[MUSICAL] Endless SHOCK @ Imperial Theatre 22/02/2010 18:00
I didn't take notes during this one and I'd never seen any version of the show before, so this is just what I remember thinking about the performance at the time. It's a JE musical - crack comes with the territory.
When I've gone to Yurakucho from Ikebukuro previously for shows, I've taken the Yamanote Line and walked from the JR station. Today, I finally realised I could take the Yurakucho Line and get myself closer to the theatre. I didn't realise until I emerged from the station, however, that it would bring me out right *underneath* the theatre. I walked past the door to the backstage on my way up, that's how close it was. Don't think they'd have wanted me to go in there, though.
Nice, short goods queue. I just got the pamphlet, with which they were giving away an Endless SHOCK bag so I had something to carry it in, and they were also handing out a piece of paper with a correction on it: 'cemetery' had been spelt incorrectly in the pamphlet. I'm impressed that a) someone noticed this and b) they cared enough to issue a correction. Not tempted by other goods because I didn't want to buy a poster or a clear file, and the photos were only of Koichi. (Well, there might have been photos of Yara upstairs with the stage photos, but I didn't go up to look.) I also really don't feel the need for a light-up mirror, music box, or Endless SHOCK photo album. The pamphlet has a lot of nice pictures and some quite sensible English explaining the first half of the plot, though there were some interesting word choices.
Anyway, while Shock may be Domoto Koichi's show, I was there primarily for the Musical Academy guys: Yara Tomoyuki, Machida Shingo, and Yonehana Tsuyoshi. Given the average age of the audience, I suspect a number of them were there for Uekusa Katsuhide (Shonentai). There were actually a lot of people who had to be over forty, many of them in couples, but a fair few kiddies as well. A nice evening out watching a very, very slashy Johnnys musical, all good family fun.
I was in row K, which is further forward than I've ever been in the Imperial Theatre, and consequently I had a rather nice view. (I figured I'd only go see it once, ever, so I might as well get a decent seat.) I wasn't quite on the aisle - there were two seats to my right - but as Uekusa was the only cast member who walked past that way, I didn't really care. He did get a great deal of applause when he suddenly popped up on the stage, though.
My thoughts, in no particular order:
When the show started they showed video clips of old Shocks, including one with Kame and Jin. ^_^
Uekusa totally hammed it up, especially when he was supposed to be playing drunk. Got a lot of laughs, particularly when he was doing a fighting/tap dance number with his daughter, Rika (Sato Megumi). He'd pushed her out the way to put himself in the spotlight, so she fought back with dance, slapping him several times, and finally punching him properly. Koichi then came along and punched him too.
There was a flying car! It hovered around the back of the stage for a while, with Rika at the wheel, until eventually it landed and Koichi helped her out of the car.
Yara's hair...oh dear. I couldn't figure out what he reminded me of at first, but now I think it's a cross between Kame's lion hair and a blond Michael Jackson. It's atrocious! Yara normally looks good blond but the style is horrible. This didn't stop me from loving him, however. His singing voice has improved considerably over the last few years, and his dancing's fantastic. I've been privileged to see a lot of good dancing on this holiday, but tonight was very different in style from most of 'You & Jin', and the guys nailed every move. There was one moment where Yara was kind of jumping on Yone's hip while Yone was standing, which sounds painful but looks great, and of course Yone is the king of backflips.
Maachin had also done interesting things to his hair, but on him it didn't look so crazy. Besides, he was blisteringly hot when wearing armour. I didn't expect that he was going to be a total Koichi fanboy, though! When he's surprised that Koichi's okay, he throws himself at him a couple of times and eventually tries to hug him, but gets rebuffed by Koichi wielding a cane. He and Yone keep up a comedic double act throughout the show.
The Japanesque Show blew me away. I don't think I've ever seen so many people dancing with swords before. I'm amazed no one screwed up; if they did, it was impossible to tell. It was so atmospheric, with the rain pouring down and a thunderstorm raging as Koichi and Yara tried to kill each other, having first slaughtered pretty much everyone else on the stage. Am also impressed with Koichi for rolling all the way down a rather long staircase. (Guess his armour was padded?)
The Jungle section looked brilliant too. Koichi went all Indiana Jones, the scenery was realistically creepy, and there was a lot of place-swapping between the guys.
It was heartbreaking watching Yara trying to court Rika, only to be outdone by Koichi at every turn. I do love a good rivalry. There's a very nice moment where Koichi, having finally extricated himself from the box he was brought to the stage in (he tried to climb over but didn't realise there was a door), is hugged from behind by Rika. He breaks out into a Michael Jackson impersonation, however, and starts singing 'Beat It'.
Another amusing moment; Koichi shoots himself in the head, and when the lights return, he's still lying on he stage floor, gun in hand. He gives the cleaning lady such a fright when he suddenly sits up, especially since he then ends up pointing the gun at her.
There was some flying, albeit nowhere near as much as DB, but Koichi did a couple of interesting things. At one point he actually landed on the balcony of the second floor, which must've been great for the audience up there, and he also moved around from red-lit ladder to ladder in the sky, linking up with a couple of female dancers who were also on the ladders at various points.
Not too keen on Uekusa's singing voice but he and Koichi had a nice duet.
Massive drum scene near the end impressed the hell out of me where Yara, Koichi and Ishikawa (the drummer guy) had to keep switching positions as they played drums over their heads, something that could easily have gone wrong but worked out flawlessly.
'In the Cemetery' was terribly creepy, kind of visual kei PV-like with very fancy dressed zombies. I really wasn't following the whole resurrection thing but it's hard to keep track of which sections are plot and which are musicals within the musical.
Very shiny costumes. Koichi sparkled the entire way through the show, there are sections when he and Yara are shining in gold and silver respectively, and everything's just really bright and twinkly. The dancing is more or less like that too, very twirly and smoothly done. But I have to admit my favourites were Koichi vs. Yara dance battles, and 'Why Don't You Dance With Me?' could not be straight if you adjusted it with a spirit level.
Okay, so that was very short and not all that helpful, but if you want to see it for yourself I can't imagine it's changed too much since the 2008 DVD release and that's on YT somewhere!
When I've gone to Yurakucho from Ikebukuro previously for shows, I've taken the Yamanote Line and walked from the JR station. Today, I finally realised I could take the Yurakucho Line and get myself closer to the theatre. I didn't realise until I emerged from the station, however, that it would bring me out right *underneath* the theatre. I walked past the door to the backstage on my way up, that's how close it was. Don't think they'd have wanted me to go in there, though.
Nice, short goods queue. I just got the pamphlet, with which they were giving away an Endless SHOCK bag so I had something to carry it in, and they were also handing out a piece of paper with a correction on it: 'cemetery' had been spelt incorrectly in the pamphlet. I'm impressed that a) someone noticed this and b) they cared enough to issue a correction. Not tempted by other goods because I didn't want to buy a poster or a clear file, and the photos were only of Koichi. (Well, there might have been photos of Yara upstairs with the stage photos, but I didn't go up to look.) I also really don't feel the need for a light-up mirror, music box, or Endless SHOCK photo album. The pamphlet has a lot of nice pictures and some quite sensible English explaining the first half of the plot, though there were some interesting word choices.
Anyway, while Shock may be Domoto Koichi's show, I was there primarily for the Musical Academy guys: Yara Tomoyuki, Machida Shingo, and Yonehana Tsuyoshi. Given the average age of the audience, I suspect a number of them were there for Uekusa Katsuhide (Shonentai). There were actually a lot of people who had to be over forty, many of them in couples, but a fair few kiddies as well. A nice evening out watching a very, very slashy Johnnys musical, all good family fun.
I was in row K, which is further forward than I've ever been in the Imperial Theatre, and consequently I had a rather nice view. (I figured I'd only go see it once, ever, so I might as well get a decent seat.) I wasn't quite on the aisle - there were two seats to my right - but as Uekusa was the only cast member who walked past that way, I didn't really care. He did get a great deal of applause when he suddenly popped up on the stage, though.
My thoughts, in no particular order:
When the show started they showed video clips of old Shocks, including one with Kame and Jin. ^_^
Uekusa totally hammed it up, especially when he was supposed to be playing drunk. Got a lot of laughs, particularly when he was doing a fighting/tap dance number with his daughter, Rika (Sato Megumi). He'd pushed her out the way to put himself in the spotlight, so she fought back with dance, slapping him several times, and finally punching him properly. Koichi then came along and punched him too.
There was a flying car! It hovered around the back of the stage for a while, with Rika at the wheel, until eventually it landed and Koichi helped her out of the car.
Yara's hair...oh dear. I couldn't figure out what he reminded me of at first, but now I think it's a cross between Kame's lion hair and a blond Michael Jackson. It's atrocious! Yara normally looks good blond but the style is horrible. This didn't stop me from loving him, however. His singing voice has improved considerably over the last few years, and his dancing's fantastic. I've been privileged to see a lot of good dancing on this holiday, but tonight was very different in style from most of 'You & Jin', and the guys nailed every move. There was one moment where Yara was kind of jumping on Yone's hip while Yone was standing, which sounds painful but looks great, and of course Yone is the king of backflips.
Maachin had also done interesting things to his hair, but on him it didn't look so crazy. Besides, he was blisteringly hot when wearing armour. I didn't expect that he was going to be a total Koichi fanboy, though! When he's surprised that Koichi's okay, he throws himself at him a couple of times and eventually tries to hug him, but gets rebuffed by Koichi wielding a cane. He and Yone keep up a comedic double act throughout the show.
The Japanesque Show blew me away. I don't think I've ever seen so many people dancing with swords before. I'm amazed no one screwed up; if they did, it was impossible to tell. It was so atmospheric, with the rain pouring down and a thunderstorm raging as Koichi and Yara tried to kill each other, having first slaughtered pretty much everyone else on the stage. Am also impressed with Koichi for rolling all the way down a rather long staircase. (Guess his armour was padded?)
The Jungle section looked brilliant too. Koichi went all Indiana Jones, the scenery was realistically creepy, and there was a lot of place-swapping between the guys.
It was heartbreaking watching Yara trying to court Rika, only to be outdone by Koichi at every turn. I do love a good rivalry. There's a very nice moment where Koichi, having finally extricated himself from the box he was brought to the stage in (he tried to climb over but didn't realise there was a door), is hugged from behind by Rika. He breaks out into a Michael Jackson impersonation, however, and starts singing 'Beat It'.
Another amusing moment; Koichi shoots himself in the head, and when the lights return, he's still lying on he stage floor, gun in hand. He gives the cleaning lady such a fright when he suddenly sits up, especially since he then ends up pointing the gun at her.
There was some flying, albeit nowhere near as much as DB, but Koichi did a couple of interesting things. At one point he actually landed on the balcony of the second floor, which must've been great for the audience up there, and he also moved around from red-lit ladder to ladder in the sky, linking up with a couple of female dancers who were also on the ladders at various points.
Not too keen on Uekusa's singing voice but he and Koichi had a nice duet.
Massive drum scene near the end impressed the hell out of me where Yara, Koichi and Ishikawa (the drummer guy) had to keep switching positions as they played drums over their heads, something that could easily have gone wrong but worked out flawlessly.
'In the Cemetery' was terribly creepy, kind of visual kei PV-like with very fancy dressed zombies. I really wasn't following the whole resurrection thing but it's hard to keep track of which sections are plot and which are musicals within the musical.
Very shiny costumes. Koichi sparkled the entire way through the show, there are sections when he and Yara are shining in gold and silver respectively, and everything's just really bright and twinkly. The dancing is more or less like that too, very twirly and smoothly done. But I have to admit my favourites were Koichi vs. Yara dance battles, and 'Why Don't You Dance With Me?' could not be straight if you adjusted it with a spirit level.
Okay, so that was very short and not all that helpful, but if you want to see it for yourself I can't imagine it's changed too much since the 2008 DVD release and that's on YT somewhere!