Japan Society Annual Play Reading Series Presents THE FAR SIDE OF THE MOON In March

Japan Society will present a staged reading of the far side of the moon by Japanese playwright Izumi Kasagi, led by New York-based director Skye E. Kowaleski, taking place Monday, March 10 at 7:30 PM at Japan Society (333 East 47th Street).  

This one-night-only event marks the 19th installment of the Society’s annual Play Reading Series: Contemporary Japanese Plays in English Translation, introducing exciting topical plays from rising playwrights in Japan to artists and audiences in the U.S. 

Izumi Kasagi’s the far side of the moon takes place in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, centering on an aging mother and her adult hikikomori (shut-in) son struggling under the weight of isolation, time and memory.  With a cataclysmic flash, the woman is in jeopardy, unable to find help in her haunted and absent son and lost behind the divide of her property fence.  As passersby navigating a torn and poisoned world, sometimes we do the most good by extending a hand over the fence towards what we can’t reach.  Izumi Kasagi, whose play the far side of the moon was a prestigious Kishida Kunio Drama Award finalist, paints lives in shimmering watercolors in this moving modern meditation on disconnection and loneliness.  Skye E. Kowaleski, NYC-based holistic artist and former co-director of the OBIE Award-winning venue JACK, leads a cast of New York-based actors through this poetic work, newly translated into English by Amanda Waddell.  Playwright Izumi Kasagi and director Skye E. Kowaleski will appear live for an audience Q&A following the reading.

About Japan Society’s Play Reading Series

Launched in 2005 by Artistic Director Yoko Shioya, Japan Society’s Play Reading Series: Contemporary Japanese Plays in English Translation aims to introduce Japan's groundbreaking up-and-coming contemporary playwrights to US audiences and has served as a platform for many Japanese playwrights launching their international careers.  Each year, a selected Japanese playwright is paired with a rising New York-based director and company of actors culminating in a staged evening-length English-language premiere of one of their plays.  Throughout its 20-year legacy, the Play Reading Series has been instrumental in introducing the works of now-internationally recognized Japanese playwrights to English-speaking audiences, including the first English translations of works by playwrights such as Toshiki Okada, Ai Nagai, Shiro Maeda, Yukio Shiba and Suguru Yamamoto among many others.  More recently, the Play Reading Series has focused on spotlighting female playwrights, intended to reflect and showcase the rise of women theater makers in the Japanese contemporary/experimental theater community.  Japan Society’s Performing Arts program will expand this project in 2025 to encompass a week-long residency for the featured playwright, furthering the Series’ mission to facilitate exchange between artists in Japan and the U.S., acting as a vital international incubator for promising Japanese playwrights pushing the envelope of contemporary theater in Japan.

Tickets & Information: 

Monday, March 10 at 7:30pm (followed by an Artist Q&A)

Tickets $21 / $14 Japan Society members.  

Artist Biographies:

Izumi Kasagi is a playwright, director, actor and leader of the theater company Snuunuu, born in Iwaki City, Fukushima Prefecture.  While she was still a student at the Department of Culture, Faculty of Integrated Arts and Social Sciences at Japan Women's University, as an actor, she joined the theater company U-enchi Saisei Jigyodan, led by Akio Miyazawa.  Since then, she has performed with many theater companies, including Penguin Pull Pale Piles, Geikidan Motoya Yukiko, Geikidan Haegiwa, Mikuni Yanaihara Project and Nibroll, among others.  Outside her acting work in live theater, she has appeared in the TV drama Ama Chan and multiple films including Pandora’s Box, The Inerasable and Golden Slumber.  She also featured in the animated film Pyu to Fuku! Jaguar The Movie and the international mega-hit anime FLCL as a voice actor.  She has become increasingly active as a playwright and director and in 2018 founded her own theater unit, Snuunuu, as an outlet for writing and directing her own plays.  In 2016, her play The Key to the House was nominated for the final selection of the Sendai Short Play Award.  In 2021, the far side of the moon was nominated as a finalist for the 66th Kishida Prize for Drama.  Kasagi recently directed Geikidan Galba’s Distant Voices from the Sand Country (written by Akio Miyazawa/Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre WEST). Her most recent play, Umi made Hyaku-nen, is currently a finalist for the 69th Kishida Drama Award.

Skye E. Kowaleski is a director, writer, and facilitator working towards collective healing, transformation and liberation.  They have spent the last decade creating new theatrical work and advocating for artists and change-makers in NYC.  Favourite directorial work includes: Heather Christian's Animal Wisdom (The Bushwick, Woolly Mammoth and A.C.T - Co-Director), Tariq Hammi's Smail (Theater Row), Olivia Clement's Heart and Soul Yoga Studio Beirut (Corkscrew Theater Festival), Brett Solomon Evan's Delicious Filth (The Brick), and Daaimah Mubashir's Everyday Afroplay (JACK - Co-Director).  Their work as a writer/director has been seen at JACK, Ars Nova, University Settlement, The Bowery Poetry Club, Dixon Place, HB Studios and more.  They have previously held administrative and creative positions at Young Jean Lee's Theater Company, The Public, Town Stages, and The League of Independent Theater and most recently at JACK, a performance meets civic space in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn.  MA: Women’s and Gender History, Sarah Lawrence College (Gerda Lerner Award).  BA: Tisch School of the Arts at NYU (Experimental Theater Wing). 

Following this play reading of the far side of the moon, Japan Society’s Performing Arts Season continues with traditional Japanese instrument rockstars The Shakuhachi 5 in their North American debut concert in The Shakuhachi 5: Shakuhachi Vogue – A Visual Concert (May 16), featuring an impressive range of new and traditional works over four centuries to the backdrop of a mesmerizing video collage of ukiyo-e images, designed by visual artist Tei Blow.  The season culminates with the music series Shun Ishiwaka: Jazz Transcending (June 5 & 7), in a set of two contrasting programs, one on each night, that place the rapidly transcendent star percussionist and musician Shun Ishiwaka front and center for American audiences.  In January 2025, Japan Society presented the 20th installment of the Contemporary Dance Festival: Japan + East Asia (January 10 – 11), featuring ensembles from Japan, Taiwan and South Korea that represent the hottest contemporary dance coming out of East Asia today, followed by Shuji Terayama’s Duke Bluebeard’s Castle (January 15 – 18), a mazelike retelling of the original tale and the Bartok adaptation by underground theater / filmmaker legend Shuji Terayama, further subverted into a wild burlesque showcase by the crossdressing, all-female company Project NYX, all directed by experimental theater veteran Kim Sujin as part of the 2025 Under the Radar Festival.

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