The Panda Factor (continued)
The most difficult part had to be the voice recording (afureko).
In an afureko session, the actors are in a soundproof room where they act
out the voices of the characters as they watch them on a monitor. (Used to
be that we had film then videotape playback but now we can go directly from
an editing system like an Avid setup or whatever.) The directors, producers,
engineers, and other staff sit out in the control booth drinking tea,
snickering at the weird jokes the actors make and wondering when they can go
home.
I had my first chance to direct an afureko session a little while ago. The
production staff was very polite and only asked me once if I was OK doing
it. I told them that I was fine and that I had been to afureko sessions
before. It was true that I was familiar with the process but I had never
directed before. To my knowledge it was the first time a foreigner ever
directed Japanese language voice recording for a domestic show. No way was
I going to say that though!
I was somewhat worried that it was going to be like the scene in the first
NAKED GUN movie where Frank (Leslie Nielsen) disguises himself as an umpire
at a baseball game and, when the pitch is thrown, the player of both teams and
everybody in the stands stop what they are doing and stare at him, waiting
for him to decide. [Looking around nervously] "...Strike?" And the crowd goes
wild. (Of course, like Frank I would no doubt have gone out of control
afterwards.)
For this project, I was the assistant director, taking care of one part of
a 4 part show. The
production manager, chief director and client producer were there as well as
the directors of the other parts. When I was sitting in the booth the actors
saw me and smiled like, "Oh, wow, we have a foreign visitor." When the
recording director went in and talked to them about what to do for the
different episodes I could see just by the weird looks on their faces when
he told them that I was directing one of the parts.
Luckily mine was the C part so I was third in line and got to see what the
other director of the A and B part did, which was almost nothing. The
recording director made little word and grammatical changes to the dialogue
and that had me worried. Some of the changes I didn't really get the
difference in nuance. It was quite possibly the time when I felt furthest
away from fluency in the Japanese language in my life.
C part came up and I made one suggestion and the recording director looked
at the chief director and asked, "Is that OK?" (which hacked me off a bit).
The director said, "He's directing it. Ask him." (which made me feel much
better.) They did a good job and I had no problems with anything so they
went on to the D part. I am very glad that I was able to work with a group
of talented actors my first time out!
* * *
There is a barrier as to what a foreigner can do but it's not very well
defined. Historical dramas are out for sure. It's highly unlikely that a
foreigner could ever direct THE TALE OF GENJI, the most famous Japanese
legend-story. Just as unlikely is that he could direct a historical drama.
No matter how much he studied, no matter how well he knew the material,
unless he grew up in Japan and was considered to be fully and utterly
Japanese by the other staff they wouldn't feel confident following his lead.
That makes some sense to me.
I can understand why the Japanese staff would be reticent to let a
foreigner direct a contemporary drama or comedy such as MAISON IKKOKU or
ORANGE ROAD. The personalities and drives of the characters might be
difficult for him to capture in a way that the audience would empathize with
them.
(This also extends to stories done overseas as well. When a Japanese
character shows up in a comic or animated show or even a movie they are
almost always based on some completely distorted American media-induced
image of the Japanese. It's gotten to the point where if I see a character
with a Japanese name in somebody's story proposal I don't even want to see
the rest because it's almost sure to be full of ninja or faux Samurai
ideology or some such.)
Most anything else though is fair game in my opinion. Those who say that
only a Japanese person could really direct Japanese animation are not
looking at the larger picture. It is myopic and foolish to limit yourself to
a purely Japanese viewership. The world
beckons!  |
