Starting from Loomis and Other Stories

Little Theater in Camp

KL 81 Little Theater in Camp I mentioned before that camp was exciting, at least at first. I was nineteen years old and eager for new adventures. There were all these new people of different and interesting backgrounds to meet. Strangely, camp gave me a chance to pursue what interested me the most: writing and acting, performing in front of people. I had taken a drama course at Dorsey High School during my year in Los Angeles and had acted in plays at the Japanese-language school. But nothing like the Little Theater at Tule Lake. It was late summer 1942; we had only been in camp for about two months and already the camp newsletter, the Tulean Dispatch, was in operation. I noticed that announcements for recreational activities abounded. I guessed the administration was urging everyone to get involved in some activity to ward off boredom and depression among the inmates. One of the announcements was an appeal for people interested in forming a theater, so I went to the first meeting and was surprised at the large turnout, about fifteen people. How exciting that was! Two persons assumed leadership roles: Perry Saito of the Recreation Department, who was the organizer, and Sada Murayama, a woman a bit older and more sophisticated than the rest of us, who seemed to DOI: 10.5876/9781607322542:c12 little theater in camp 82 have had some theater experience. She would direct the plays. Perry stated that the group was open to anyone interested in theater, experienced or not. The main purpose was to put on shows as diversions and entertainment for camp inmates. As for acting, we would learn together by actually being in plays and performing before an audience. The recreation hall in Block 4 became our little theater. Thanks to the “behind-the-scenes people,” we soon had a stage and a curtain at one end of the barrack and benches for the audience. Lights were made by using empty tin cans procured from the mess halls. KL A program of three one-act plays was planned, and auditions for the parts were held. The first play bill included Ile by Eugene O’Neill, a comedy, and a fantasy. I was cast in the fantasy. The play featured Yukio Shimoda, who was primarily a dancer at the time and who would later become an actor on Broadway and in the movies. I played the Maker of Dreams (the title of the play) who was responsible for the romance between Yukio, as Pierrot, and a young lady as Pierrette. It was definitely not a stellar role. But my luck changed unexpectedly when one of the actors in the comedy decided to leave camp and I was chosen as an emergency replacement. So there I was with two parts, one of which I had to learn in a hurry as we were well into rehearsals. I had great fun playing a very proper clergyman in the comedy. It seemed the more serious I was with the character, the more laughs I got. Howard Imazeki, a journalist from San Francisco, praised my performance in his review for the Tulean Dispatch. This proved to be my first notice as an actor. The most dramatic play was Ile, an early work by O’Neill. Perry Saito was the captain of the whaling ship. With murky lighting and the sound effects of a foghorn, a brooding sea atmosphere was created in which the bleak drama takes place. little theater in camp 83 After two years at sea, the crew of the icebound ship is ready to mutiny unless they head home, but the captain is determined to fill the ship with “Ile” (oil) first. The captain’s wife, also homesick, pleads with him and finally convinces him to turn back. Just then a cry is heard that the ice has broken, and the captain, disobeying his promise to his wife, orders the ship forward. This is too much for the wife; her breakdown is enacted by the actress in her manic, disjointed playing of the organ. I have always wondered what happened to the woman who played the wife. She was electrifying. The theater’s capacity was around 150, and each performance was scheduled for a certain section (ward) of the camp. I believe we had seven or eight evening performances of each program. The theater had its heyday during late 1942, and I...