Event
       Sakura Taisen Kaiyou Show 5 - Kaijin Bessou
       (Sakura Wars Revue the 5th - Villas of the Sea God)
Location
       Shinjuku Kousei Nenkin Kaikan
Date
       2001.08.17
Time
       18:30~ (around 3 hours)
Starring
       Regulars:
       Shinguji Sakura [Hana-gumi] (Yokoyama Chisa)
       Kanzaki Sumire [Hana-gumi] (Tomizawa Michie)
       Tachubana Maria [Hana-gumi] (Takano Urara)
       Iris [Hana-gumi] (Nishihara Kumiko)
       Ri Kohran [Hana-gumi] (Fuchizaki Yuriko)
       Kirishima Kanna [Hana-gumi] (Tanaka Mayumi)
       Soletta Orihime [Hana-gumi] (Okamoto Maya)
       Reni Milchstrasse [Hana-gumi] (Ikura Kazue)
       Fujieda Kaede [Deputy Manager] (Orikasa Ai)
       Oogami Ichiro [Captain] (Suyama Akio)
       Oyakata [Stage property manager] (Nakajima Toshihiko)
       Kotone [Bara-gumi] (Yao Kazuki)
       Kikunojo [Bara-Gumi] (Matsuno Taiki)
       Dan Kousuke [Dandy Boss] (Sonooka Shintaro)
       Nishimura Yantaro [Dandy Gang member] (Nishimura Youichi)
       Takeda Peromucho [Dandy Gang member] (Takeda Shigehiro)
       Kaneda Kinshiro [script writer] (Hotaru Yukijiro)
       Guests:
       Shinguji Kazuma (except 8/15, Nozawa Nachi; 8/15 voice only)
       Shirokitsune no Rei (8/10.11, Lasalle Ishii)
       Shirokitsune no Rei (8/12.14, Shimizu Yoshiko)
       Shirokitsune no Rei (8/15.17.18, Shimazaki Toshiro)
       Matsukichi (Sanyutei Tonraku)
       Higashichuken Unkokusai (Kunimoto Takeharu)
       Onna (Yamazawa Nori)
       Kodomo (Anna)
Cost
       SS Seat : 9000 yen
       S  Seat : 7000 yen
       A  Seat : 4000 yen

  * Event report version 0.5 by CuSO4, 2001.09.05

The show is around 3 hours long and there are totally 10 sessions :
  8/10 - 18:00
  8/11 - 13:00
  8/11 - 18:00
  8/12 - 13:00
  8/12 - 18:00
  8/14 - 13:00
  8/14 - 18:00
  8/15 - 18:30
  8/17 - 18:30
  8/18 - 13:00

The ticket I bought was a S seat (2nd floor) on 8/17, the second
last day of the show.

Stephen Lee and I was in the Avex Mode Anime Rave 2001 event in
early afternoon that day.  Sakura Taisen Hana-gumi members were
also there.  They left the event at around 16:00 to go back to
Shinjuku to prepare for the Kayou Show.  Stephen and I stayed a
little bit longer till around 16:30 to watch the Sakura Taisen
Paris Hana-gumi performance.

We left Ariake Big Sight, took the TRW to go to Shinkiba, changed
to Subway and arrived at Shinjuku 3-chome at around 17:15.  Met
up with Richard "Pocky" Kim in Shinjuku 5-chome and went to the
venue.

When we arrived, there was already a long queue there, same as
previous Kayou Show.  Many Sakura Taisen Cosplayer there.
Nearly all the Sakura Taisen main characters had people
cosplaying them.  And same as last year, they had put a large
block of ice in the corridor where people were queuing to
cool the air.

When we were approaching the tail of the queue, Dandy Boss,
Takeda, Nishimura, and Kaneda-sensei were saying hello to the
people queuing up.  I managed to shake hands with Kaneda-sensei.
^_^

They let people to go inside the venue at 17:30.  As usual, large
number of people rush to the kiosk to get the Sakura Taisen Kayou
Show goods after camera check.  This year's goods are :
  Lamune Pack (2 Lamune plus an Iris omake)  500 yen
  Sakura no Omamori                         1000 yen
  Wristband and Mini Towel (8 design)       1000 yen
  Memorial Poster (B2, Matsubara Hidenori)  1500 yen
  Telephone Card (Red)                      1500 yen
  Telephone Card (Blue)                     1500 yen
  Wrapping Cloth (Furoshiki, 90cm diagonal) 2000 yen
  Pamphlet                                  2000 yen
  T-Shirt                                   2000 yen
  Calendar                                  2000 yen
  Poster                                    2500 yen
  Music Box (song : Subete wa umi he)       2500 yen
  Hana-gumi Strape Set A                    2500 yen
  Hana-gumi Strape Set B                    2500 yen
  Paris Hana-gumi Strape Set                2500 yen

Many goods were sold out in minutes.  I think both Richard and
Stephen bought the Ramune Set, Omamori, and Pamphlet.  I only
bought the pamphlet and Omamori.

The Ramune set has Iris's Omake because there is a song in the
Kayou Show sung by Iris : Ramune no Uta.  The last lyric of the
song is "Shuwaa".    ^_^

The Omamori (guardian charm) is like those Omamori sold at the
shrines.  On the outside, it is written "Arataka Jinja", which
is the place where Sakura's sword Arataka was placed.  Inside
the Omamori, it is a letter written by Sakura's father Kazuma
to Sakura, which is same as the Omamori used in this Kayou Show.

At the other side of the hall, a stall is being setup to sell
the advanced ticket of the upcoming Sakura Taisen movie, with
a Sakura Taisen Clear File illustrated by Matsubara Hidenori
as bonus.  Stephen and I queued up to buy the ticket.  However,
Stephen was the last one who bought the advanced ticket with
clear file, which meant they sold out right in front of me !
;_;

Just before the show started, Hiroi Ohji (original concept
of Sakura Taisen, director and overall producer of the
Kayou Show.  In the Kayou Show world, Hiroi is a stage
worker working under Oyakata) came out and addressed the
audiance.  Oyakata joined him after a few minutes.

Unlike previous year's Kayou show, Hiroi did not reminded
people not to stand up during the show except the final
Sakura Taisen OP song : Geki! Teikoku Kagekidan.

During the talk, Oyakata stated that the Kayou Show was planned
for a 5-year period only, and this year is the 5th year.  After
some more talk, Hiroi said that there will be a "big Kayou show"
next year.  However, please do not read into this too much, as
Hiroi has a record of announcing big during previous year's
Kayou show but failed to compile.  E.g. he said in the 2nd year
that the next year's show would be perform throughout the whole
country, which failed to materialized.

When the show finally began, Richard spot a familiar figure
sitting in the middle of the first row in the second floor.
It was Inoue Kikuko !  Sitting to the right of her was Kozakura
Etsuko, and sitting to the left of her was her manager/sister
Yayoi onee-san.  Another seiyuu, Kimotsuki Kaneta, was seated
a few seats behind her.

[Hana-gumi Revue]
The whole Hana-gumi came out and sang Hana-gumi Revue.

[Prologue]
Then the Deputy Manager of the Daiteikaku Gekijou, Kaede, received
an order from Manager Yoneda that the next play to be performed by
Hana-gumi would be based on Kaijin Bessou, written by Izumi Kyoka.
She was troubled as she had only 3 days' time to settle the script.

Kaede was talking with Gekijou's resident script writer
Kaneda-sensei when they bumped into Dandy Boss.  Dandy-san
suggested to go to an onsen to write the script.  So they
took a bus to go to the onsen (song: Bus wa Yuku Yuku Yume Jousete)

[Act I]
Meanwhile, somewhere in Tokyo, next to an Inari Jinja, there was a
Inari-sushi shop.  (Note: Inari is a kind of thin sweet bean curd.
Inari-sushi is wrapping sushi rice with an Inari sheet.  It is said
that Fox like Inari very much according to folklore.  Inari Jinja
is a shrine dedicated to the spirit of fox, which is believed to be.
a very spiritual animal.)

Kohran and Iris walked by, Iris got her first taste of Ramune.
(song: Ramune no Uta).

The Inari-sushi shop was very famous in previous generations, but
the current owner, Matsukichi, was not up to the standard of his
ancestors and the shop was in the blink of out of business.

Takeda, the self-procliamed Brazilian Japanese, went to the Inari-
sushi shop to make Matsukichi return the money he borrowed from
Takeda.

Orihime and Reni walked by.  It turned out that the whole Hana-gumi
was around as they went to a nearby temple to get some Sakura-mochi.

Sakura was trying to find the Omamori she lost earlier.  The omamori
was given to her by her father Kazuma.  Maria joint her later for
the search.

Later Kohran, Iris and Kanna were also searching for Sakura's
Omamori.  (song: Kangaeru Ashi)

Kanna was very hungry but she had forgot to bring any money.  She
then ate the Inari offered to the fox spirit at the Inari Jinja.

Nishimura Yantaro walked by, fell off the staira, and dropped his
wallet.  During his search for his wallet, he found an Omamori.

Sumire walked by.  (song: Shiawase na Yume)

The Shirokitsune no Rei (white fox spirit) appeared and thought
it was Sumire that stole and ate the offering.  Sumire fought the 5
minor fox spirits and got captured.  In this session, right before
the fight, Sumire got her balance off and fell down, one of the
minor fox spirit help her got up.

Hana-gumi members were around to try to find Sumire, as she had not
turned up.  The Shirokitsune no Rei appeared, and the Hana-gumi got
into a verbal war between them.  The exchange was so fast, and Kanna
gang called the spirit some name which he denied furiously.  The
audiance seems to enjoy the name calling very much.  Unfortunately,
I did not get the name they were calling the spirt.

The spirit then "attached" itself into Sumire, becoming a Sumire
with white furs.  Sumire then fought other Hana-gumi members.
Sakura then appeared and used her special spiritual power from
her sword to "purify" Sumire and made the fox spirit went away.
(song: Guchi Zusamu Uta)

[Showtime : Hana-gumi Iwai Taiko]
All 8 members performed Iwai Taiko.  Taiko is a kind of big durm
used by Japanese during festival.  The Taiko performance is much
much better than the Spring Kayou Show one.  You can feel that
they had practise for a long time.

The performance consists of sevreral parts with no break between
them.  The rhythm changed for every part and the focal persons
changed in an organized way.  There are solo foreground parts by
every individual of the Hana-gumi.  IMHO, Sakura's solo part was
the best of the group.

[Intermission]
Unlike previous Kayou Show, there was no special performance during
the intermission.

We found that Kikuko and Yayoi-onee-san was leaving their seats.
A few minutes later I bumped into Yayoi-onee-san in front of the
ladies' rest room.  I think she was waiting for Kikuko there.

Later, Stephen went talking to Kikuko and told her he had watched
her performance in the Avex Mode Anime Rave 2001 event earlier
that day.

[Act II : Izumi Kyoka's Kaijin Bessou]
Unkokusai narrated the introduction : time was Taisho, when the
people in this era depended on stream energy; place was deep in
the sea, where no people living on land knew it's existence.  The
young master of the sea world in his villa was waiting for his
lover to descend from above the sea......

The heir of the master of the sea, Maria, was feasting with his
advisor (Oyakata) and his subordinates (Kaede, Orihime, Iris).
(song: Umi no Utage, Hana no Utage)

They were waiting for the arrival of the lady originally from the
land (Sakura), who was accompanied by another lady (Sumire), and
guarded by the captain of the soldiers (Reni).

During their wait, Oyakata mentioned something "not lucky" about
the way Sakura came.  They then consulted the Sea Doctor (Kohran).
After checking some literature, Kohran said the rules of the land
was different from the rules of the sea, so it would not be "not
lucky".  (song: Kono Kakimono wa)

Meanwhile, Sakura was riding on a "dragon-horse", accompanied by
Sumire and Reni, went towards Maria's villa.  Sakura was not too
sure if she wanted to go to the villa.  (song: Yoru no Kurage)

At the same time, the red villain (Kanna), was leading her troops
to attack the villa.  Kanna was very funny when she performed this
villain part.

At last, Sakura arrived at the villa.  After several rounds of
talked between her and Maria, which is too long for a "Kayou Show"
IMHO, Sakura finally settled her thought and decided her coming to
the villa was a correct choice.

Suddenly, the troops of Kanna attacked the villa.  After rounds of
VERY VERY funny fights, Maria drove Kanna's troops away.

Tanaka Mayumi is a natural stage performer, as shown in her previous
Kayou Show performance, especially in Kayou Show 3 when she was
Akechi Kojiro in Beni Tokage, where she was crying for Beni Tokage's
death.  This time, her ability to make the audiance ROTFL is in full
gear.

Now that the villain was defeated, Sakura and Maria had the grand
final.  (song: Subete wa Umi he)

[Finale]
The Hana-gumi sang the song Hana-gumi Revue again with 22 dancers.
Then the dancers performed line dance (rocket dance).

Next is the final song : Sakura Taisen OP - Geki! Teikoku Kagekidan,
where all the experienced audiance stood up and performed the
specific gestures together during the chrous.  As mentioned earlier,
since Hiroi Ouji had not told the audiance about the stand-up part
and the gesture part, many people in the second floor did not stand
up.

After the show ended, as usual, some audiance in the first floor
initiated the audiance clapping sequence "ban ban ban, ban ban ban,
ban ban ban, ban".

After I went back to the hotel, I had some time to study the
pamphlet in more details.  I found something:
* It seems that several famous movie director are Sakura Taisen
  Kayou Show fans.  They are : Yamada Yuoji and Amemiya Keita.
* Some of the dancers come from a group called "Performing Art
  Center", which is in charged by Nozawa Nachi (Sakura's father
  Kazuma in this Kayou Show).  Those dancers are known as Nachi
  Musume.
* There is a photo where Maria was cosplaying Sakura in the Sping
  Kayou Show earlier this year.  However, this picture has Sakura
  Singer alongside with the cosplayed Maria.  Apparently this was
  taken fromthe last session of the Spring Kayou Show and is not
  in the DVD release.
* There are photos of Oogami, Kanna, and Iris juggling in the
  Spring Kayou Show.  This juggling part is also not in the DVD.
* There is a photo of Kaede, instead of Iris cosplaying Kaede,
  singing Yoru no Samba with Nishimura and Takeda in the Spring
  Kayou Show.  Again, this is also not in the DVD.

Some final words : I was dividing my time watching the show and
looked at Kikuko, so some of the sequence of the events I wrote
above might be misplaced.  Also, 3 weeks has already passed after
the show, my memory of it might be fading out, so I might make some
mistakes in the report.

I have been to 3 of the 5 summer Kayou Show, and I still find it
very interesting.  I am looking forward to next year's "Big Kayou
Show", if it materialsed.

--

Hitoshi, please feel free to use this report anywhere you like.

--
'CuSO4' Yung
cuso4@cuso4.com, cuso4@manbow.com, chyung@hknet.com, cuso4@cuso4.org