''Rashomon'' is the name of several different stage productions, all ultimately derived from works by

Ryūnosuke Akutagawa , art name , was a Japanese writer active in the Taishō period in Japan. He is regarded as the "father of the Japanese short story", and Japan's premier literary award, the Akutagawa Prize, is named after him. He committed suicide at the age ...

Source material

's two short stories "

Rashomon is a 1950 Jidaigeki psychological thriller/crime film directed and written by Akira Kurosawa, working in close collaboration with cinematographer Kazuo Miyagawa. Starring Toshiro Mifune, Machiko Kyō, Masayuki Mori, and Takashi Shimura as va ...

" (1915), also known as "The Rashomon Gate", and "

In a Grove , also translated as ''In a Bamboo Grove'', is a Japanese short story by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa first published in 1922. It was ranked as one of the "10 best Asian novels of all time" by ''The Telegraph'' in 2014. ''In a Grove'' has been adapted se ...

" (1922), also known as "The Cedar Grove", were famously fused and adapted as the basis for

Akira Kurosawa was a Japanese filmmaker and painter who directed thirty films in a career spanning over five decades. He is widely regarded as one of the most important and influential filmmakers in the history of cinema. Kurosawa displayed a bold, dy ...

's 1950 award-winning film ''

'', screenplay by Kurosawa and frequent collaborator

Shinobu Hashimoto Shinobu Hashimoto ( ja, 橋本忍, ''Hashimoto Shinobu''; 18 April 1918 – 19 July 2018) was a Japanese screenwriter, film director and producer. A frequent collaborator of Akira Kurosawa, he wrote the scripts for such internationally acclaime ...

. In 1951 the film won an honorary International Academy Award, following the success of the film in winning a Golden Lion award at the

Venice Film Festival The Venice Film Festival or Venice International Film Festival ( it, Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica della Biennale di Venezia, "International Exhibition of Cinematographic Art of the Venice Biennale") is an annual film festival h ...

in the same year. The Kurosawa and Hashimoto screenplay deviates from Akutagawa's original stories in a number of ways, most notably by allowing a note of hope to triumph over Akutagawa's dark pessimism. Neither Akutagawa's story nor any of the plays based on it share anything with the popular traditional

Rashōmon (Noh play) ''Rashōmon'' (羅生門) is a Noh play by Kanze Nobumitsu (c.1420). Like other celebrated dramas such as the Maodori-hasi and Ibaraki, it is based on the legend of ''Watanabe no Tsuna'' and the demon of Rashōmon. Historical setting The play ...

(c.1420) about a man who climbs the

rajōmon , also called , was the gate built at the southern end of the monumental Suzaku Avenue in the ancient Japanese cities of Heijō-kyō (Nara) and Heian-kyō (Kyoto), in accordance with the Chinese grid-patterned city layout. At the other far north ...

gate to see if a demon is on top of it.

Stage versions

Fay and Michael Kanin

This 1959 Broadway adaptation by

Fay A fairy (also fay, fae, fey, fair folk, or faerie) is a type of mythical being or legendary creature found in the folklore of multiple European cultures (including Celtic, Slavic, Germanic, English, and French folklore), a form of spirit, o ...

and

Michael Kanin Michael Kanin (February 1, 1910 – March 12, 1993) was an American director, producer, playwright and screenwriter who shared an Academy Award with Ring Lardner Jr. for writing the Katharine Hepburn-Spencer Tracy film comedy ''Woman of the Year' ...

ran for six months (January–June) at the Music Box Theatre, New York, starring husband and wife

Rod Steiger Rodney Stephen Steiger (; April 14, 1925July 9, 2002, aged 77) was an American actor, noted for his portrayal of offbeat, often volatile and crazed characters. Cited as "one of Hollywood's most charismatic and dynamic stars," he is closely assoc ...

and

Claire Bloom Patricia Claire Bloom (born 15 February 1931) is an English actress. She is known for leading roles in plays such as ''A Streetcar Named Desire (play), A Streetcar Named Desire,'' ''A Doll's House'', and ''Long Day's Journey into Night'', and ...

. The Kanins' production was nominated for three Tony awards. The Kanins' somewhat sentimental script sticks closely to the film, including elements added by Kurosawa that do not appear in Akutagawa's original short stories. The Kanins later went on to write the film screenplay for the Western ''

The Outrage ''The Outrage'' is a 1964 American Western film directed by Martin Ritt and starring Paul Newman, Laurence Harvey, Claire Bloom, Edward G. Robinson and William Shatner. It is a remake of Akira Kurosawa's 1950 Japanese film '' Rashomon'', base ...

'', which also credits Kurosawa and Akutagawa (but not Hashimoto). ''The Outrage'' was one of several Westerns based on Kurosawa's films, most notably

John Sturges John Eliot Sturges (; January 3, 1910 – August 18, 1992) was an American film director. His films include '' Bad Day at Black Rock'' (1955), '' Gunfight at the O.K. Corral'' (1957), ''The Magnificent Seven'' (1960), '' The Great Escape'' (19 ...

' ''

The Magnificent Seven ''The Magnificent Seven'' is a 1960 American Western film directed by John Sturges. The screenplay by William Roberts is a remake – in an Old West–style – of Akira Kurosawa's 1954 Japanese film '' Seven Samurai'' (itself initially ...

'', adapted from Kurosawa's historical epic ''

Seven Samurai is a 1954 Japanese epic samurai drama film co-written, edited, and directed by Akira Kurosawa. The story takes place in 1586 during the Sengoku period of Japanese history. It follows the story of a village of desperate farmers who hire seven ...

'' (1954), and

Sergio Leone Sergio Leone (; 3 January 1929 – 30 April 1989) was an Italian film director, producer and screenwriter credited as the pioneer of the Spaghetti Western genre and widely regarded as one of the most influential directors in the history of cine ...

's ground-breaking "

Spaghetti Western The Spaghetti Western is a broad subgenre of Western films produced in Europe. It emerged in the mid-1960s in the wake of Sergio Leone's film-making style and international box-office success. The term was used by foreign critics because most ...

" ''

A Fistful of Dollars ''A Fistful of Dollars'' ( it, Per un pugno di dollari, lit=For a Fistful of Dollars titled on-screen as ''Fistful of Dollars'') is a 1964 Spaghetti Western film directed by Sergio Leone and starring Clint Eastwood in his first leading role, ...

'' (1964). The Kanins' script was also staged on U.S. television as a "Play of the Week" (1960).

East West Players East West Players is an Asian American theatre organization in Los Angeles, founded in 1965. As the nation's first professional Asian American theatre organization, East West Players continues to produce works and educational programs that give ...

(EWP) presented the first intimate staging of the Kanins' script, as their inaugural production in 1966. The show was revived two more times by EWP before retiring (once during their 5th season in 1970, and once in their 20th season in 1986). More modern adaptations of ''Rashomon'' have gone back to Akutagawa's original stories.

Ivor Benjamin

Ivor Benjamin's 1988 adaptation is from original translations by Jane Guaschi, then a language student at Sheffield University, U.K., and stays closer to the bleaker viewpoint of Akutagawa than the Kanins' version. This adaptation received its international premiere by torytellers Theatre Company(no longer in operation), Ireland, 2005, for which the tour was nominated for two ESB/Irish Times 2005 Theatre Awards:

Liam Halligan Liam James Halligan (born 29 April 1969) is a British economist, journalist, author and broadcaster. He is currently economics and business editor at GB News. Since 2003, Halligan has written a weekly column in ''The Sunday Telegraph''. He al ...

for Best Director and Chisato Yoshimi for Best Costume Design. The script has also been performed at Jackson's Lane Theatre, London, UK (1988), the University of the Philippines (2000), in Ashland, Oregon, USA (2005) and by Black Sheep Theatre Company,

Rochester, New York Rochester () is a city in the U.S. state of New York, the seat of Monroe County, and the fourth-most populous in the state after New York City, Buffalo, and Yonkers, with a population of 211,328 at the 2020 United States census. Located i ...

, US (2009).

Other adaptations

''Rashomon'' – adaptation by Meena Natarajan and Luu Pham for Pangea World Theater (2000). ''Rashomon'' – adaptation by Philippe Cherbonnier (after Akutagawa), directed by Kwong Loke, Kumiko Mendl and David K.S. Tse for

Yellow Earth Theatre Yellow Earth Theatre is an internationally touring theatre company based in London and established in 1995 to raise the profile of British East Asian theatre. The company also runs several initiatives to support and develop British East Asian tal ...

Company, London UK and tour, (2001). ''Rashomon'' – a 1996 English language opera by London-based Argentine composer

Alejandro Viñao Alejandro Viñao (born 4 September 1951) is an Argentinian composer currently living in the United Kingdom. Life and career Viñao studied musical composition in Buenos Aires with the composer Jacobo Ficher. In 1976 he was awarded a British Coun ...

, with libretto by Craig Raine.Poetry Wales – Volume 32 – Page 48 Welsh Arts Council – 1996 "With Rashomon, the composer Alejandro Vinao phoned me up and asked if I was interested in doing an opera and I said, "Let's talk about this". Because it was wonderful doing an opera at Glyndebourne, but it took a tremendous amount of ..."

References

External links

IMDb - ''Rashomon'' - Akira Kurosawa
and
Play of the Week

IBDB - ''Rashomon'' - Fay & Michael Kanin

Projecttartscentre.ie

Yellow Earth adaptation
{{In a Grove Japanese plays Asian-American theatre 1959 plays Rashōmon 1988 plays Japan in non-Japanese culture