s foremost modern playwrights. His work consists of several plays based on Japanese folk tales and history, and often interrogates…
Mayama, Seika (1878–1948)
Mayama Seika was a novelist, historian, and one of the most prominent playwrights in Japan’s modernist theater movement.