Casual, candid chats with the performers after watching a fascinating play is always a big reason for going to small theaters. If you're looking forward to doing that again in the post-pandemic days, you might want to help save them.
The Shogekijo Aid crowdfunding campaign is raising money to support small playhouses with a capacity of 300 seats or less across Japan, hoping to protect various art forms that have been centered on these venues and cultivated by their staff and fans.
"What theater buffs really thirst for now is to go back to the space of a theater and watch a play there. So I strongly feel the need for maintaining theaters," said freelance art director Mizue Naka, who initiated the campaign.
Shogekijo Aid is the first such action solely targeting facility operators.
Naka in January began Stage Channel, an online streaming service dedicated to theater plays, hoping to help increase the theatergoing population. To get theater arts going, she stressed the importance of "making people who have no habit of going to theaters get involved."
By offering works at a reasonable price, the site was meant to help more people easily enjoy theater plays. If you actually go to a theater, it ususally costs more than going to see a movie.
However, many theater companies and venues have had to either cancel or postpone their plays since late February, when the government issued a request for organizers to suspend cultural events due to the spread of the new coronavirus. Concerned that some venues might have to close for good, Naka decided to launch the fundraising campaign.
Although the state of emergency was lifted this week across the nation, it will likely take some time for many small stage theaters to draw a full house, leaving many theater people in limbo over an uncertain future.
Donations from 500 yen are being accepted until 11:59 p.m. on June 5 at https://motion-gallery.net/projects/shogekijo-aid.
The money raised will be distributed evenly among about 50 small stage theaters.
For those who don't go to any particular theater regularly, or have yet to experience what it's like to watch plays in an intimate environment, the crowdfunding site offers short introduction movies about each venue. You can find some that stir your curiosity and earmark them to visit when they reopen.
The campaign may convey the voices and passion of theatergoers to people who have no particular interest in stage performances.
"They may wonder, 'What is it this theater culture that so many theater people are trying to protect? Let's see how great that is,'" Naka said. "I'll be delighted if this crowdfunding campaign serves as a trigger to make them go to theaters."
Read more from The Japan News at https://japannews.yomiuri.co.jp/
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