I Paid 4000 Yen to go to a Women's Department Store and Watch a Play Written for Five Year Old Girls, and it Made me Feel Like a Man.

I realized for the first time today that Brother's Grimm stories may be the only stories in existence where the main character is actually a MacGuffin.

Take Snow White. What real purpose does Snow White herself serve to the story? She doesn't really develop as a character. . . hell, she barely even acts as a character. The entire plot consists of the vaiorus reactions different people have to her existence-- the Queen, the Hunter, the Prince, the Dwarves-- without the character herself having to be at all active or interesting in any way. In other words, a MacGuffin.

So what brought on this little insight?

It starts with my insecurity about my Japanese language ability. I've been getting gradually better at picking apart the various sentences I hear from the various people I have encountered in Japan, but to a still fairly large extent I've sounded and acted like the typical dumb Gaijin. My anxieties came to a head yesterday. I decided to see if I could find the location where the musical play Snow White was being performed-- why I wanted to see the play, I'll get to in a moment. I found the location easily, but upon arriving, I realized that I might have some difficulty in obtaining tickets, due to my lingual deficiencies. So, I left, despondent.

That night, I felt terrible. I worried that I might have blown my only chance to reserve tickets to this play. I beleived, at the time, that this play might be the only chance I get to see Miyuu Sawai in person. That's right, Miyuu Sawai, former live action Sailor Moon, had the lead role in a stage adaptation of Snow White, one whose run just happened to correspond with my arrival in Japan. I decided that night that I must at least try to get tickets; melodramatic as it sounds, this was about more than meeting a former pseudo-Sentai star. . . it was about self-resepct.

So I went again today, this time (mostly) prepared: I brought a hairbrush (so that I would look presentable to ticket booth lady) and my Japanese books, so I could figure out how to ask for a reservation. I travelled to the famous Mistukoshi department store in Nihonbashi, the officially protected historical site wherein the theatre was located. I cracked open my books, took down notes, considered every possibile contingency-- the tickets are sold somewhere else, the tickets are sold out for the day, the tickets are sold out period-- and, fully prepared, went to the front desk to reserve my ticket.

In all, it took about two minutes. I paid 4000 yen for a ticket that very day. I spent the next hour and a half or so bombing around the department store and buying a 500 yen prepackaged nigiri lunch. . . which, as it will turn, was not the wisest use of my time, but more on that later. At 2 o'clock, I took my seat. Between then and beginning overture, the seats swelled with three-to-five year old girls and their mothers, along with a few older girls and boys. I was the only foreigner in the whole theatre. . . though interestingly, I was not the only adult male not accompanying children. At 2:30, the show began. . .

. . . Miyuu Sawai, centre stage, dancing with two professional ballerinas. A nice touch. . .

. . . The Queen. This actress, who appears to have operatic voice training, was so deliciously over-the-top that I thought she was going to steal the show. The ballerinas are now her evil minions. . .

. . . I kid you not, the voice of the magic mirror is a dead fucking for Zordon from Power Rangers. The octave, the voice enhancement effect-- it was dead on. I half expected the mirror to order Alpha to summon five teenagers with attitude. . .

. . . Miyuu Sawai and the Prince start singing. If you don't know already, Miyuu Sawai, as her character Usagi Tsukino, released two "character singles" to help promote Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon. Her singing in the play was quite a notch better. . .

. . .The Queen, spurned by the prince and consumed with jealosy, casts a spell on him which causes him to act like an instructor at the William Shatner school of stage fighting. . .

. . . I haven't really mentioned Sawai's performance yet, so I may as well now. Apart from the fact that she plays the least interesting "lead" character ever written, Sawai is, well, Sawai. That is, she displays a lot of the rather irritatingly forced mannerisms (unsubtle in all the wrong ways) while at the same time offering numerous glimpses of what she's truly capable of as an actress. . .

. . . JESUS FUCKING CHRIST THE DWARVES JUST BURST THORUGH THE SIDE DOOR AND NOW THEY'RE MARCHING THROUGH THE AISLES SINGING LOUDLY!! But seriously, it's The Fucking Dwarves who steal the show. Consisting of two men and five women, they are the comedic heart and soul of this play, mugging and pratfalling flawlessly. . .

. . . And thirty minute intermission. . .

. . . It turns out this "musical" consists of one song being repeated over and over again, and it's not a catchy song. . .

. . . Turns out princess can't cook worth a shit. I actually really liked that part. Must be the anti-royalist lefty in me, though the reaction from the always kickass dwarves really sold it. . .

. . . So we're an hour and a half in and Snow White still hasn't been poisoned. . .

. . . Oh, wait, Snow white was poisoned, Prince was broken out of prison, Prince somehow found Snow White in the middle of the woods, Queen somehow found him in the middle of the woods, big fight, Queen was killed when Prince fired Hunter's bow, kiss, wake up, lovey love love, but wait, Snow White can't leave the dwarves behind but the Prince understands. . . all in about the last ten minutes of the play. . .

That's curtain. Miyuu Sawai and the Prince bow, then the Dwarves bow, then the Queen and Hunter and others all bow, and show's over.

OR IS IT?

. . . Before I go on, there's something I have to confess. You're gonna hate me for it, nearly as much as I hate myself for it.

I didn't bring my camera.

It would be one thing if I simply forgot. But no, I made a deliberate decision not to bring my camera. I wasn't even sure that I would get to see the play at all, let alone that very day. And I was certain that whenever I did get to see the play, I wouldn't be allowed to take photos, nor would there be any photography of the actors taking place. So, I decided that it wouldn't be worth the hassle to bring the camera.

By the end of the play, this seemed like it had been a wise decision. The curtain down, the lights came on, and everybody filed out the door. But, as the audience made their way down the main hall, we were stopped by one of the theatre employees.

"Oh no," I thought. "You're not. . . Don't tell me. . . No, no, you short bald Japanese man, don't do this to me! Don't--"

And then it happened. Miyuu Sawai, the prince, and five of the seven dwarves all filed out of the same exit the audience had taken and lined up against the wall to pose for photos. Children lined up all the way back into the fucking theatre, waiting for their chance to pose with the characters of the play, while I stood just across from them, not ten feet away from the live action Sailor Moon herself.

Fuck me.

I seriously debated whether or not to stay. The line up, mostly kids and moms with a few scattered teenage girls and adult men, was pretty damn long. Plus, I was not, shall we say, exactly the target demographic of this enterprise. Eventually, sheer economic considerations won out-- I paid 4000 yen for this, I may as well get the whole experience, camera or not.

Thus, when the last of this kids passed through, I walked up to the first dwarf. She stood up (they had all been kneeling down for the kids up till this point) took my hand, and said "Arigato Gozaimasu". . . followed by "Ooki!", i.e. "Big!" I replied with my own "Arigato Gozaimasu", nodded at the mention of my size, and moved on to the next dwarf, who smiled, took my hand, thanked me, and also remarked at my size. This pattern was repeated as I made my way through the dwarves, with one of the actresses having the courtesy to break the monotony by saying "thank you very much" in English. . . followed by another remark at my size. Then came the prince. He stood up, shook my hand, thanked me in a very deep voice and then, despite being probably a good six feet tall himself, also said "ooki!" Honestly, I can't really sure whether they were shocked at how tall I was or, given the notorious ambiguity of the Japanese language, they were very politely asking what the hell someone of my age was doing at a play like this.

Up until this point I had been avoiding eye contact with Miyuu Sawai, so as not to weird her out. In retrospect, this may have actually been a mistake, given how our meeting went. After the dwarves, and the prince, finally, I came to Miyuu Sawai. Her eyes widened slightly at the sight of me-- being incredibly vain, I like to imagine that she was pleasantly surprised at the sight of a gaijin fan, especially one possessing the novelty of hugeness. She took my hand, like all the others, and thanked me for coming, and I thanked her in return. I made no mention whatsoever of Sailor Moon, thinking that it might be inappropriate for this particular venue. This is about Snow White damn it, not a role Miyuu Sawai stopped playing back in 2005. Again, in retrospect this might have been a mistake. In trying to play it as cool as I could, I worry that I may have given the impression that I had no clue who Miyuu Sawai was. To her, I was probably just some Gaijin out for a really childish day of entertainment, who had no idea at all with whom he was shaking hands.

So, after a few simple words, I parted hands with Miyuu Sawai and made my way into the crowd that awaited their chance to take yet more photos of the cast. I stood just outside the crowd, taking one last look. As the crowd broke into one last burst of applause, Miyuu Sawai caught one last glimpse of me and waved. If you've ever seen me give my dorky wave. . . well, that's the wave I gave her back, out of pure instinct. The actors retreated back into the theatre, and the crowd dispersed. I walked off, with a mixture of satisfaction, a strange lack of excitement, and extreme regret at not having brought my camera. A regret which would later be joined by a further regret at not saying, "hey, I really like you in Sailor Moon."

But, there are always second chances. It turns out that the same theatre company behind this production of "Snow White" is at work producing another play, called "Imagine 9/11". . . I could not think of more diametrically opposite subject matter. And indeed, Miyuu Sawai is slated to star in this new play. Whether or not I get the chance to meet Sawai again, I am interested in seeing this play. But I will bring the damn camera this time.