Musicals in Post-Globalization: the Case of “Ever-Growing” Musicals from Vienna Via Japan

ReVisions Musicals in Post- Globalization: the Case of “Ever-Growing” Musicals from Vienna via Japan Rina Tanaka Published on: Mar 14, 2017 License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY 4.0) ReVisions Musicals in Post-Globalization: the Case of “Ever-Growing” Musicals from Vienna via Japan 1. Introduction The end of the globalization era meant the beginning of new methods, regardless of regional predominance. Today, a new style of performances is coming from non-English- speaking countries even in the genre of musical, which is originally from English- speaking countries. However, it has been overlooked due to the commercial or even mass productive nature of musicals (McMillin 2006, pp. 28-29), which has been a dominant pattern in musicals for decades[1]. How have musicals been changing in the post-globalization era? This paper analyzes the interactions established between Vienna and Japan by musicals since the 1990s as a possible illustration of the post-global theater. It consists of the following four parts. Section 1 presents two key concepts of this paper, “post-global” and “interweaving cultures in performances” as well as the current situation regarding musicals. Section 2 deals with the short history of musicals in Vienna in the post-war era until the launch of the first successful “Wiener [Viennese]” musical Elisabeth. As Vienna started taking its musical productions to the world, Japan was the first importer of Elisabeth. Section 3 considers two adaptations of Elisabeth in Japan as examples, indicating the reactions of other countries as well as Vienna, including the “re-import” phenomenon. After the great popularity of the Wiener musicals in Japan and the successive adaptations in the world, a new type of co-production developed in Japan. Section 4 describes a musical Marī Antowanetto [Marie Antoinette] since 2006 as an example of this co-production. The final section outlines the main conclusions and identifies the phenomenon of the interactions that started in Vienna and later developed between Vienna and Japan as an illustration of performances in the post-globalization era[2]. 1-1. Theoretical consideration 1-1-1. Post-globalization In general, the post-global era today arose “out of a shared story about the failure of the master narrative of globalization” (Sussman & Groves 2012, p. 13). Post- globalization is characterized as the confluence of multiple out-of-control flows, which are neither “inside” nor “outside” language, as in complex ways it both definitively is and is not language (id., p. 25). And when it comes to deal with the transitional or incompatible nature of post-globalization, “critique” is proposed as a tool to monitor flows[3] (ibid.). In short, post-globalization is identified with a junction of multiple localities as well as globalities, requiring a monitor reflecting on it. 2 ReVisions Musicals in Post-Globalization: the Case of “Ever-Growing” Musicals from Vienna via Japan 1-1-2. Interweaving cultures in performance On the other hand, regarding theater studies, a new type of performances came out of the end of colonialism in the 1960s. Distinguished from the terms “intercultural performance” or “intercultural theatre”, Fischer-Lichte called this new phenomenon “interweaving cultures in performances” (Fischer-Lichte 2010, p. 4). As “intercultural” performances mean a combination of texts, acting styles, stages, or scenic devices from different cultures, especially the fusion between Western and non-Western cultural components, processes of “interweaving” or exchange between cultures have been going on at least since the onset of modernity and, as a result, cultures permanently undergo change and transition (id., pp. 14-15). Each locality must be reflected in each process of interweaving. This type of performances finally produces “something new which is neither one nor the other but both at the same time” (id., p. 12). Fischer-Lichte explained these performances bring the audience a “liminal experience” or in-betweenness[4], embracing “fascination as well as alienation, enchantment as well as reflection” (ibid.). As Sussman and Groves pointed out, the importance of critique to deal with the conflux of local and global narratives emerged in post- globalization, and so performances interweaving different local contexts transfer the spectators into a liminality and challenge them to reflect on this state. The similarity of these two theories is the alternation to reflect on different local narratives not integrated but gathered on the same stage. 1-1-3. Musicals in the (post-)global era: Reconsideration of mass productions? The perspective, in which musicals must be representative of globalization, also requires reflection. The British newspaper The Guardian published an article in 2010 which criticized the conventional style of musicals. In the article, the authoritative musical productions from New York’s Broadway and the London’s West End were described as an “one-way cultural exchange com[ing] down to the quality of homegrown product”, according to the adapting principle to imitate the “original” production by the exporter (also see Section 3-3). It ends with the following question: Should we really be clapping the ubiquity of a homogenised theatre culture across the planet, where your musical adventure, from Seoul to São Paulo, can take on the same uniformity as your cup of Starbucks coffee? (The Guardian 2010) 3 ReVisions Musicals in Post-Globalization: the Case of “Ever-Growing” Musicals from Vienna via Japan Musical productions from Broadway and later from the West End are regarded as the mainstream ever since the genre was established and developed. It could be said that the monopoly by these two districts in Anglo-Saxon countries played a role in scattering the master narrative by shipping all the same products to various regions. As indicated in the article, such a one-sided export is already questioned even in the musical metropolis London. 2. The third wave of musicals from Vienna While the monopoly by two districts in Anglo-Saxon countries is being questioned, a new wave of musical productions has come from a non-English speaking country. Musicals by the Austrian musical production company, United Stages Vienna (Vereinigte Bühnen Wien, hereafter “VBW”) have been gradually recognized on a global scale since their first export of Elisabeth to Japan in 1996. Today, VBW productions have been performed in 16 languages[5] in 22 countries[6] (VBW 2016). This section takes a glance at the brief history of musicals in Vienna in the post-war era and considers how expectations of a musical production from Vienna were created. 2-1. Before the Wiener musicals started The first encounter between musicals[7] and Vienna occurred in the post-war era. Musicals were brought to allied-occupied Vienna by Marcel Prawy who came back to his hometown as a cultural officer of the United States Army in 1946 (Bartosch 1997, p. 457). After the Broadway musical Kiss me Kate[8] had been performed in the Volksoper Wien in 1956, musical hits were steadily imported to Vienna from the musical metropolises and performed at the Volksoper and later at the Theater an der Wien (hereafter “TadW”) since 1963 (Pelz 1995, p. 25). In spite of their successes in sales and in tourism[9], musicals could not easily gain positive impression. For example, the Austrian conductor Clemens Krauss described Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess (1965, Volksoper) as “ausländisch [foreign]”. Musicals were experienced as a culture of the occupation forces or one of the expressions of American propaganda by the people in Vienna in the post-war era (Steinberg 2003, p. 170). Even after productions have started being imported from the West End to Vienna since the 1970s – and considering the great sensation of mega musicals since the 1980s[10] – musicals were frequently mentioned as typical American such as “wie Campbell-Soup sollen alle Musicals [...] weltweit zuverlässig wiederholbar sein [like Campbell’s soup, every musical should be steadily representable all over the world]” (Goehler 2001, p. 104) or “Broadwayklonen [Broadway clones]” (Gruber 2010, p. 149). 4 ReVisions Musicals in Post-Globalization: the Case of “Ever-Growing” Musicals from Vienna via Japan However, musicals were needed at any cost especially for a theater suffering financial problems. The TadW, one of the central theaters for musicals in Vienna until 2006[11], recovered by using the genre and municipal assistance. Musicals boosted the occupancy rates to 99.60% in 1983 (Pelz 1995, p. 84). Yet the TadW could not run musicals without municipal assistance which accounted for 50-60 % of the running costs (id., p. 91). The percentage of public assistance in the running cost of musicals in Vienna was considerably higher than that in the other countries.[12] Such circumstances created a complicated expectancy for any musical production from Vienna. That is, a musical not only had to meet the international (=Anglo-Saxon) musical standards and therefore be able to be exported to the global market, but also had to sustain Viennese culture, which had been destroyed by the war, and secure the further financial assistance for the theater. 2-2. Turning point: Elisabeth (1992) According to the expectations of a musical production from Vienna, the history of international Wiener musicals began with the musical Elisabeth, which was the first VBW production successfully exported to the world[13]. Elisabeth, a musical about the Empress Elisabeth in Austria, started being performed in 1992. For this “thoroughly European theme”[14], specialists who have experience in Europe were gathered from various fields. The production team was a combination of the Austrian author Michael Kunze, who was working as a lyricist in German pop music as well as a translator for musicals imported from Broadway and the West End, and the Hungarian composer Sylvester Levay, who was working in Hollywood at that time. The stage director was Harry Kupfer, the chief director of the Komische Oper Berlin[15].

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