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sambart93 · 6 years

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2018.07.31 Danshi wa Tsurakunai yo? / Being a Boy Isn’t Hard? [Review]

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CAST and CHARACTERS

Present Selves Harashima Motohisa Ishiwatari Masshu Akisawa Kentaro Jounin Tatsuki Matsumura Taiichiro

Past Selves Masaki Kaoru Higuchi Yuta Kimura Atsushi Takenaka Ryouhei Fukazawa Taiga

Classmates Takasaki Shungo Iwa Yoshito Tanaka Hiroki Oikawa Kou Horita Reo Sato Nobunaga Yamagata Takumi

Teachers Mende Tomoyuki Murakami Kouhei Nishioka Daisuke Kitadai Takashi Kanesaki Kentaro Totani Kimito

NON-SPOILER REVIEW Overall: This is a lot of fun. Many times the audience were dying in hysterics of laughter. It's a simple story but it's very funny, packed full with comedy and hilarious moments. The characters are interesting and it has some ridiculous moments. I can't really say anythnig else about it other than say it's entertaining and very funny! ALSO I am very thankful for the high-touch at the end of show! I got to high touch with so many actors that I like!! It appears this stage isn't selling out which makes me sad because it's got some really great names in it and it's a lot of fun! Rating: 8.5/10

SPOILER REVIEW

PRE-SHOW Well this place is fancy as fuck... << was the first thoughts that went through my mind xD also I quickly realised that ‘Oh, it's also where Wakasamagumi is going to be this time around!’ which got me excited although I probably won’t be going. I forgot how many damn actors that I love that are in this! And there was a high touch after this so I was super nervous because I like a LOT of actors who were in this!!

MAIN PLOT

So five friends decide to meet up for their 10th year High School anniversary, especially one of them (Masshu) is adamant on them getting their seishun/youth feeling back. So they go back to the place where they all met and were forced to spend one month as a summer extra curriculum activity. While at first, as students, they hated the idea of having to spend a month of their summer holiday doing classes and cleaning and spending time with people they don't know or like, especially our main character Naoki (Harashima Motohisa and Masaki Kaoru) who has no interest at all in making friends or even continuing being with them after the activity is done. But as the summer classes go on, they all genuinely begin to bond and enjoy their time and by the end, they don't want to depart and want to end their summer by making a festival, which will hopefully attract all the nearby schools which all happen to be ALL-GIRL schools (while they're stuck in an all-boys school).

THE SHOW ITSELF

Oh this was so funny! Unfortunately I spent the first 30 minutes of this play in a LOT of pain with my back from some reason so I couldn't fully immerse or get into the story even though I really wanted to laugh along with everyone else! *cries* but once the back-pain passed, I did not stop laughing and there were so many rounds of applause from the audience because so many parts were absolutely hilarious! I was dying of laughter as was everyone else and some of them on stage were dying too - I'm looking right at you Higuchi! He could not contain he laughter at some times xD this little shit.

I'll do my usual, go through actors and hopefully talk about their characters and what I thought and some scenes that stood out to me.

I was so surprised to see Harashima Motohisa (he plays future Naoki) in this! He's one actor who I love no matter what he does but I don't go out of my way to see him so it's always pleasantly surprising when I see him pop up in stuff that I'm watching. I really love how much his cringed at his past self and his past blogs that he used to write and upload. Also I love how at the beginning his suspiciously says 'my job? .... I'm a... I'm a salaryman.' but then towards the end he completely loses it and yells 'I LIED!!! I'm a salaryman!!! I don't want to be normal!!!! I tried being an actor.. I tried being a youtuber... I tried having part time jobs!' and he just blows and it's so funny!

When I first saw Masaki Kaoru, I wasn't keen just purely from me being vain and basing people on their looks. I'd never seen him before so I should've been a bit more open. But I quickly opened up to him and I really enjoyed how ridiculous his character was. Every time he came on stage to narate the next day or the next part of the story, he would always introduce himself as someone else, like 'Good morning, I'm Bob Dylan! That's a lie. I'm Naoki!' and then would proceed along with the story. He ended up being really cute and his character was really nice. I'm glad his character development ended up being good and him learning to appreciate his friends, but also his reaction to his future self was hilarious (more on that later). He's an Amuse kid and he was in ODAC's HOME when I watched it last week (I still haven't released that review have I?! Jesus just how far behind am I... damn K-TV taking up all my time). One scene in this I really liked was when Higuchi brought some snacks and games for them to bond over and they break the sweets pack out and over into the audience, so the first 6 rows or such had a chance of getting sweets from them! And once they were thrown Masaki was sweet enough to be like ‘there’s still a packet on the floor over there’ and such.

Masshu's character was so adorable. I was surprised that him and Higuchi were playing the same character but it makes sense. They're both super funny and entertaining. I love how ridiculous this character was! Especially with Masshu randomly throwing out random English like 'let's find our.... blue spring ('seishun' instead of 'youth')' and he would be like '...why?! ... why??' in English instead. It cracked me up a lot. But I did get worried because in this story past self, Higuchi, spends a lot in the hospital and can't join in on activities because of doctor's orders so I was super worried that we were going to get a 'I wanted us 5 to do this trip because I'm dying'' kind of plot line -- but thank god, turns out his future self is doing well.

As for Higuchi, lets be real, he was just playing himself. There was a scene where Taiga goes mental because he got his game system taken away from him so he goes on a mental pillow hitting streak on the members and Higuchi was just in the corner dying of laughter to himself along with the entirity of the audience. His character was annoying and in your face but in a good way; he just wanted to be friends with everyone! And because he was clearly a weak or sick child he wanted to make lots of friends and be normal and make meaningful memories - he reminded me very much of Kamen Rider Fourzes' Gen and his mission to make 100 friends!

Moving onto the Jounin/Takenaka pair. I personally, if you know me and remember, I don't particularly like Jounin as an actor; whenever I've seen him, I've always felt annoyed or underwhelmed by his character/acting. But in this one, I felt he did just fine. He was alright and did just a fine job. But he didn't exactly stand out either. Takenaka on the other hand; I focused on him more than I did Jounin; and I really liked his introduction where we're immediately told that he was once the main lead in Meitantei Jun and everyone around him wants handshakes and such and he's just like 'I'm used to it. You can ask, don't worry about it,' and we also see glimpses of teachers coming to him and saying, 'your mother called, won't you answer?' and he always replies 'tell her I'm busy' because (as he explains) she's only calling because she wants him to take more auditions because he just keeps failing them all. Jounin remembers his past self and gets annoyed because by now his mother has already past away (5 years ago) and when he finally go the courage to tell her that he didn't want to act anymore and to finally tell her he found a normal job etc. she was so happy to hear and congratulated him. But she soon passed after that. So when these two finally meet, of course Jounin is like 'you should answer your mother's calls. You should just tell her how you feel' etc. But more on that later.

4th in line is Matsumura and Taiga. They are the polar opposites; Taiga is obsessed with playing games and finds so much positivity and joy in life even from the smallest of things; while Matsumura, even though he got his dream of being the CEO of a gaming company, he finds it boring, nothing is interesting in his life. Seeing this polar opposite was very interesting. I really enjoyed Taiga's character and I love how mental he went when he didn't have a game to play in his hands xD I also love that he just enjoys whatever! I didn't realise, until the high touch event, who Matsumura was and then I saw him and I was like 'damn your Makoto from EnStage!'. He looks MUCH better in this stage than he does in EnStage.

Finally we have Kimura and Akisawa. These two were very similar in their present and past selves. It was very hilarious to see them two because they didn't change much. Both of them were scared of ghosts and both were loud and pretending they weren't scared of ghosts. They had... a lot of passion < is the best way to put it xD they created a lot of the comedy when it was just the five boys on stage together. This character is constantly moving and it's in a very yankee way and he's also always twisting and being super fast moving etc. it was very comedic and fun to watch! OH and another ridiculous thing about him; Akisawa has kids and they're called Donald, Minnie and Mickey, which is already ridiculous enough, but then it's later revealed that they're all boys!

Towards the end, the present selves manage to contact their past selves so they end up having one on one battles with each other which is just absolutely hilarious. So we had Harashima and Masaki going head to head against each other and Harashima is like 'you're my black past!!! Why didn't you enjoy it?! Why did you have to be so crazy?!' and Masaki is like 'you're a salaryman?!?! You're my black future!! Why did I become like this?!?!'

We had Masshu and Higuchi getting along very well and just talking about how's life and Masshu explains 'you get really sick for about 4 years, but don't worry, I'm all good now'.

Jounin keeps asking Takenaka about their mum and why he won't answer her calls while he's on this summer trip and tells her that he should be honest about his feelings of not wanting to be an actor anymore and that he should talk to his mother more. Also he asks him if ghosts are real and Takenaka is like 'they're not' and Jounin admits he believes in them.

Then we had Matsumura and Taiga; Taiga is so happy and fascinated that he became the CEO of a gaming company and asks Matsumura to play a game with him. But Taiga keeps losing but because Taiga is so happy about playing games and Matsumura can see the happy life his old self is leading that he says Taiga is the real winner and he now wants to find fun in his life again.

Finally we have Kimura and Akisawa who are just being absolutely ridiculous and going all headbutty and fighting on top of each other a lot and Kimura is annoyed that Akisawa is considering divorcing his wife and Kimura is like 'I thought I was cooler than this!!! I'm supposed to love my one and only girl for the rest of my life like a cool guy!!! If I find a woman I love then she surely deserves it all!' and finally Akisawa is like 'damn past me is so damn cool! What was I thinking divorcing her!'

Another scene I really loved with our main five boys is in a past scene; where they five boys and their teacher Tani-sensei and the Kendo sensei are all together and Higuchi randomly asks 'who here are virgins? Come on, admit it' and at first only Tani-sensei raises his hand, so naturally the audience start laughing, and then all the boys except Higuchi raise their hands and finally, he's turned away from the boys so they can't see but the Kendo sensei raises his hand a little too, and the entire audience EXPLODED in laughter. So naturally all the boys are like 'come on (Higuchi), raise your hand too! You're a virgin too!.... right? ... you're a virgin, right? ... wait what?! WHEN?! TELL US EVERYTHING!'

Now I'll get down to the more minor characters, starting with Iwa Yoshito! His character stood out because everytime he was on stage and with the rest of the class, for some reason they really wanted to just strip him off all his clothing and while they didn't show it the first few times, there's one part where the 5 MCs are in the foreground and you can see some of the students using their shirts to block the view and when they stop doing that, Iwa is just stood completely shirtless. And then towards the end of the show he just takes his shirt off himself and everyone's like 'why did you do that?' and he's like 'I give up!' and walks off xD

Takasaki Shungo’s character was very interesting. He was the ONE guy in their school year and in the summer school who was in touch with girls and the first scene with him, we see him on the phone to a bunch of girls and making dates to go to the summer festival with them. Naturally, all the other boys are super jealous! He is also the one who really gets into Kendo sensei’s ‘Special Class’ and he starts practising at night when everyone else is asleep and he wants to learn more so he starts trailing the sensei at night (which is hilarious). And then when they do the cultural event slash festival at the end, he’s the one who’s able to invite the all-girl schools to go and watch (we, the audience, as treated as those students at the end) them perform.

Hiroki's character was so funny! He was adorable too with these two cute pink pins in his hair. His part was smaller than I would've wanted but you can't win them all can you xD he had a main part of this story which was tormenting the PE(?) teacher and constantly making banana jokes around him. He asks the teacher where his banana is and the teacher is like '???' and Hiroki replies 'well you look like a monkey'. Then in a later scene, the teacher has a yellow towel around his neck and Hiroki goes 'why do you have a banana around your neck?' and every time this joke happens the teacher tries to attack him and yells 'It's not a banana!'. But in the very final scene for him, he's actually holding a banana and Hiroki approaches him and just says 'thank you for teaching me so much teacher!' and of course the teacher gets pissed because that's not what he was expecting and is like 'OI! I have a banana! Are you not going to say it?!' and Hiroki is like 'nah I gave up on that joke' and Hiroki runs because the teacher tries to attack him again xD it was really funny and really hilarious. Especially considering how many monkey jokes get thrown at Hiroki himself from his coworkers and friends xD

Now onto the teachers - who are BAT SHIT CRAZY!

Murakami Kouhei plays the headteacher (or at least is the more senior within this group) and he's perculiar in that he quotes many different and famous people through the entirity of the play and acts very stoic. But then when they do the festival at the end, he goes a little loopy because he gets to play one of the final bosses and has two swords to fight the boys with (as expected of a Kamen Rider actor!).

Nishioka Daisuke is just the most perverted teacher ever! He's Murakami's right hand man and of course obeys and respects everything about Murakami but he's also like 'oi, you should introduce me to the students at the All Girls tachibana school' and things like that. He's just a pervert xD

Mende Tomoyuki plays the 'robot' teacher. Everyone thinks he's a robot because his movements and his talking is so monotone and so rigid but of course he isn't. He's a very strict teacher and doesn't show much emotion.

I am pretty sure it's Kitadai Takashi who plays the aggressive and abusive PE teacher. Whenever he tries to attack and hurt the students, Murakami is always by the side and he looks over to him and stops attacking the students xD

Kanesaki Kentaro ends up playing the Kendo sensei who everyone in the audience absolutely fell in love with, He is absolutely hilarious! At first we see him teaching the 'Special Class' and we just think he's normal but then in a later scene we seen him on a scooter with a helmet and just skating across the stage all silently which was just bizarre. And then in a later scene he's off scootering and a student tries to talk to him but he continues skating like he never saw him xD and finally towards the end when he joins up with the MCs, he just gets ridiculously funny; the virgin scene and then him getting happy about girl schools coming to the festival and he's all trigger happy when he has a wooden sword in his hand. He totally became the audience's favourite by the end of the show! He was such a barrel of laughs. Seriously, my notes of him were just 'The kendo sensei being crazy as fuck'.

Totani Kimito plays the new homeroom teacher 'Tani' (which is a pun becaue in Japanese homeroom teacher means Tanin and he's like 'I"m the tanin, Tani. No that's not my name on purpose' xD I really liked him. He was very sweet and very easily lovable. But I was suspicious of him because he bumps into the boys in the future just after they talk about 'are ghosts real?' so for the majority of the play, I assumed present Tani was actually a ghost reciding in that place, but I was wrong. There was no catch. He was just there with another year of school summer activity students.

One thing I am thankful about is the fact that there was surprisingly nothing sad in this play, thank god! I was waiting for it. Especially when we had Higuchi being sent to hospital and we learn that Jounin's mother passed away. But there was no big sad moment and no tears so (thank god) it was a completely comedic and positive play which -- guys -- it's been a while.

Unfortunately none of the other boys particularly stood out but after googling them, I recognise a lot or can say I've seen and/or know about some of the stuff they've done.

AFTER EVENT!

As in per usual style of mine, I had no idea there was an aftershow event until I was at the damn show! It was a high-touch/high-five event with all the main characters/actors! So I got to high-five:

Harashima Motohisa Ishiwatari Masshu Akisawa Kentaro Jounin Tatsuki Matsumura Taiichiro Masaki Kaoru Higuchi Yuta Kimura Atsushi Takenaka Ryouhei Fukazawa Taiga

And it went in order of Matsumura-Taiga-Akisawa-Kimura-Takenaka-Jounin-Masshu-Higuchi-Harashima-Masaki along the line. I am so super happy that I got to get high-touches with Taiga (I remember he had such a great smile on his face), Masshu (my friend is his fan so he's used to seeing white foreigners in front of his face now xD), Higuchi (I was super nervous high-touching him... I honestly think this is the FIRST stage I've ever seen him live in the flesh too! DAMN), Kimura (he was cute, obviously! I've always wanted to see him on stage but our schedules and stages just don't tend to match xD) and Harashima (I was super nervous high-touching him too!). Also the line slowed down about Higuchi/Masshu/Jounin around so that didn't help my nerves with Higuchi! Haha MAsaki always greeted me with this huge smile right at the end of the line which was adorable! But of course I was sad that Hiroki was NOT in the line xD

GOODS

I was so thankful that Hiroki only has one bromide set this time. BUT I did feel a little upset he didn't have at least two sets xD I think this is the cheapest he's ever cost me!

And we are done!

#tanaka hiroki #hiroki tanaka #iwa yoshito #higuchi yuya #masaki kaoru #harashima motohisa #ishiwatari mashu #kimura atsushi #jounin tatsuki #fukazawa taiga #murakami kouhei #kanesaki kentaro #totani kimito #stage #stage play #review

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