PAYDAY
October 2006
Set at a kiosk, a unique little shop selling only bottles of water and newspapers, PAYDAY looks at “trading” as one of the most significant forms of human communication. The vendor, a woman, performs a series of routine actions to open the shop every day, only in a unique, rather mechanical way. Her actions from setting up the stand to putting out merchandise to prepare for the day’s business are the core essence of this play.
The vendor rides a mobile chair on wheels, tugging on two lines of rope that connect her waist and the inside of the kiosk: a metaphor of her past profession as a tightrope walker at a circus.. Her repetitive, mechanical actions of setting up the shop for the day represent various human emotions such as the despair of the repressed laborers and their hope for freedom as well as their hardships and their pride.
This piece has been restaged in several different versions, each adapted to the respective local venue, under the title KIOSK.
DIRECTED BY: Yasuki Fujita
TEXT AND CONCEPT BY : Shino Kuraishi
PERFORMED BY: Tomoko Ando
MUSIC COMPOSED AND PERFORMED BY: Osamu Saruyama
STAGE MANAGER: Ryo Koga
LIGHTING DESIGNER : Minoru Chida
SOUND DESIGNER : Yusuke Hatakeyama
COSTUME DESIGNER : Yoko Ando
COSTUME CREATOR: Naoya Watabe
PHOTOGRAPHER : Katsu Miyauchi
PRODUCER : Keizo Maeda Miki Amano