Gallery
Woman -Killer in Oil Hell (Onna Koroshi Abura no Jigoku)
(Original Joruri by Chikamatsu Monzaemon)
Adaptation and English translation by Masako Yuasa
Stage photographs from the Production of Woman -Killer in Oil Hell,
directed by Yuasa at the Workshop Theatre of the University of Leeds,
UK, on 15-17th March 2004. Photos were taken by Tim Skelly.
Cast of the production
Kawachi-ya Tokubei……Michele Chung
Sawa……Katheryn Owens
Yohei……Jonathan Bonnici
Kachi……Helen Love
Teshima-ya Shichizaemon……Michael Taylor
Kichi……Tiphaine Tailleux
Kiyo……Michele Chung
Zenbei……Michael Taylor
White Fox……Michael Taylor
Chorus and Narrations are performed by the members of the cast.
(ZENBEI, YOHEI and KICHI, ACT ONE)
YOHEI: Then accordingly, early this morning a rich countryman of Aizu
escorted Kogiku to Nozaki Kannon by houseboat through the Catfish
River. If this Aizu countryman defeats me in getting Kogiku, I will
lose my face. So, I came here to seek a fight with him.
KICHI: Now, now, Yohei-sama. You’ve just given yourself away. In that
case you aren’t visiting Kannon-sama, the Goddess of Mercy, for your
faith but for your complacency as a man of pleasure.
(SHICHIZAEMON, KICHI and KIYO, ACT ONE)
SHICHIZAEMON: Oi! Yohei! Kichi! Come out! Come here! If you don’t come out right now, I’ll come and get you!
KICHI: Is that my husband who’s shouting outside?
(WHITE FOX and KACHI, ACT TWO)
KACHI:
…If you want to cure Kachi’s disease, you must stop arranging husband
for her! (KACHI acts as if possessed by the late KAWACHI-YA TOKUBEI)… I
want you to allow Yohei to marry the woman he loves, even if the woman
is a courtesan. You must pay a ransom for the woman and take her in as
Yohei’s wife…
WHITE FOX: Where have you come from? Leave her at once! The magical power of the mountain ascetic will never end!
(WHITE FOX, YOHEI and KACHI, ACT TWO)
YOHEI: You quack mountain priest! Stop the silly prayer!
(YOHEI and KICHI, SCENE 1 of ACT THREE)
YOHEI: You’re my last hope and my last saviour. Please, O-Kichi-sama, I
beseech you, please help me out of this. If you haven’t got money, it
can’t be helped, but you’ve just said that you have some in your safe.
(YOHEI and KICH, SCENE 1 of ACT THREE)
KICHI: Talk it over with my husband some other time. If we have enough
money, we may be able to help you. You know, even if a woman has been
married to a man for fifty or sixty years, she isn’t supposed use money
in her own way. It’s a rule that a wife must cleave to her husband.
Please don’t think ill of me.
(YOHEI and KICHI, SCENE 1 of ACT THREE)
KICHI: Someone! Help me! Someone, please, come and help me!
(YOHEI and KICH, SCENE 1 of ACT THREE)
YOHEI: Stop shouting, woman!
(KAWACHI-YA TOKUBEI as a NARRATOR, SCENE 2 of ACT THREE)
NARRATIOR: Shichizaemon holds a Buddhist memorial service for Kichi, on
the eve of the 35th day since her death. The fellow believers of the
Jodo-Shin sect gather in the Teshima-ya. When the service is over, a
mouse, running over the beams of the shop ceiling, dislodges a piece of
old paper. There are blots, like bloodstains, one the paper.
(YOHEI, SCENE 2 of ACT THREE)
Yohei, “Twenty years of disobedience to my parents and wrong doing had
grown into a devil in me and made me blind to good and wise human
nature. I, Kawachi-ya Yohei, murdered O-Kichi-dono and stole money in
the shop.”