Yose, nice to meet you. I arrived at Shinjuku Suehirotei so overexcited that my very first photo came out as a blurry mess (deleted on the spot 🤪). Lanterns, a wooden lineup board, and tall banners in the early-evening light of Shinjuku 3-chome. The name of the headliner, Yujaku Sanyutei, was fluttering in the breeze, and my mood was already at 100 before I even stepped inside.
What is Shinjuku Suehirotei?
Founded in 1897, it’s one of four permanent rakugo theaters (yose) in Tokyo. The lineup changes every ten days, and the early-September program (the 1st to the 10th) belongs to the Rakugo Geijutsu Kyokai. As a total yose beginner, my homework was the YouTube channel “Kanda Hakuzan TV.” I thought I knew what the place felt like. Thought.
After the intermission, from the back
I got there late in the afternoon, so I went in after the intermission and settled into a seat near the back.
I had actually been looking forward to Raiko Sakamoto, the silent-film narrator, but it seems he was off that day. A shame. Still, my main reason for coming was Yujaku, so I switched gears.
The unexpected laugh came from Nana Hitomi, who appeared in his slot. She’s a magician with a witch persona, and while she looks youthful, her patter sounds like it’s been around the block a few times (in the best way). That gap, plus her back-and-forth with the audience, had the whole room nicely loosened up.
Yujaku’s “Yodogoro”
The headliner was Yujaku Sanyutei, and the story was “Yodogoro.” A young actor, Yodogoro Sawamura, is given the role of Enya Hangan in Chushingura, but Danzo Ichikawa, who plays Yuranosuke, refuses to give him the time of day, and Yodogoro is left agonizing. Because the tale is about actors and Nakazo Nakamura shows up in it, I’ll admit I briefly thought, “Wait, is this ‘Nakamura Nakazo’?”
Hangan is in the middle of committing seppuku, and Danzo just stands there at the shichisan spot, refusing to come closer. Yodogoro, seething. The length of that pause became Yodogoro’s frustration itself, and it reached all the way to my seat at the back. As someone who usually watches kabuki, the stage picture formed in my head on its own, so I got to enjoy the performance twice over.
And the timing! The casting for the full-length Kanadehon Chūshingura in the November Program at the Kabukiza Theatre had just been announced. I’d been staring at the website, agonizing over whether to see Program A or Program B, so this was uncannily on-topic for me (laughs).
Well, I say “agonizing,” but the dates I can actually go are already fixed, so it’s Program B. I want to see both, though!!! 😭
So this is what a yose feels like
The way performers glide on and off one after another, the announcement at the intermission. Just watching the particular rhythm of a yose is fun in itself.
The tatami box seats are nothing like the ones at the Kabukiza. They’re the kind of tatami you could sprawl out on, and people were sitting there in a relaxed, any-which-way sort of manner. I liked that. Even from the back, the closeness to the performers and the atmosphere were simply the best.
This is going to be a habit.
Wrapping up
After the show, I looked up at the lit-up Suehirotei and took a good look at the big lantern before heading off. Fun detail: the lantern reads 末広亭, with the simpler character, rather than 末廣亭. Spotting little things like that is part of the pleasure.
I want to go back. More than that, from now on I’ll check the yose schedules and go whenever they line up with my kabuki dates. Not just Suehirotei, but yose in general. I want a rematch with Raiko, and someday I’d love to see Shori Kanda.
More places to travel to means more nights away, which means I need more regular hotels…
