mum & gypsy is a theatre company founded in 2007 by Takahiro Fujita, one of the youngest directors of the “zero generation”. In Japan’s contemporary theatre world, this new generation of directors and playwrights have come on the scene after the advent of Oriza Hirata’s colloquial spoken-language theatre style. Hirata, director, playwright but also essayist and professor, is the founder of the “contemporary colloquial theatre”, a theatrical style that eschews theatre conventions in favour of “a theatre that is a direct portrayal of the world” and, through the use of simple dialogues, recreates and re-enacts everyday life on stage.
Following the theory of Hirata, Takahiro Fujita has created his own style which is characterized by a new methodology in which story lines develop in parallel through a complex interweaving of scenes. Symbolic scenes are repeated in the form of “refrains” that are presented from different characters’ perspectives, much like the technique of quickly shifting scenes in a movie. This method also makes creative use of the “physical transformations” that occur in the actor during these shifting perspectives. In recent years Fujita’s main creative theme is people’s memories.

In a small town in 2001, a man was reported to kill a little girl. The body was found in a ditch and the news had repercussions on local young generation. Dots and lines, and the cube formed lively presents those boys and girls of 2001, ten years later in 2011 and the very current moment in their lives of 2013 with some news of the past world tragedy. The author drastically yet exquisitely reproduces characters’ memories and events in a mixed chronological format using number of conspicuous refrains. This refrains would also call your memory and bring you back to those period of time which is promised to rebuild your idea of relationship between theatre and the audience.

text and direction: Takahiro Fujita
cast: Aya Ogiwara, Shintaro Onoshima, Ayumi Narita,
Satoshi Hasatani, Jitsuko Mesuda, Satoko Yoshida
music support: Yoshio Otani
light Design: Kaori Minami
sound design: Rie Tsunoda
stage director: Susumu Kumaki
tour manager, subtitle operator: Miwa Monden
company manager: Kana Hayashi
production: mum & gypsy
co-produced by Steep Slope Studio

The 2014 European tour is realized by Fondazione Pontedera Teatro, MESS International Theatre Festival Sarajevo, Associazione Lis Lab Performing Arts, Meina (Novara), Inteatro Polverigi (Ancona), Ente Autonomo Regionale Teatro di Messina
with the support of the Japan Foundation Performing Arts Japan Programme for Europe (PAJ Europe) – Touring Grant
and the cooperation of Fondazione Fabbrica Europa

[photo: Nikola Blagojevic]