TORAFU ARCHITECTS

Commemorating 20 years of activities, chelfitsch Theater Company staged a recreation of one of their signature plays, including an all new cast, and for which we performed the stage design. Following the premiere of “Five Days in March” in 2004, it has since been performed over 100 times in cities worldwide. This play portrays the everyday lives of young people over five days in March 2003, during which the American military began its aerial bombardment of Iraq. Instead of telling their own stories subjectively, the characters tell second-hand accounts of the events, while occasionally breaking character, as if explaining things directly to the audience. Deliverables included a set able to switch viewpoints depending on the words and movements of the actors as the action unfolds in a love hotel in Shibuya, at an intersection, or in the middle of Roppongi. Strips of white vinyl tape were posed on the floor surface at regular intervals at an angle of 90 degrees from the center. The white lines take on a life of their own as their presence can suggest a pedestrian crossing, conjure the walls of the hotel or be negated altogether by the actors moving freely as if nothing was there. The large box hanging above the center of the stage where subtitles appear evoke the large displays in Shibuya and the ceiling of the hotel, while its existence itself makes palpable the unrest surrounding the looming war. We sought to recreate Tokyo in March of 2003 with a minimal amount of elements on a stage in 2017.