Essay Shibaitaroka, Japan! By 桂三輝	フレームで見る  英文をプリントする  脚注をプリントする
日本をしばいたろか！ 筆者は1月の末に、米国出身のお笑い芸人であるリー5世と関西テレビのバラエティー番組に出演した。 しっかりとした台本のあるアメリカのコメディーと違い、状況に応じた芸人のとっさのリアクションを生命線とするこの種の番組、果たしてどんな苦難、難題が2人を待ち受けていたのか…？！

Last month I had my first opportunity to take part in my own Japanese "Variety Show." American performer Lee V and I teamed up with a great production team assembled by Kansai Television to create the show Shibaitaroka Japan!

As befits the principal players in a Japanese variety show, Lee and I were really put through the hoops! We started shooting with the opening segment, a little scripted skit, set in a kushi-katsu (fried food on skewers) restaurant. That was fun, but that was also where the fun and games ended.

After that it was close to torture. We were first whisked away to the mountains on the outskirts of Osaka, approaching Wakayama, to undergo a uniquely Japanese kind of religious shugyo or training. In the freezing cold, wearing nothing but short white kimonos, we were made to stand under a freezing cold waterfall for over a minute. Being Canadian, I was quite confident that I could withstand the cold. I was wrong. It was really cold. Really, really cold.

We were then taken to a Japanese traditional cooking school, where the master chef offered us several "traditional" Japanese delicacies. The most difficult dish to stomach was sweetened fried grasshoppers. I really wish they had done something to them to conceal the fact that we were eating grasshoppers, and then not told us we were eating grasshoppers. I have to admit, though, that they didn't taste as bad as they looked, but that's not saying much.

This style of show is much more popular in Japan than in Canada or the United States. In North America, the most popular kind of comedy show is the sitcom, or "situation comedy." This kind of show, like the popular show Friends which was widely seen in Japan as well, is a tightly-scripted performance by the same set of characters in the same setting every episode.Fans get to know the characters' personalities, quirks, peculiar habits and set phrases, a lot like Japanese vaudeville, new comic plays (shinkigeki).

In Japan, on the other hand, a more common pattern is to send some geinin, or comedians on one or more adventures on location and just see what happens. The script is very bare-bones and the show relies heavily on the quick wits and spontaneous reactions of the comedians.

It was a real honor to be invited to do our own show, and I hope they invite us to do it again. On the other hand, maybe I should be careful what I wish for.

Shukan ST: February 11, 2011

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