Nakamura Hichisaburo was exactly the opposite to Ichikawa Danjuro in his stage methods. He belonged to Sakata Tojuro’s real school, and was quiet and restrained on the boards. Danjuro was bold and exaggerated, Hichisaburo effeminate and mild. They represented the two currents of the popular mind during Genroku. Danjuro was not altogether welcome in Kyoto and Osaka, Tojuro’s stronghold, where his style was not wholly appreciated, although he was acknowledged to be a great actor. Hichisaburo, on the contrary, met with great success on the stages of these towns.
He was a handsome man, and the criticism of the time acknowledged his dignity of manner. Unlike Danjuro, he did not startle with the strength of his militaristic actions, which caused him in some quarters to be regarded as slow. But this was according to Yedo critics, who had grown accustomed to Danjuro’s striking efforts. In Kyoto, it was contended that Hichisaburo was not good as a fighter, but one critic declared that he was like patent medicine, good for everything.
Hichisaburo’s manner on the stage was similar to Tojuro’s, yet the stars of Kyoto appeared to tower above him. As a lover he was very popular, and delighted in mixing Yedo slang with his stage lines, and knew how to reach his audiences. It is said of him that he was good in pathetic rôles and “could bring tears to the eyes of a demon”. Moreover, he was a good dancer, which was probably due to the fact that he was entirely familiar with the Nō stage. Some years younger than Danjuro, he married the daughter of the second Nakamura Kansaburo, and probably took the name of Nakamura from this family.
Like most of the actors of this early period he wrote his own plays, the most successful of which was Asamagatake, or Mount Asama. Although Hichisaburo was a Yedo actor, he spent much of his time in Kyoto and Osaka.
The most prominent actor who imitated Hichisaburo was Ikushima Shingoro. Hichisaburo was taken ill on the stage while playing Juro, one of the brothers in the Soga revenge, his favourite rôle.
After Danjuro and Hichisaburo, the most distinguished actor of this time was Nakamura Denkuro, who died in 1716. He was of more aristocratic theatre lineage than the two prominent Yedo actors above, for he was no less a personage than the grandson of Saruwaka Kansaburo. The first Kansaburo had three sons: the first was the child of a concubine and did not inherit; the second son, who accompanied Kansaburo to Kyoto and danced before the Emperor, succeeded as second of the line, taking the name Akashi, which he was given at the time of this performance in Kyoto. He left his name to his younger brother, who became the third head of the family.
The son by the concubine was blessed with two sons, and one of them was no other than Nakamura Denkuro, who exercised considerable influence upon Yedo Kabuki, establishing traditions that have been handed down to modern times. Denkuro’s father, perhaps because of his illegitimacy, never appeared as an actor, but was engaged as an accountant of the Nakamura-za all his life. Nevertheless, it was his son who inherited the theatre genius that might have been expected to appear in the first Kansaburo’s legitimate offspring.
The rôle of Asahina, an historical character, at the Nakamura-za made Nakamura Denkuro famous, and the manner in which he painted his face with broad red lines and the style, colour, and design of his costume have served as a model for all succeeding actors who have essayed this popular rôle. Asahina was a bold warrior of the time when Yoritomo ruled by the sword in Kamakura. Denkuro used Asahina’s crest to decorate his stage costume, a crane in a circle, and it has always been preserved, Asahina not being considered by audiences or actors as the real thing unless faithful to all the details of Denkuro’s grotesque creation.
And it is by these traditions that the modern Tokyo actors link this old past with the bustling, strenuous modern days, for a veteran of the Kabuki-za in Tokyo succeeded to this illustrious stage name a few years ago, and to celebrate the auspicious occasion appeared in all the startling array of colours, unearthly red make-up, and exaggerated gestures and postures of his Yedo predecessor.
On account of chronic illness Denkuro was obliged to withdraw from the stage at the height of his career, and could only return to say a few words on the introduction ceremony of the second Hichisaburo, who was a child-actor when he took the name Nakamura Hichisaburo had made so famous. Denkuro had been closely associated with the first Hichisaburo, hence his interest in his youthful successor.