Today, after many years of dreaming about it and never really believing in achieving the dream, it came true.
I went to Takarazuka near Osaka to see a play of the famous Takarazuka Revue troupe!
I don't feel like explaining a lot, so here an extract from wikipedia:
The
Takarazuka Revue (宝塚歌劇団 Takarazuka Kagekidan?) is a
Japanese all-female musical theater troupe based in Takarazuka, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. Women play all roles in lavish, Broadway-style productions of Western-style musicals, and sometimes stories adapted from shōjo manga and Japanese folktales.
And I also had an amazing seat in the S-section, which is twice-closest to the stage!
This year, Takarazuka Revue has it's 100th birthday so we went to see the '100 Year Anniversary Show' which consists of 3 special small anniversairy shows.
The first one is called 宝塚をどり, the second was a short musical named 明日への指針 and the third, 宝塚100花詩集!!! was a one-hour sparkling and brilliant Revue and compilation of songs of old shows! (*-*)
You can see three amazing videos of the show HERE!
But let's start at the beginning!
I woke up at 5am and we went by bus to Osaka. It was the first bus I drove with that had a TV and even Games!! (oO;)
Finally we arrived at Takarazuka Station!
The quarter around the theater is really beautiful and cute! Everywhere are little shops and cafés and everywhere pics of the Revue, it just looks really nice.
And then finally..the Theater!!
Infront of the Theater they had a little wall with a stair and some pics of the Top stars! (*0*)
Had to take pics XDD
And the famous show-stairs!! XDD
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| lol me being hilarious! |
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And a huge poster of the show we were gonna see!
The old, classy 'Takarazuka Grand Theater'!
Well this is a theater, isn't it!
It is so beautiful!! (;//;)
There is also the Takarazuka Hall of Fame, some kind of museum about all the very first actresses and screenplay writers, musicians, stage designers etc.!
There you could wear some of the amazing Zuka-costumes and have a photo! :DD
Taylor, Megan and me :DD We look hilarious but it felt glorious! :D
And then finally we went to see the show!
Of course I didn't take any photos but I found some online.
So the first section was about the very beginnings of Takarazuka that included mostly traditional Japanese dances!
It was called 宝塚をどり (Takarazuka (w)o dori) which is some kind of wordplay I think, as the 'wo' actually is a grammatical particle but when you speak it, it sounds like O-dori which means 'dance'.
It started with nothing more then Kabuki at it's best!
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| Pic: Takarazuka Revue's facebook |
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Side note: In Kabuki, all the parts are played by men. Also, before Takarazuka, in Japan women were not allowed to play theater for centuries.
The Dance-show included several songs and dances about different nature-related themes like flowers, water and fire.
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| Pic: mainichi.jp | | |
It ended in a beautiful finale with a lot of fans and cherry blossoms and colors (*-*)
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| pic: mainichi.jp |
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The second part of the show was a western-style musical.
明日への指針/The guide to the future.
It was a romantic funny musical that took place on a ship.
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| Pic: Mainichi.jp |
Masaki Ryu!
My list of favourite Takarasienne has a new member XD
I really didn't think that we would be able to see the Top stars, I thought on a friday at 13pm there is rather something like a understudy.
But no, we saw the Topstars of Moon group!!
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| Pic: Takarazuka's facebook page |
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Then was a break again and then came the last part of the 3-hours-show, which was called 'Takarazuka 100 Flower poems!'
It was an amazing Revue show that was almost one hour long!
It is tradition at Takarazuka, that after the main musical, there is always a finale-show with colorful, sparkling costumes on the huge Revue-stage.
As a part of this finale, always the junior-students of Takarazuka school do a Can Can-dance!
But this time it was not a normal Can Can, it was a Can-Can consisting of 50 girls performing perfectly synchron infront of a huge mirror wall, so in the end that it was a Can Can consisting of 100 girls! Or wear it even in reality 100 girls? I have no idea XD However I'm absolutely sure they were more than 50!
Afterwards came a nice compilation of scenes from famous plays, just as 'Rose of Versailles', 'Lucifer's tears' and other plays!
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| pic: http://astand.asahi.com |
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| Pic: http://pic.prepics-cdn.com |
And of course, the pair dance of Masaki Ryu and her partner Reika Manaki!
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| pic: mainichi.jp | | | |
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| pic: http://mainichi.jp |
And then after every song you think: 'Omg that was amazing, that was the best. It cannot become any more bigger, more sparkling, more perfect!'
...But it can XD
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| Pic: http://astand.asahi.com |
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| pic:http://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/tashumidetabo/ |
Look at those hats!
It was ..unbelievable. I still can not find the words to describe it accurately . It exceeded all my expectations!
The voiced were amazing!! The stage design was..absolutely breath-taking beautiful, I've never seen that much glitter an sparkle and feathers and and and..!
The show was perfect! They had a lot of dances and very difficult choreographies but everything was perfect, synchron and beautiful!
Just one thing happened when the main male dancers had a group dance at the end of the show, they had to come to the stage through something like a glittering curtain that consisted of something like silver tinsel (lametta).
But one of the very long tinsel stuck to one of the dancer's clothes at her shoulder and she could not get it off (>//<) I felt so sorry for her because she had to dance synchronous to the others and it was really bothering her.. but then luckily the dancer next to her put it off of her back in a very small movement without even interrupting the dance. Well that's team-work!
Still, you can not describe how beautiful, dreamlike and gorgeous everything is.. not only the show, the whole place, the theater, the athmosphere - I'm so happy that I had the chance to see Takarazuka. If you ever saw a video, it is nothing compared to the live show! I'm definitely more addicted to it than before
宝塚歌劇、 お誕生日おめでとうございます！
Takarazuka, Happy Birthday!
