Back in 1986, there was a man by the name of "Tiger Lily" in Yotsuya 4-chome. That’s how he called himself when he appeared as a loudly dressed painter at the scene of a bingo game 25 years ago, on the eve of the economic bubble. Everybody around was wondering where on earth that name "Tiger Lily" came from, until some other actor on the stage enlightened us. "It’s the name of an Indian girl in 'Peter Pan'." (*1)

I borrowed the Disney animation version of "Peter Pan" (*2) on DVD from the Tsutaya store, and found out that "Tiger Lily" was the daughter of the chief of an Indian tribe in Neverland. She is abducted by Captain Hook, saved by Peter Pan, and does cause a bit of jealousy in Wendy, but that’s about all that she does. It’s not the kind of character that leaves a particularly lasting impression.

The name of the painter that appears in U-enchi Saisei Jigyodan’s play "Total Living 1986-2011" could as well have been "Tinker Bell", "Lost Boy" or "Peter Pan" as long as it was a figure from Neverland I suppose, however in order to allow a natural shift of the story on stage to the "Peter Pan" topic, it was necessary to make one wonder about the meaning of that name first. I guess that’s why they chose a relatively low-keyed character name. Anyway, thanks to the actor who explains about the original material, the viewer bears the story of that land of dreams in mind while following the events on stage.

"Total Living 1986-2011" / Photo: Nobuhiko Hikiji / Courtesy of Festival/Tokyo

In a nutshell, "Peter Pan" is all about the conflict between the protagonist, Peter Pan himself, and Captain Hook. Nonetheless, "Peter Pan vs. Captain Hook" is in fact nothing more than a proxy war, and when reorganizing the plot according to the aspect of "growth (conflicts)", one understands that the actual protagonist is Wendy, and the man she is fighting is her father, Mr. Darling. The role of Mr. Darling is to transfer his daughter from the fairy tale world of the child’s room to her own private room in order to "mature", but Wendy, revolting against this, escapes with Peter Pan out of the bedroom window, and finally arrives at Neverland, a place inhabited by children who forgot to grow up.

The creator’s intention behind setting up the "Peter Pan vs. Captain Hook" conflict as a proxy war in the place of "Wendy vs. Mr. Darling" becomes quite clear when considering that the same voice actor does both roles, Captain Hook and Mr. Darling. (*3) "Peter Pan" is an archetypal "there-and-back-again" story that illustrates how Wendy ultimately accepts her own growth by way of the process of passing through the parallel universe of Neverland before returning to the real world.

"Total Living" depicts 1986 and 2011 as two contrasting or intertwined eras. 1986 is when the Chernobyl accident occurred in the Soviet Union (the present part of Ukraine), while 2011 – needless to mention – was the year the Great East Japan Earthquake and subsequent nuclear accident at Fukushima happened. As described above, Tiger Lily made his first appearance in Yotsuya 4-chome in the summer of 1986. The people chatting on the rooftop of a film school in Tokyo in 2011, have forgotten about 1986, or at least lost their sense of reality in terms of that time. In their attempt to circumvent forgetting and supplement lacks, the "Forgotten Lighthouse Keeper" and the "Lacking Woman" embark on a trip in search of the lighthouse they are supposed to light up once again…

When understanding our hero Tiger Lily as "a resident of Neverland", one can interpret Yotsuya 4-chome in the summer of 1986, when he appeared, as a "Neverland" kind of place where Tiger Lily and his friends were throwing parties every night, and playing "bingo of lacks". It a peculiar game with prizes such as a remote control without a main unit, shoestrings without shoes, or other items where something is lacking. In other words, Yotsuya 4-chome in the summer of 1986 is depicted as a fantastic place full of lacks just like Neverland, where children without parents or flying kids that don't grow up live.

What does the rooftop of a film school in Tokyo in 2011 stand for then? Is it the real-world "London", the place to ultimately return to from the fantastic place of "lacks"? Not quite. It is rather, very simply, "Neverland 25 years later". Totally different from the growth experience of Wendy, who returns to London and accepts to grow up and become an adult, we Japanese are obviously mired in the fantastic place of "lacks" – while "forgetting" advances – even after 25 years. Rather far from modern historical progress, we seem to be locked in a vicious circle kind of place.

"Total Living" tells the story of the Forgotten Lighthouse Keeper and the Lacking Woman, who light up the lighthouse in order to avoid/repair "forgetting" and "lacks". After the first performance at Nishi-Sugamo Arts Factory on October 14, U-enchi Saisei Jigyodan leader Miyazawa Akio made the following comment in an on-stage conversation with novelist Takahashi Genichiro.

"Quite simply I'm just angry with myself. […] If you ask me whether I was remembering everything about Chernobyl before the accident at Fukushima on 3.11, I must say I wasn't." (*4)

The memory of 1986 is damaged in no small measure in the people living in 2011, and Miyazawa’s statement reflects his anger and grief about such simple "forgetting" with no lessons learned.

"Total Living 1986-2011" / Photo: Nobuhiko Hikiji / Courtesy of Festival/Tokyo

The novel "Koi suru genpatsu" that his talk partner Takahashi wrote for the November issue of "Gunzo" tells the story of a group of men who produce a charity adult video. According to Takahashi’s own explanation in the same conversation, the idea for the basic plot came to him immediately after the terrorist attacks in 2001, but at the time he struggled to realize it. He dug the plans out again after 3.11, and finally got around to finishing the piece. For some reason. In his own words, that’s because he "realized that it was possible to laugh about it now that it happened at such a close distance." 9.11 was too far away geographically for people who weren't concerned to make a mock of it. "Whatever you try to write about it, it always turns out extremely serious." In contrast, 3.11 could be felt as "being about ourselves," and as such it could actually "be laughed about."

Miyazawa’s reaction in front of Takahashi looked to me to be rather subdued. "As a victim myself whose bookshelves collapsed, I felt that I could perhaps relate to it," he recalls his 3.11 experience from a very Tokyoite point of view. (I myself got away with a collapsed bookshelf as well.) 3.11 as "something about ourselves." Is that really so? There appeared to be something on Miyazawa’s mind that’s troubling him.

Back to Tiger Lily and Yotsuya 4-chome in the summer of '86. A sense of reality and detailed information about the explosion in Chernobyl probably didn't get through to the bustling Japan on the brink of an economic explosion, several thousand kilometers away. It really was like fireworks that you watch from a rooftop in the distance. Without even waiting for the "forgetting" that would come with the passage of 25 years, people were already "lacking" something back in 1986.

So what about Fukushima 2011? Located 200 kilometers north of central Tokyo, Fukushima is significantly closer than Chernobyl. Daily reports provide us with abundant information. Compared to 1986, it does feel more like "being about ourselves," and there is perhaps a sense of community that tells us we should feel that way. However, I doubt that everyone in Tokyo can, like Takahashi, feel about Fukushima as "being about ourselves." In the play, Miyazawa lets the documentary filmmaker say the following line.

"Should I go there right now? To the north? Or North-East? To the place where it happened? Should I take my camera and go there? […] It’s far away, totally unrelated. It surely would have made sense if I lived there. But I'm not seeing it that way… […] I do feel like doing something. […] But I'm lacking an answer; an answer to the question WHAT to do." (*5)

Nuclear accidents are not the only elements that connect 1986 and 2011 in "Total Living". It’s also about the "suicides of pop idols". Such unfortunate incidents took place in the respective "Neverlands" in both eras, but how serious can they be compared to Chernobyl or Fukushima? To me it looks as if like these two suicides are emphasizing the "lacks" in the fantastic world remote from reality.

Miyazawa continued to collect countless "voices" before and after 3.11, and tried to avert future "forgetting" by "describing". But what happens to the "lacks"?

"Total Living 1986-2011" / Photo: Nobuhiko Hikiji / Courtesy of Festival/Tokyo

Video footage filmed by one of the actors and projected directly onto a screen installed on stage was one characteristic feature of the piece’s direction, whereas the real actors on stage looked so different on the video screen that a sense of discomfort kept reverberating in my mind like a basso continuo. Now doesn't this again signal – even if unintended – how TV news footage reporting on the earthquake is completely different from the real scene of the disaster, and that future playback of "voices" and "descriptions" from before and after 3.11 will in fact never reproduce reality? (In such case, the "descriptions" can rather be facilitative to the "lacks".)

Art is of course not there to provide answers. "Facing it (3.11) straightforwardly is what seems to me now like the right thing to do," (*6) Miyazawa sums up his feelings that inspired the making of "Total Living". However, what the piece tells is not a story of post-3.11 Japan, but it portrays the “post-3.11 Tokyoite" living 200 kilometers away from the afflicted area, within the closed circle of another Neverland.

*1: "Total Living 1986-2011" (In "Higeki Kigeki", November 2011 issue)

*2: Published in 1953, based on J. M. Barrie’s original drama from 1904.

*3: This seems to conform to the assignment of the roles of Captain Hook and Mr. Darling to the same actor in the original play. In the Japanese dubbed version of the Disney film, however, the characters are spoken by different voice actors.

*4: F/T OFFICIAL BLOG "Miyazawa Akio & Takahashi Genichiro ('Total Living' post-performance talk, 10/14)"

*5: See *1

*6: See *4