Takezo (Shingo Usami) offers advice to his daughter Mitsue (Mayu Iwasaki)
‘Bomb away!’ said Major Thomas Ferebee aboard his B-29 aircraft on 6 August 1945, as the atomic bomb dropped into Hiroshima and destroyed the city and killed up to 140,000 people. Hisashi Inoue’s The Face of Jizo opens three years after that catastrophic event and concentrates on one of the survivors, a young woman named Mitsue (Mayu Iwasaki) and the relationship she had with her father Takezo (Shingo Usami).
These days, Mitsue is easily frightened. A sudden flash of light or clap of thunder sends her scurrying for cover. She suffers intermittently from radiation sickness. She works as a librarian, but she is lonely; as the play progresses we learn that all her friends died in the blast. She feels guilty to have survived.
She holds conversations with her father. Takezo is an optimistic fellow, full of advice for his daughter, especially when she refuses to accept that the young man at the library who keeps coming in is as much interested in her as any of the books. Takezo’s personality – and Usami’s performance – bring levity into a subject, and a moment of history, that is awful to contemplate in detail. Only once, and it is a sobering and powerful scene, does he speak of the dreadful damage done to human beings as the bomb seared into and obliterated lives by the thousand. During this, Mitsue says nothing but her face tells the story of her suffering and loss.
Japanese academic, novelist and critic Saiichi Maruya declared The Face of Jizo ‘the greatest play of Japan’s postwar era’. Indeed, it is moving and deeply affecting. Its themes are of courage, love, spirited fathers and learning to embrace the past and move on. There are no spoken recriminations.
Shingo Usami, who also directs alongside David Lynch, says: ‘Presenting The Face of Jizo is not about denying the pain Japan inflicted on so many people during the war but about facing [this] with honesty and reflection. As Hisashi Inoue articulated in the prologue of this play, we must continue learning from the past while also honouring the innocent lives lost to war. Through this deeply human story, we hope to share a message of love, resilience, and the urgent need to move beyond blame and denial.’
This production is a reprise from a sold-out season at the Old Fitz in 2023 so, as you would expect, the performances and direction are polished to perfection. It features the original cast and creative team. The translation from Japanese (by Australian writer Roger Pulvers) is fluid and contemporary, and is another reason this play is so accessible.
What happened to people like Mitsue and Takezo is representative of the thousands of people who died or suffered in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, people who in their ordinary lives, hopes and dreams are just like you or me. Here is a father and daughter who didn’t want that war, or any other war. Such a tragedy that humans are such slow learners.
A powerful, yet tender 80 minutes of theatre. Catch it if you can.
At the Reginald Theatre, Seymour Centre, until 6 September, with selected performances in Japanese with English surtitles.
Tickets: $39-59
Website: https://www.seymourcentre.com/event/the-face-of-jizo/
