A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM Presented by THE NINAGAWA COMPANY at the PAVILIONS, Plymouth, England 20-22 July 1995 and

on tour. Directed by Yukio Ninagawa. Scenery by Tsukasa Nakagoshi. Costumes by Lily Komine. Lighting by Tamotsu Harada. Sound by Masahiro Inoue. Music by Ryudo Uzaki. Music arranged by Akira Sekiya. Boy soprano Hajime Kikuchi. Choreography by Kiyomi Maeda and Suketaro Hanayagi. With Tetsuro Sagawa (Theseus/Oberon), Kayoko Shiraishi (Hippolyta/Titania), Yoji Matsuda (Philostrate), Kazuhisa Seshimo (Egeus), Miho Tsumiki (Hermia), Keita Oishi (Lysander), Takao Osawa (Demetrius), Hiroko Yamashita (Helena), Kenichi Ishii (Peter Quince), Ofuji (Snug), Goro Daimon (Nick Bottom), Atsushi Fukazawa (Francis Flute), Masafumi Seno (Tom Snout), Tadashi Okada (Robin Starveling), Yung-bieu Lin/Yoji Matsuda (Puck), Shigeru Shibuya (Peaseblossom), Takuya Miyawaki (Cobweb), Mari Suzuki (Moth), Masahiro Kazama (Mustardseed), Elichi Seike and Kaoru Ota (fairies). By Stephen J. Phillips Yukio Ninagawa's reputation precedes him. Audiences have come to anticipate a visually stunning production, an arresting marriage of image and sound, an imaginative realisation of an Occidental text in Oriental terms drawing on both theatrical traditions. Reputations can be hard to live up to and sceptics are always looking for flaws. This production of A Midsummer Night's Dream has its share of the latter. Some of the music and visual effects become repetitive; it would now be easy to parody the Ninagawa style. Sand falls from the flies to create the wood near Athens too often; it's noisy and drowns the actors' voices - eventually it leaves a cloud of dust that is a visual distraction. The falling roses work once but not twice. Sceptics in the audience may well begin to conclude the director has one or two good ideas but little more to offer here. However, the production also has those strengths which Ninagawa's reputation is justly built upon. Memorable images engineered by the director combine with the energy of the actors to cross the language barrier and hold the audience who responded with a standing ovation. Ninagawa sets his Dream in a Japanese stone-and-sand garden - a symbol of the Buddhist view of the world - modelled on the famous stone garden of Ryoani. The programme tells us this 'would carry the same kind of cultural overtones and resonance for a Japanese audience as Shakespeare's "globe" would for a British one'. A Western audience unfamiliar with the cultural values Ninagawa is drawing on will be heavily dependent upon such notes but without them his use of imagery from Japanese Buddhism would be lost on us. There is, however, a danger of their creating a slightly artificial experience. We are told that the falling sand that symbolises the wood recalls 'the spider's web extended by Buddha from heaven to help people up' and that 'falling roses will always suggest to an oriental mind the impression of the Buddhist cosmos full of floating lotus petals'. I once asked a young Japanese student whether the average cinema audience in Japan would notice the use of Noh theatre conventions and allusions to Buddhism in Kurosawa's Shakespeare films. She replied

'Only old people and foreigners are interested in traditional Japanese culture'. Westerners are never going to see Ninagawa's Shakespeare productions through Japanese eyes but that does not mean that we cannot find them an illuminating and moving addition to the performance tradition of the plays. Bottom in an apron stir-fries noodles and his fellow-actors bring edible and drinkable contributions to their first rehearsal, arriving on bicycles and scooters to the sound of heavy urban traffic. Their basic good fellowship contrasts sharply with Oberon and Titania (roles doubled with Theseus and Hippolyta) who are in the middle of a bitter domestic standoff where anger has driven all dignity out of the rulers of fairyland. There is a real sense of the frightening nature of a wood at night full of strange sounds as the 'rude mechanicals' come on-stage with their lanterns one by one, scaring each other out of their skins. Puck is played by a Chinese opera performer whose acrobatics astound while his words are spoken by a Japanese actor just offstage, who also takes the role of Philostrate, creating an eerie sense of the otherwordly nature of Oberon's lieutenant. The moment at which his companions realise that Bottom has been 'translated' and flee is played in exaggerated slow motion which not only demonstrates the actors' superb mime skills but also makes the disorienting effects of terror palpable. When Bottom is enticed up-stage by a decidedly nyphomanic Titania and her entourage one is given a sense of the dangers as well as the delights of fairyland. Unlike Jan Kott, Ninagawa is not alert only to the darker side of the play. His lovers may be extreme in their passions - and he is well served by his young performers here who are as brash and bitchy as could be desired - but their experiences serve to mature them and deepen their ability to love. Even Bottom is not left unaffected by his encounter with another world. An unforgettable expression of pleasure lights up Goro Daimon's face as he tries to recall his 'most rare vision'. For me the greatest surprise was how well The Tragedy of Pyramus and Thisbe worked. It is usually the low point of contemporary British productions where the director and his actors stuff in as many gimmicks as possible to make the audience laugh at material that has become unfunny. The Japanese actors, however, have a set of conventions they can meaningfully parody. Traditional Japanese theatre has seen female roles taken by men but British audiences now only associate transvestite playing with pantomime. Atsushi Fukazawa's Flute relished every opportunity the role of Thisbe gave him as a female impersonator, carefully made-up and dressed in a striking kimono. Shakespeare's play here translated perfectly into a Japanese context as Western audiences accept that Oriental theatre has a degree of stylisation long absent from their own dramatic tradition. The result was genuinely funny. Peter Quince kept an anxiously deferential eye on his mocking patrons while trying to bring his star-struck cast to order. Snug was played by Ofuji, a former professional Sumo wrestler, and the lion became a magnificent dragon. With its references to Buddhism this production reminds us of the painful transience of all human life. Oberon's blessing of the couples at the end of the play is all the more poignant for this. Puck extinguishes the candles that have illuminated Theseus' wedding feast as he speaks the epilogue. The sand begins to fall again as he gives a final display of his acrobatic skills. The sounds of modern city traffic rise - a reminder of a world that has forgotten how to dream and is denying itself the spiritual refreshment that can come in such rare visions.