Product Description
English commentary (by Paul M. Griffith) English menu, Region Code All, NTSC. Performed in 1994. 70 mins. Bando Tamasaburo V is in the kabuki world a legend. He is the greatest onnagata actor of his generation. Born in 1950 he has performed in the US, China and South Korea, and once collaborated with cellist Yo-Yo Ma, creating a dance to Bach's Cello Suite no 5. This series focuses on his incredible kabuki dances. Kyokanoko Musume Dajoji is based on the noh play Dojoji and was first performed in 1753. Perhaps this play contains ther greatest single dance in the kabuki repertoire, requiring the utmost skill of the performer. The drama is set at Dojoji Temple, which has just had a new bell installed. A young woman, Hanako, the disguised spirit of Kiyohime, arrives and offers to dance. She dances with a hat, then a hand towel, then with one after the other. The dance begins with the slow, ranbyoshi, 'mad rhythm', putting out her right foot which she slowly raises, which is followed by the kyu-no-mai or fast dance. She later depicts the life of a happy city girl, then after a costume change, portrays the different types of women found in the pleasure quarters. The highlight is the kudoki, when Kiyohime imagines being in the company of her lover, noted for its sensuality. In the end, the dance increases in tempo where she can reek her revenge on the priest she had believed had promised to marry her, by causing the bell to crash to the ground.
