🏳️🌈They/Them, NB Lesbian🏳️🌈 ◉A blog to share my thoughts, my work, my writing and my life... and my fandoms ◉Anime/Games/Movie Journalist in Japan, Freelance Writer (Writing Portfolio) ◉J-idol Obsessive (ももクロ, ukka) ◉Occasional Photography ◉Living in Japan, Finding Myself (ENG/日本語 OK)
Jewels of Takarazuka – Serika Toa-san [Cosmos Troupe] (from Fujingaho August Issue)
"I realise that I'm colourlessly transparent in nature that I haven't changed much."
This series documents the powerful words of Takarazuka Top Stars that give courage. The new Cosmos Troupe Top Star Serika Toa-san appears on this month's issue. No matter what kind of profound roles that she plays, Serika-san always gives a feeling of a "dominant immaculacy". If you look at her and things surrounding her, you'd realise that she has been walking forward without hesitation and her accumulative experiences have reflected this complex but beautiful radiance, which we now want to know more about what she is thinking about.
(Note: Happy Shonichi for Serika-san's "Xcalibur"! This is her first performance as a Top Star, and it's worth the celebration of a translation:D)
“I am colourlessly transparent”. I remembered being a little shocked when I heard Serika-san’s words from before. Because Takarasiennes always do their best to showcase their respective strong styles…
3 years has passed since then, and now she has become Top Star, I wonder if there have been any changes?
“I’m not sure if there were any changes. But my position before was that I was able to play many interesting roles. It really was a good experience that I got to play a wide range of roles.”
So among those, what was the most ambitious role that you’ve taken on?
“I would say Rocky from “HIGH AND LOW” was quite difficult. It was very hard of Kuroki Keiji-san to play [Rocky] with that impression, and later knowing that [HIGH AND LOW] was going to be staged as a musical, there was difficulty that Takarazuka Revue is going to be performing this. [Such as thinking Rocky]’s going to be singing…? Finally, I wanted to mix a little of Kuroki-san’s vibes of Rocky [into my portrayal] and aimed to adjust my mindset to perform as such on the stage.”
What lies at the heart of Serika-san’s approach to portray these characters?
“I would make myself aware with how these roles would ultimately end up as. After figuring our their final destination and the “present” [of the plot], then I dive deeper from there. When there’s a goal and the present [starting line], then my approach is that I’ll delve deeper into whatever is in between the two.”
Would that also be a way of thinking that can be used not just for approaching your characters?
“I’d say so. When I think about my objective, and the current situation that I’m in, I will go deeper into that gap in between…For instance, if I couldn’t turn well in my dance, I would think whether there was something wrong with my posture. When I realise my situation, then the image of the solution will appear itself. The key is how to focus on yourself. No matter what you do, knowing about yourself is the best shortcut of growing up and improving. And the many failures will be the times when you know more about yourself. Looking back on the failures, it’s shock after shock after shock... You definitely want to evade [from those failures]. But you can’t escape from them by chance and each time you’d have to think logically… and that’s the approach that made me arrive at this point.”
Behind that sparkling smile as she talks, she looks back to the failures and realises these experiences that have accumulated solidly. But those times had been difficult… I wonder what she would be thinking during these times?
“When there were times that I couldn’t help myself, there is a great presence [of support] from everyone in the troupe after all. There were many times that I thought we could overcome this because we’re all in this together. I believed that my roles and lines exist for partners [that act alongside me]. For example, if I have to portray an amazing role, it is by the strength of surrounding factors that could show how amazing the role is. So for that, everyone and I must be careful with showing it. This [cooperation] is the culture of Takarazuka Revue, and also the responsibility of an upperclassman. When [the cooperation] is being executed, you can feel from everyone [that they are working on it together].
When she was transferred to Cosmos Troupe [in 2018], I thought how Serika-san used to say it was difficult to guide her juniors but for Serika-san now, she felt a great change in herself from that.
“After all, when we communicate daily, I got to know how this person is like from their ways of thinking in this process. It has been a while since I transferred into Cosmos Troupe and I’ve been feeling great changes since then. Of course, this is also for the change in position. Our great troupe leader (kumichou) Susshi-san (Kotobuki Tsukasa) and [previous] Top Star Makaze (Suzuho)-san graduated, and I’ll have to think of how to lead the whole troupe. But when I give advice to my partners, or when I look back on how I console [people] from their troubles, in the end that was the greatest I’ve seen in my growth.”
From there, Serika-san’s Cosmos Troupe begins. What are your hopes for the reliant Cosmos Troupe members?
“Everyone in Cosmos Troupe is very serious and are very skilled. But even we enjoy being fun and unserious every day, we try not to do that on stage…I hope to support everyone and adding colour to the sophisticated Cosmos Troupe members is one of my missions.”
Her [Top Star] debut performance will be “Xcalibur”. This will be Japan’s premiere of this Korean musical with the songs composed by Frank Wildhorn.
“Korean musicals have an image of [encompassing superb songs]. For this performance as well, the volume and textures of Mr Wildhorn’s songs are fantastic. It takes the strength to sing Mr Wildhorn’s songs but it’s great to sing them. Besides, some songs delicately touch the heart and you could feel the softness of the piano melody. When creating this performance, the songs help me expand the imagination on how to portray my role, so I am looking forward to other hints that this musical would provide.”
Even with a condensed career, she has this immaculacy and transparency that never fades, and from there she continues to solidly accumulate her honed skills and mentality… Along with the struggles [that may rise], we look forward to how Serika-san’s energy will radiate.
MY JEWEL ~The jewel of the heart~
When talking about her teacup poodle Candy-chan (on the right), Serika-san’s face melts away in happiness.
“I love her dearly because I thought that I should work harder every day for her… Since she came to our house, I never wanted her to hate this place, or fear this place. When I ask “are you gong to sleep?”, her fixed position is [sleeping] on my lap… She’s just a princess.”
On the left is her chiwawa Purin-chan from her family home.
ON STAGE…
This is from the finale of “Casino Royale~My Name is Bond”. Serika-san played an antagonistic role of Le Chiffre, but in the finale she showed a bright smile and appeared almost like a “Prince Highness”. This costume with a tight collar is matched in noble elegance.
Cosmos Troupe performance: Musical “Xcalibur” (Adaptation and Direction by Inaba Daichi)
The Korean production company EMK Musical created numerous works such as “Mata Hari”, “The Man Who Laughs” and they collaborated with the outstanding creator Frank Wildhorn for this gigantic musical. Ever since the premiere in 2019, this has been a topical performance with over 32 thousand audiences in Korea.
Directors Daniel Kwan and Scheinert spoke to Salon about their bold new film that embraces the profound and profane
Shut up I'm not crying.
Also behold the rewards of research and sensitivity!! That's practically a fable - like the lion decided out of true generosity of spirit to research mice and discovered it actually WAS a mouse and that was why being a lion was so goddamn difficult ... the analogy needs work but you get it.
Anyway go and see Everything Everywhere All At Once. People said it was what ADHD feels like and going in I was like "if it gives normal people ADHD glasses then how will I, an ADHD person, even be able to distinguish that" ... and then there were scenes like "The protagonist is having an extremely fraught conversation about her taxes. She is simultaneously, in another reality having a very fraught conversation about saving the universe. In both, she is scolded for not paying enough attention although in one her interlocutor should KNOW exactly why this is difficult." And the line "I never know what is going on but I have a feeling it's my fault!" ... and I was all OK yes this is in fact what ADHD feels like.
The people that think trans people want to force people to have sex with us have the same energy as those people in the early 2010s who seemed to think that if gay marriage was made legal they’d be forced into a lesbian sex colony against their will or something
I ended up having a conversation with a Japanese person about this after an all nighter and I can’t help but want to rant about it here but: it’s hard to comprehend the gap between my genuine care for North East England, a place I grew up in, and my despair encapsulating my detestment for it.
I genuinely don’t think anything could radicalize you more than life in the region. When you talk of education discrepancies with someone whose family has been in the sector for their entire life, or experienced just how little the investment in the region has left its people further and further isolated and divided from the idea of being a member of the nation they’re born within, it’s hard not to understand just why people were wooed by promises of Brexit and closed borders and the false promises of the far right.
What have you got to lose? When the shipyards died and Thatcher closed the mines, no investment was given to the region to ensure it could evolve and recover from the derelict state it was left in at the end of the 1980s. Buildings lie derelict or depressed, a shell that’s falling apart filled with poverty-stricken populaces without upward mobility to anything approaching a future. If you want one you leave, and it’s exactly what I did.
Yet a conversation of schools and an environment in a dozen schools across the south of all fundings leaves a picture that’s near-unrecognizable. Uniforms worn with pride, exchange students sharing cultures and boosting school funding who’d never reach north of Birmingham because the area’s too rough and undesirable, and the way the promise of jobs and regional investment attract money and opportunities that sound like fantasy where I’m from, where the only uniform is a football shirt representing the central, solitary, final beacon of hope to a terminally-derelict region.
I have these conversations of life in the south of England like it’s a foreign country. It represents nothing I know, and nothing I could ever know. I’m a region where wages are 20% lower, half are on food banks, investment is non-existent, people are dying (and far younger), is it a wonder that there’s nothing left that could give them even a sliver of hope for the future? why should they expect change when all they have is betrayal?
And the result is an area I hated living in, with every fiber of my suffocated, introverted, despaired existence. I couldn’t wait to leave because it was soul-crushing and grave from every metric. Yen it’s an area I can’t help but feel angry on its behalf, because these kind people are abandoned and deserve a future that many would rather see disappear entirely. The mines and imagery of it tower of the region as there’s nothing left but these closed shafts to the crust with a warmth greater than they ever earned from Westminister.
I live thousands of miles away yet care just as much if not more than ever, even as I would never return. Systemic issues hold it back from ever changing, and if that doesn’t radicalize you, what will?
By the way these are older 2020 pictures, my Polaroid camera is currently, well, broken… unfortunately 😭
There's so much lore. An original soundtrack (masterlist here, thanks to @thisisnotjuli). It all began with a pair of boots. Then, a movie poster by @beelzeebub:
And here's how it's going:
@ms-musers:
@lspy:
@monsterhospital:
@waldwynde:
@fireleaptfromhousetohouse:
@mjulmjul:
@marella-moon:
@holl-horse:
@bricktoygrapher:
@greenscircus:
@theshitpostcalligrapher:
@sweetdollface:
@onion-souls:
@onemagpie:
@gregspectations:
@mimiadraws:
@flurgburgler:
@shrugsinchinese:
@runfreebirdrun:
@when-sanpape-arts:
@marblellous:
@ynngaa:
@vanwizard:
@inthefallofasparrow:
@1percentcharge:
And lastly, before she was Wonderwoman, @reallyndacarter was "Dancer #2." She has kindly revealed this hitherto unreleased photo from the world premier of the film:
Obsessed with Goncharov? Need more? If you want to join in, please be sure to use the tags #goncharov (for posterity) and #unreality (for those who need it). Take care out there!
stormborns
dededos
izzy806
tangentwithtanner
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