There are many excellent theatres in Portland. I am fortunate to be able to work with several well established companies who are putting on new and challenging and engaging productions. One of the productions I'm currently working on is "Enjoy."
I usually keep my performance interpreting posts and information over at the Performing Arts Interpreting Alliance, but "Enjoy" by Toshiki Okada at CoHo Productions also belongs here. This is a new play (it was written in 2006) and has rarely been performed in the United States; this is its West Coast premiere. It is definitely a play to see and not one you will see. It opens on January 17th and runs through February 8th.
"Enjoy" is well written and, although I have only seen a run through, from what I saw on Saturday, the direction and the acting are up to the task of the words on the page. Toshiki Okada has a theater company, chelfitsch, for which he writes and directs all of their productions. His productions include movement and sound in particular, non-standard ways. The director of the CoHo production, Michael Griggs, has incorporated that style into the play which opens later this month.
I will be interpreting the play with Steve Nail, for two performances: Friday 1/31 at 7:30 pm and Sunday 2/2 at 2:00 pm, which will be followed by a panel discussion. There are other special events in conjunction with this play, which you can read about by visiting the CoHo website (click on ENJOY).
If you have a little extra cash and would like to get a jump start on your charitable donations for 2014, there is an Indiegogo campaign to help raise funds for this production. You can read more about the CoHo Productions process as well as more about this play and the production on the Enjoy Indiegogo campaign website, which includes a short video about the production.
COHO PRODUCTIONS PRESENTS
Enjoy
By Toshiki Okada
English Translation by Aya Ogawa
Co-produced and Directed by Michael Griggs
Enjoy
By Toshiki Okada
English Translation by Aya Ogawa
Co-produced and Directed by Michael Griggs
In a Japanese manga café, nine underemployed “freeters” (part-time or temp workers) share their stories of break-ups, hook-ups, smelly free-loading customers, 30thbirthday-induced terror, present depressions, past failures and future panics. This is the cry of Japan's Lost Decade Generation—those with the misfortune to have graduated while the economy crashed. A member of this generation himself, Okada captures the hyper-colloquial, chronically self-reflective language, and Ogawa translates into pitch-perfect absurdist hipster poetry.
Enjoy runs Thursday through Sunday each week from January 17, 2014 through February 8, 2014, at the CoHo Theatre, located at 2257 NW Raleigh Street in Portland, Oregon. (Interpreted performances on January 31st and February 2nd.)*
Shows start at 7:30pm each Thursday through Saturday, with a Sunday matinee at 2pm. Tickets run $20–25 and are sold at a reduced rate of $15 for shows on Thrifty Thursdays.