Summary of Vietnam Trip (Part 1): International Experimental Theater Festival and the 17 Samurai

I traveled to Vietnam on November 20, 2025, and performed Aristophanes' "Peace" at a theater in Ninh Binh on the 26th.
As a member of the "Uzume Theater," led by German director Peter Gessner based in Japan, I joined this production team.

The 6th Vietnam International Experimental Theater Festival included local Vietnamese troupes, many from Asia including China, and participants from as far away as Poland and Israel.
The schedule lasted about 10 days, and I believe there were usually two performances a day, morning and night, totaling around 20 groups.

It is unclear whether all units were given equal conditions. Regardless, the number of participants allowed was set at 15, including performers and staff, but there were cases where it seemed there were clearly more people than that.
Perhaps they brought extra people, thinking, "The festival covers costs for up to 15, and anything beyond that is at our own expense."
However, if that were possible, we could have brought extra personnel as well. I suspect that is why the limit of 15 was imposed.
In this regard, communication was slow, the organizers' decision-making and dissemination of information were slow, and I felt that things remained unclear and disorganized until the very end. Perhaps this is just the way things are in Vietnam. I felt the response was too slow for an international event inviting people from all over.

That said, the treatment we received locally was exceptional.
We had three meals a day at a beautiful hotel. Not only were our trips to and from the airport and theater covered, but they also provided a large bus exclusively for our Uzume team for sightseeing, so we spent absolutely no money on accommodation, food, or transportation.

Although some members complained about getting tired of the hotel food at every meal, we were there simply to perform, and it was fortunate to be given an environment where we didn't have to worry about such extra things.
Some members wanted to eat out, and the hospitality was such that they were even willing to provide separate funds for that. In any case, their stance of trying not to burden the festival participants was consistent.

I thought, they must have a lot of money.
However, while I was grateful for the sightseeing trips to Ninh Binh's proud tourist spots, it is true that everything, including meals, was so well-cared for that it felt a bit stifling, or perhaps even a bit of an unwanted favor (though it might be bad luck to say so).

Since I had come all the way to a town I didn't know called Ninh Binh, I wanted to wander around and make my own discoveries.
I had found a "book cafe" about a 10-minute walk from the hotel on Google Maps and really wanted to go, but in the end, I never did.

I did manage to slip away from group activities and wander the night streets on my own a few times. Or rather, I did it without saying anything.
I suspect the organizers didn't want us to do that.
Behind the good treatment, there might have been a managerial system that absolutely did not want any trouble to occur, no matter what.

The Pham Thi Tran Theater, which served as the main stage for the festival, was huge and had an exterior that clearly cost a lot of money.

Also, there was a super-huge LED screen covering the entire back of the stage, which must have cost a fortune.
Furthermore, many, or rather almost all, of the participating units used special pin microphones, which I assumed were the latest technology the theater boasted.
In any case, there was a strong sense that they wanted everyone to use this amazing theater's amazing screen and amazing microphones.

Some performances benefited from this equipment, while others made me wonder why they did it.
For example, in a puppet show where paper butterflies attached to wires were fluttering, I felt very disappointed when they displayed an animation of countless butterflies dancing on the entire LED screen in the background.
I was dumbfounded, thinking, "If that's the case, you should have just made an animation and played it from the start; the traditional techniques on stage are dead."

Meanwhile, Uzume Theater completely ignored the vibe.
As if to cover up the existence of the LED screen, we hung our own white curtain, projected anachronistic shadow puppetry and our own projector images, and simply showed what we wanted to do and what we had created.
As for microphones, we decided that the theater was too big for just our natural voices, so we set up foot microphones. We took the approach of delivering our natural voices as much as possible while having them picked up by the foot mics. It was memorable that while explaining this intention to the local sound staff, they reacted as if it were "strange that we wouldn't use these wonderful, latest-technology pin microphones."

I got the impression that this is perhaps what the Rokumeikan era was like.

I believe our performance sufficiently entertained the audience who came. However, it might not have necessarily been in line with the organizers' intentions.

As for exchanges typical of an international theater festival, there were points of contact with the Mongolian unit and the Polish unit.

The leader of the Mongolian unit seemed to be an acquaintance of Peter's, and he offered to hold an opinion exchange meeting about theater for the members as well.
Mittsun, one of the participants, handled most of the interaction as the Japanese representative, so to speak.

What left an impression on me was their question: "It's called an experimental theater festival, but what does experimentation in theater mean, and what is experimental theater?" I answered this by saying, "For me, theater itself is always experimental. I don't feel value in carrying around a beautiful, polished finished product; I feel value in approaching it each time as a new experiment where I don't know what will happen." It probably wasn't the answer they were looking for, but it was the first time I had put this thought into words myself, and I realized anew, "I see, that's how I've been thinking."

Come to think of it, since arriving at the hotel on the 20th, while participating in the dinners, plays, and sightseeing planned by the organizers, Peter kept talking only about preparation and rehearsal, to the point where he couldn't think of anything other than his own performance. As one of his own, it was reliable to have him as a leader, but objectively, it must have looked somewhat obsessive.

In the first place, most of the units bringing programs to the festival were bringing finished products, and I suspect their perception was that checking technical aspects and having meetings on-site was sufficient, and that rehearsals were unnecessary (or even embarrassing) at this point.
In such a situation, it must have been surprising for the organizers that the Japanese, who had already finished their Tokyo performances the previous month and were supposed to be bringing a finished product, were so eager to "rehearse." The reaction to Peter's requests was slow. Of course, I recognize that they still provided the maximum support they could.
I think this is related to the fact that I felt what we were doing was "experimental."

In this overly large theater, in this town of Ninh Binh, on this occasion where a special audience for this festival gathers, a performance for people with no prior knowledge cannot be the same as the Tokyo performance. Also, it is impossible that it wouldn't be a better stage than it was a month after the Tokyo performance.
Peter believes this so naturally and purely that he wants to use the time and place to do as much as he can of what is currently in his head. That is why he made those obsessive requests for rehearsal opportunities.
As a result, I don't know if it will really pay off.
But perhaps he has no interest in just doing what has already been done and achieving the results he already knows.

I don't either.

I think that spirit of stupidly continuing to push forward is Peter's driving force and the reason for Uzume Theater's eternally unfinished stage.
Regardless of whether that is right or wrong, I think it is a very "artistic" attitude.
Because of that, the fact that it always has a huge impact on the procedures that should be followed properly, such as technical checks and dress rehearsals, is something that cannot be defended.

The biggest and worst accident this time was that one of the "15" collapsed with a high fever the day before the performance. It was influenza, and they said it was over 40 degrees.

Hinako's main role is the goddess of "Autumn Diligence," and while she doesn't have a huge amount of time on stage, she was the assistant director and played a leading role in pulling the team together, and even when she wasn't on stage, she played music and assisted with quick changes, taking on far too many roles.
Of course, this wasn't limited to her, and as Peter had warned everyone many times in advance, it was a state where "if even one of these 15 is missing, this play cannot be performed."

In this emergency, Peter had no choice but to consider a substitute.

Actually, one of the staff members accompanying the Polish team, "Emilia," had been living in Osaka since March to study fashion and could speak Japanese. Knowing this through our opportunities to travel from the hotel to the theater and sightseeing, we approached her about being a substitute.
She was a bright and straightforward woman, and we were told she agreed immediately.

Even so, Peter decided that if Hinako expressed the will to "do it" herself, he would go with Hinako no matter what state she was in.
This was known to all of us, and it was a decision made after explaining to Emilia, "You will have to memorize the lines and you will be almost completely tied up on the day, but in the end, we might decline."
Emilia also understood and said, "That is only natural."

It is regrettable, but in the end, we went ahead with the substitute.
The lines were cut to less than one-tenth, almost to a single word.
In the first place, she is not an actor, and she has only had about half a year of experience with Japanese (though some say she is better than Peter, who has been in Japan for 30 years). Fortunately, Japanese is not understood by most of the local audience, so we could rely on subtitles for that.

The problem was the various roles backstage, but the "power of the team" that had been building the stage together throughout the Tokyo performances came to life here.
While sharing when Hinako was doing what, we figured out who could take over, and if that was difficult, what we should do, and by complementing each other, we somehow made it work.
There were parts we had to cut and parts where we had no choice but to have Emilia help, but we kept it to a minimum.
Honestly, this is a result achieved by the sense of unity of the production team, which is rare even in the history of Uzume Theater. Of course, we all had various issues and dissatisfactions, and it's not like we were all best friends, but I think we were truly blessed with a good team.

I have endless gratitude and respect for Emilia herself and for the Polish artists who allowed her to participate.

As for the subtitles, translator Ayako Goto had been preparing them for some time, but she was working sleeplessly until just before the actual performance.
Because the appearance when actually projected on the local subtitle screen wasn't what she had intended, she changed all the formatting, and by watching how other units displayed their subtitles, she continued to make improvements, thinking she could make them easier to understand.

In this theater festival, Uzume Theater didn't receive any awards in the end, but it seems that the excellence of the subtitles became a topic among the organizers.
I can only say, thank you very much for your hard work.

Now, in addition to the 11 performers, the sound and lighting professional staff, director Peter, subtitle specialist Goto, and Emilia, who kindly accepted the substitute role and made the stage a reality, the last person indispensable to this Uzume Theater "Peace" Vietnam performance team is "Gat," who was in charge of interpretation and attendance locally.

It is no exaggeration to say that without this person, Uzume Theater could not have done anything it wanted to do.
That might be an overstatement, but she took on such an important role with unbelievable dedication.

She fought through the incomprehensible situation of continuing to communicate in mutually unfamiliar Japanese with a German director who was trying to pursue only the success of his own performance without following the organizers' intentions.
Sometimes, even when local theater staff reacted as if to say, "What are you talking about?", she negotiated persistently to get our intentions across.
If she were a person on the organizer's side, she could have dismissed many things by saying, "That's not possible," but as far as I know, she never said no to anything and negotiated with those above her.

It is said that she stayed with Hinako, who collapsed with a fever the day before the performance, all night long.
It seems Peter told her with great intensity, "The person who can be spared the most on the day of the performance is me, and Gat is someone who absolutely must be there for everyone. So, I will stay with her, you please rest," but she reportedly did not give in until the end. That is unbelievable guts.

While I would like to express much gratitude and some opinions and disagreements to the executive committee, which is the organizer, in participating in this theater festival, if I were to send the greatest gratitude that blows all of that away, it is that they introduced us to her.
It comes down to this one point.

For us, Vietnam is a country where people like Gat exist.

If I were the President of Vietnam?, I would want to commend her immediately.
I should.

On the day of the performance, the number of audience members was smaller than expected.
Considering that we are completely unknown locally, it is no wonder, but the performances I had seen until then had a few more people.

The most packed one was the performance by a local troupe that children who were enthusiastic about the Polish outdoor performance rushed to see, seeking more.

I think the performance that was the most terribly empty was the one after the children, who were disappointed that it wasn't a continuation of what they had just seen, left halfway through.

Even if it wasn't quite that bad, there were still quite a few noticeable empty seats.

One reason, I think, is that since it was the latter half of the festival schedule, many of the participants who had been somewhat forced to watch the plays had already returned home.
In fact, more than half of our own team returned home as soon as their performance was over, without watching the rest of the festival.

Another reason, though this might be a cynical guess, is that there probably wasn't a single person from China in attendance.
Since there were performances by Chinese theater troupes before and after ours, a considerable number of people, including participants and supporters, should have been in the area.
If there was some kind of movement due to "those circumstances," it would be a shame, but the individuals are not to blame. It is simply a possibility that was fully conceivable given the timing.

However, I (and perhaps Peter, unusually) do not consider the lack of audience members to be much of a problem in itself. Rather, I feel that everyone was so determined not to let a single person who had come all this way leave unsatisfied, that it resulted in a performance with great focus.

The applause after the show was warm, and we could feel that our performance had been accepted and enjoyed.
If there were no festival participants or Chinese groups there, it means that almost everyone else was a local who had gathered out of curiosity.
We were in Ninh Binh, and we were appreciated by the people of Ninh Binh.

That alone made the trip across the sea worth it.

I titled this article with the subtitle "17 Samurai."
It might be a bit too pretentious, but without any one of these people—the 15 who traveled from Japan and the two wonderful, courageous people we met there—this performance could not have been achieved.

Also, I think it was very important that we did what we had to do without pandering to anyone.

This is far from a proper "summary" as a member of the theater troupe, and I am sure there are inappropriate parts, but I wanted to write this down as a milestone for my own blog.

Lastly, I would like to express my gratitude and respect to all the "Heiwa" members who could not go to Vietnam with us.