The two Japanese productions of Macbeth: Akira Kurosawa's Throne of Blood and Yukio Nevagawa's Ninaga Wa's Macbeth

Masuo, Kishiko (1997). The two Japanese productions of Macbeth: Akira Kurosawa's Throne of Blood and Yukio Nevagawa's Ninaga Wa's Macbeth. University of Birmingham. M.Phil.

[img]
Preview
Masuo97MPhil.pdf
PDF - Accepted Version

Download (1MB)

Abstract

Among productions of Shakespeare's plays in recent years, some cultural adaptations by Asian and other foreign directors are more highly regarded than English productions which use the original texts. Two such productions are Throne of Blood, a film directed by Akira Kurosawa in 1957, and Ninagowa 's Macbeth, a stage production by Yukio Ninagawa in 1980, ( first staged in Tokyo, in Edinburgh in 1985, and in London 1987). The significance of these foreign productions is how they revive the power of Shakespeare's originals energetically in their different cultural, social, religious and linguistic context. These two Japanese productions of Macbeth show the examples of those productions which succeeded in transforming and reviving the power of the play into their own tradition. To understand the Japanese re-interpretation of the play, the viewer or the audience must learn about the cultural background, which describes Shakespeare's play from the Eastern point of view. Western representatives of productions of the play are, on film, Orson Welles and Roman Polanski, and on stage, Trevor Nunn. Through consideration of these western productions, the originality and uniqueness of the Japanese adaptations of the play can be seen. The intensity and suspense of the drama are most impressively expressed in their own Japanese cultural context. It can be said that the encounter of the East and the West brings another aspect to the interpretation of Shakespeare's drama as performance.

Type of Work: Thesis (Masters by Research > M.Phil.)
Award Type: Masters by Research > M.Phil.
Licence:
College/Faculty: Faculties (to 1997) > Faculty of Arts
School or Department: School of English, Drama and American & Canadian Studies, Department of English Literature
Funders: None/not applicable
Subjects: P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN2000 Dramatic representation. The Theater
P Language and Literature > PR English literature
URI: http://etheses.bham.ac.uk/id/eprint/4458

Actions

Request a Correction Request a Correction
View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year