I went to see after the quake, a play based on two Haruki Murakami short stories from the collection of the same name, with a classmate yesterday. The two stories mashed together were Superfrog Saves Tokyo and Honey Pie (the latter of which is among my favourite Murakami stories). I really liked it. The production got at the internality of Murakami stories by having a narrator and letting the characters narrate themselves. So you got the impression of being told the story more than it being strictly dramatized. The stories were integrated well, with Superfrog being a story Junpei was working on. It all came together in that non-traditional structure that Murakami stories tend to have.
The portrayal of Froggy was very urbane, as Jessie noted, much moreso than you’d get from the story itself. I enjoyed how he was portrayed, introduced in green light, but merging into the narrator as it went on. Frog’s urbanity borrowed a lot from that singing and dancing Looney Tunes frog, I felt. The sets and lights were used really well, and for one small incident the music was Norwegian Wood. I smiled.
Another thing, making me realize I’m in Vancouver, is that I actually recognized actors. Frog/Narrator was played by Alessandro Juliani, the guy who was Gaeta on Battlestar Galactica. I had to look up Hiro Kanagawa to know where I recognized him from and it turns out he’s been in loads of things, including the X-Files many years ago. So that was also kind of neat.
Tomorrow I’m going to volunteer at CanZine West at the Discorder Magazine booth. Maybe go to the Antiquarian Book Fair before that. Fun fun.
