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Nyotaimori

SARAH BERTHIAUME

26

detsember
Author Sarah Berthiaume
Premier : November 2022, Tallinn, Estonia
Set Designer
Composer
Light Design

Story

A triptych is written for three actors. The character of Maude, a freelance and underpaid freelance journalist based in Montreal, Canada, is represented in three parts, the other two actors playing different characters in each part. The storyline follows Maude's increasingly pressured attempt to meet the deadline for his story, Curriculum Opportunities: Cross-Perspectives for the Future. Activities take place in parallel in the Americas, India and Maude's hometown. Suddenly, these locations are confused, throwing characters from one place to another without cause or hindrance. There are many recurring motifs that go through all parts of the triptych, such as new shiny cars, yoga (breathing), underwear called Empowerbra, and no less important nyotaimori tradition, which gives the play its name.

Tradition

The origin of nyotaimori can be traced back to the food play of wakamezake performed in Yūkaku during the Edo period, where sake would be poured into sex worker's pubic region for drinking purposes. Fuelled by Japan's economic growth in the 1960s, this practice was further evolved by the hot spring bathing (onsen) industry in the Ishikawa Prefecture where the erotic nature of nyotaimori was used as an advertising tactic by the hot spring resorts to attract male customers who were on company trips to the region. The nyotaimori practice dwindled as family and private trips to the onsen destinations became increasingly popular in the 1980s and it was subsequently adopted by catering and sex establishments as an exotic attraction

Director :

'This story brings a whole new level of astonishment. But, of course, nothing is surprising in the structure of the form itself and the unjustified amalgamation of different times and places of activities - this has been seen before. Yet something more is happening in Nyotaimori. We do not only jump in time and space but merge with it, losing our identity. Your Self, if you will, but also understandings about it. On the one hand, in this fusion, the author creates a landscape of over-exploiting toyotism and empowerbra, infiltrating and undermining the advertising industry, where the factory effect is part of both the lifestyle of Toyota City in the future and the nostalgia of starting branding of the car industry in the '70s. But, on the other hand, she takes away the grips to hold on to help you onto the surface again. On its own, there is nothing supernatural about the moments or actions depicted in the story. Still, yes, we allow ourselves to be sucked into it and ... In the philosophical plane of its tradition, Nyotaimori is simply an act of supreme submission, in its vulnerability and the beauty of service. Is it erotica? Is this an industry? Is this the way you live? All this would not happen if you were not alone in your heart. You wouldn't be alone if you could distinguish the difference. To differ.'