THE THEATRE.
" '1Hei TOILS OF YOSHITOMO : A TRAGEDY OF ANCIENT JAPAN," BY TORAIIIKO- KORI, AT THE LITTLE THEATRE.
WHAT a pleasure it is to go to the theatre and see a real play, a play which offers scope to actors and producer, a play which has the material of a real work of art. The Toils of Yoshitomo is such a play and those responsible may be congratulated on their enterprise in putting it on at the Little Theatre. Although it deals with twelfth-century Japan and is by a Japanese, it is wholly in the European dramatic tradition. Mr. Torahiko Kori, who has had the assistance in the English version of Miss Hester Sainsbury, has not attempted to do more than write a tragedy which any Englishman might have written, using certain material from Japanese history. There is no touch of specifically Japan- ese technique, there is not even a phrase or an idea that sounds more strangely in our ears than does the language of the charac. tars in Shakespeare's Richard II. or King John, so that we can judge the play from exactly the same standpoint as we would judge an historical tragedy by any living English author.
From this point of view it must be said that the author has been first and foremost a competent craftsman. He has had a story to tell, an episode from Japanese history to present, and he has presented it lucidly and step by step, so as to achieve a strong cumulative effect. The story is a simple one. The ex-Emperor Sntoko attempts to regain the throne by force from the Emperor Go-Shirakawa. He appoints his old general, Tameyoshi, who has been living in retirement, as the commander of his forces. Tameyoshi's son, Yoshitomo, is the commander of the army of the other Emperor, Sutoko, and by his oath of loyalty is compelled to fight against his father and his five brothers, whom he dearly loves. He defeats his father's forces, and all his brothers, save one, are killed. He is ordered to put to death his remaining brother, which he does, and then his father. At this last command he rebels, but his father, learning of this, kills himself, and the play ends with an epilogue at the place of execution, in which Yoshitomo, to the accom- paniment of thunder and lightning (extremely well done), with his dead father's head stuck upon a pole, fulminates against the folly and cruelty of the world :-
" Men's heads are too heavy on their shoulders, head. that are but casks of this world's nonsense, After all—
Best carried under arm—eh ? "
It is a genuinely tragic situation, and a situation which is in no way foreign to our sympathy. We can understand the loyalty which made the tragedy—conditions being what they were— inevitable and we do not know which is the more admirable, Yoshitomo in his strength or in his weakness.
Where the play falls short is not in its plot, its skeleton, but in its body. It never rises to poetry, its language is sincere, vivid even, but it never has that beauty, that illuminating, imaginative magio of the great tragic writers. Within its compass, however, it is a sincere and moving piece of work.
The production, under the direction of Miss Edith Craig, was excellent. The scenes were executed by L Makawa and Mks Mudie-Cook, from designs by the author. They were uncom- monly beautiful, as were the dresses, which also were designed by the author and executed by Miss Hester Sainsbury. In fact, it is a long time since Londoners have had an opportunity of seeing a play dressed and set in so admirable a harmony. Everything on the stage was right.
The acting was not quite on the same level, with one or two exceptions. As the aged Tameyoshi, whose intrepidity of soul still rang in his voice, Mr. J. Fisher White could hardly have been bettered. Mr. Milton Roamer also gave a fine performance as Yoshitomo. Chiyaha, daughter of Tameyoshi, is not a part that suits Miss Muriel Pratt, who was quite unconvincing, but Mile Sophie Lewis was good as the young Yositimo. Of the others, Mr. Frank Vosper (Masakiyo), Mr. Kenneth Kent (Taminaka) and Mr. George Skillan—good as Tametomo, curiously bad as Norinaga—were the best.
As is usual in the English theatre a number of the minor parts could do with a great deal more attention to detail. The Toils of Yoshitomo is the sort of play which will gain immensely by polishing. Everything should be finished to the last possible degree. For example, Mr. George Skillan should be taught how to open and close a fan, his exhibition of this as the courtier Norinaga was pitiful. Then all the characters should bo put through a daily drill until they can sit down in the Japanese fashion, not merely without clumsiness but beautifully. These are the points that tell. The whole play should be a delight to our senses and it only wants that last extra turn at the grindstone to bring this about. Here, of course, we feel the lack of that freedom from commercial necessity which alone can give artists the time to produce this final beauty, which it is given only to a. few to imagine, but which when produced many can enjoy. It is only in a theatre freed from the dreessity of winning immediate popular favour that such perfection can be attained, for perfection pays only in the long run; it needs time to make itself felt. Let us hope that Londoners will flock in sufficient numbers to the Little Theatre to enable this company to perfect itself in The Toils of Yoshitomo and then to follow it with something equally interesting.
W. J. TURNER.
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