These players appeared in what is called the Genroku age—the sixteen years from 1688 to 1703. But it also includes the years preceding and following, altogether a space of thirty years—a period of growth and expansion. It has been named the Japanese renaissance, and sometimes called the golden age of Japanese civilisation, and was a period of high achievement in literature and in art. Chikamatsu Monzaemon, Japan’s first dramatist, flourished in this period, and Ihara Saikaku wrote his criticisms of the actors.
Tojuro’s ancestors lived in the northern province of Echigo, and his father owned a Kyoto theatre. He is said to have been born in 1645, and died in 1709, and was the most representative actor of Osaka and Kyoto for the whole of the Genroku period. Tojuro was the star of the Miyako-Mandayu-za, of Kyoto, for many years. Chikamatsu Monzaemon wrote plays for him, before he turned his entire attention to composing pieces for the marionettes. Kaneko Kichizaemon, another playwright of the time, was closely associated with Tojuro, and has left many impressions of him in his book Jijinshu—or Collection of the Year’s Dust—little stories about actors, chiefly Tojuro. “All these stories came to my insignificant ears,” he writes, “therefore I call this book a collection of the year’s dust.”
Tojuro was a power in the transformation of Kabuki out of the chaotic state that followed the abolition of the Wakashu. He believed that art was long and time fleeting; he displayed broadmindedness toward his contemporaries, and did not criticise them. He was noble and refined in appearance, we are told, and had received a far better education than was the lot of most actors of his day. He had literary ability, and collaborated with his playwright friends in the composition of his plays, and wrote several dramas himself. Kaneko Kichizaburo writes that Tojuro learned to play the Nō drum from a Nō musician, so that he must have been familiar with the aristocratic stage, and the dignity and ceremonials of the Nō actors. His personal character was high, and he frowned upon the immorality of the actors, which was something that could hardly be avoided in such a loose and luxurious age. No record is left to tell of his wife and children. He had a sister whose son he adopted, but the son went to Yedo to live, and did not become an actor. His younger brother inherited his great name, yet only succeeded in imitating Tojuro, so that his talents stopped with himself and were not transmitted, as in the case of the Ichikawas of Yedo.
Many anecdotes have been handed down relating to Tojuro’s extravagance. He received a large salary, but was not at all frugal, and was accustomed to say to those who remonstrated with him about his wastefulness that in order to be a great actor it was necessary to be generous-minded and reckless. He never wore a dress that had been washed; his room was lighted by candles, not by the oil wick which was general in those days. Moreover, he did not subsist on rice and vegetables, the diet of most families, then as now, but lived like a daimyo, partaking of fish and fowl. Every day he drank a cup of the rarest tea, while he warmed his sake with costly charcoal, all in the lordly manner of a feudal magnate.
When actors repaired to his house for rehearsal, he received them seated on a beautiful silk cushion, with a gorgeous lacquered tobacco-box in front of him, and served his guests a sumptuous repast.
Once, when he played in Osaka, he ordered drinking water from Kyoto to be brought to him in casks, and his rice was selected grain by grain. When he was asked the reason for this extravagance, he replied that if his rice were not properly selected the grains might be mixed with grit and his teeth be ruined; and that if he drank Osaka water he might become ill, and in consequence be obliged to absent himself from the stage, to the great loss of his manager. It is suspected that Tojuro loved advertisement more than Kyoto water, and knew how to make himself talked about by the people of his day.
He was at his best when portraying tradespeople, and was more at ease in plebeian than in aristocratic rôles. His successful plays were those dealing with everyday life rather than historical pieces, which were the delight of Ichikawa Danjuro. Tojuro’s specialty was acting in plays dealing with the gay quarters, which pleased the people of the Genroku age immensely.
How he regarded the art of the actor may be judged from an extract taken from Kaneko Kichizaburo’s Sidelights on Tojuro: “When a poor man desires money he may be able to obtain it by stealing, or he may find it in the road, but with regard to acting nothing can be stolen. An actor who is ignorant of the fundamental principles is one who is destined never to excel.”
Kaneko tells another story to illustrate Tojuro’s attitude towards the art of acting. A certain actor who had a son 12 years of age wanted him to learn the art, but did not think it necessary for him to bother how to write or to know anything about figures. Tojuro hearing of this said:
“The art of an actor is like a beggar’s bag and must contain everything, whether it is important or not. If there is anything not wanted for immediate use keep it for a future occasion. An actor should even learn how to pick pockets.”