Kabuki

by Zoë Kincaid

When Nizaemon, the seventh, was acting in Osaka and Kyoto, the star of Yedo during the corresponding period of Bunka and Bunsei was the third Bando Hikosaburo, youngest son of the eighth Ichimura Uzaemon. In later years he shaved his head, retired from the world, and lived in Honjo, a Yedo ward, where he posted up a notice on the gate to the effect that waste-paper dealers and actors were not allowed in. He was handsome and gifted, and died at the age of 75. Acting with him was the fifth Matsumoto Koshiro, son of the fourth. The fifth Koshiro had a very large nose and his eyes were close together, two facial defects the print artists were fond of depicting, so that this Yedo actor is easily picked out in the pictures illustrating the theatre of this time. His daughter married the seventh Danjuro, but was divorced and became a nun, and lived at Ikegami near the Nichiren temple, not far from modern Tokyo.

Also, about this time there was Onoe Kikugoro, the third. He was a specialist in sewamono, or plays of everyday life, and established traditions that are being carried on by his descendants to-day. His wife O-Kiku was the daughter of an actor, and he had three sons and two daughters, but the sons died in youth. Koshiro’s daughters both married actors, one to Ichimura Uzaemon the twelfth, and the other to the fourth Kikugoro. His grandson by Uzaemon was the fifth Onoe Kikugoro, the rival of Ichikawa Danjuro, the ninth—the two great stars of the Meiji era. His great-grandson is Kikugoro, the sixth, one of the most energetic actors of the contemporary Tokyo stage.

At one time the third Kikugoro thought he would try what it felt like to be a plain citizen of Yedo. He opened a mochiya, or cake shop dealing in a favourite refreshment of his day, as it still remains of Tokyo people—steamed and pounded rice moulded into mound shapes, and prepared in various ways. He hung out a shop sign, in shape sexagonal, lacquered in red, and adorned with a gold design of grasses and written characters signifying Mochiya Kikuju, or the Chrysanthemum-Long-Life-Mochi shop. It was not true to its name. Inside the place there were costly art objects, and rare dwarf plants, while a mechanical toy, a Chinese boy, moved by a special device, came to meet the guests as they entered, and brought them tea and cake.

Of course, Kikugoro was the object of the visitor’s interest, and the matter of cakes was of much less importance. The actor would sweep the garden and talk with the visitors, but one day he suddenly tired of the whole scheme, after some customers had purchased a particularly small amount of his cakes. Kikugoro is said to have exclaimed: “They have seen my beautiful garden and listened to my compliments, and paid only 64 mon for cakes, so I’ll go back to the stage.” Perhaps he was hankering after it anyway, and made this an excuse.

From the latter part of Bunka and Bunsei to Kaei, or from 1804 to 1848, the great actor of Yedo was the seventh Danjuro, grandson of the fifth, the sixth having died young. He went on the stage at the age of four, and when he started to cry, a convenient substitute was hurried up. At the age of 17 he succeeded to the ancestral name. At the age of 42, he was exiled by the Governor of Yedo because of extravagance on the stage, since he had used real armour, and the stage setting for one of his plays had been an exact reproduction of the interior of a mansion of the aristocracy. Forbidden to come within a ten ri radius of the town, it meant that the Yedo stage was not to know him for many a year.

He was small, and had large eyes, and was very similar to his son, the ninth Danjuro, whose memory is cherished by many Tokyo playgoers to-day. Like all the members of his family, he showed a special leaning towards aragoto, and added to the family plays by adapting the Nō drama to Kabuki. He is said to have combined the strong points of the third, fourth, and fifth in this actor line, and had literary talent, composed poems, and wrote a diary called Tokumiyemasu, I Can See Afar.

He took unto himself three wives and three concubines. His first wife was the daughter of the fifth Matsumoto Koshiro. She had been the wife of Sawamura Sojuro, had married again, and her third venture was to marry the seventh Danjuro, but this union did not last long, and they were divorced. Danjuro, who was very courageous, married another daughter of Koshiro, divorce separating them again, due this time to disputes between Danjuro and Koshiro. For his third wife he picked out the daughter of a theatre tea-house proprietor. He had seven sons and five daughters. There was, therefore, every reason to believe that the Ichikawa clan would survive for years to come. The fate of the family was otherwise, for not only is there no Ichikawa Danjuro at present, but the sole blood link as representative to carry on this family is the little granddaughter of Danjuro, the ninth.

The seventh Danjuro was famous for his extravagance. His residence was more beautiful than that of a daimyo, and no doubt the Yedo authorities, ever alert to suppress luxury among the people, were ready to pounce upon him, using some pretext or other in order to hold him up as an example to be avoided.

When he was obliged to go into exile his eldest son had the responsibility of carrying on the affairs of the Ichikawa family in Yedo, and succeeded as Ichikawa Danjuro, the eighth. He gave every sign of great promise, but because of family and professional troubles committed suicide in Osaka.

The fifth son of the seventh Danjuro inherited the headship of the family after the tragic death of the young actor who had been called Ichikawa Danjuro, the eighth, for such a short time. Ichikawa Danjuro, the ninth, became the most famous actor of this line, and he brings us down to modern times. Danjuro, the seventh, had a number of followers who distinguished themselves. Among them were: Ichikawa Kodanji, the third; Ichikawa Monosuke, the fifth; and Ichikawa Danzo, the fifth.