A way from the bustle of the Waseda University students just around the corner, a quite different demographic gathered in a rehearsal studio there to prepare for their world premiere in Tokyo's theater youth culture hub of Shimokitazawa.
Answering a call from 59-year-old theater producer and director Sho Ryuzanji, eight veterans of the Japanese stage world -- average age 79 -- spent two months in that cozy rehearsal studio together with five young actors, sharpening what they were determined would be a cool but classy stage production at the Suzunari Theater. The veterans are all busy drama professionals -- directors, actors, a theater owner, a musician and a noh actor.
Ichiro Inui -- at 90, the oldest member of the ad hoc Paradise Ichiza (Paradise Company) and, as a director at the prominent Bungakuza (Literary) theater company, Japan's oldest working director -- told The Japan Times about his aspirations for the project.