When I went to go see Kuromyu and Furukawa’s new Sebastian, I thought to myself during the opening scene, “Ah, this is an interpretation of Sebastian that emphasizes he’s not human!” This time around, I wasn’t able to assist with their rehearsals, so I left it all up to Furukawa to decide how he was going to play this role, and it was very refreshing to see how that turned out. My own personal feeling was that Furukawa has been the first to be able to play Sebastian as really demonic. I take care to draw Sebastian with the idea that he should feel inhuman, so I was very impressed that he captured that interpretation in a human form (which is the only possible way, of course, haha) with his performance and made me feel, “Ah, he’s not human.” I was very impressed by that, and at the same time, I was very happy that he took away that interpretation that after reading the manga. After seeing the show, I was able to speak with Furukawa a little while in the dressing rooms, so after that I’m very excited to see how his explanation of Sebastian might change. I have plans to go see the show one more time after this. Furukawa’s Sebastian is very elegant and beautiful, but all the while there is a feeling that there’s something terrifying and monstrous about him, so this is a Sebastian that’s definitely not human. Meanwhile, Fukuzaki’s (Ciel) performance compared to last year’s was much more emotional, so I felt the contrast between Sebastian and Ciel was very emotionally hot and cold. For those who are going to see it, please do enjoy. I’m going to say this even though there will probably be some misunderstandings, but I got the impression that Furukawa presented a demonic “face” that was closer to the manga when compared to the anime Sebastian. He was very much like some strange creature, and it was as if I could see the wisps of black smoke from his body when he got serious (I can’t praise him enough really!). Anyway, to avoid taking up too much time, I thought I’d try to talk about just Sebastian. He left a very good impression on me. I think that others going to see the show will also feel a very real sense of what I mentioned earlier, that feeling that there’s always something horrifying lurking despite how beautiful he appears. For those who have the opportunity to experience the show for yourself, please do and please enjoy.
Yana Toboso, thoughts on Kuromyu 2015
Translation by Nimbus















