JAPANESE ENGLISH

13 January 2007

At first, I gave up hope to see Bjorn, Benny and Frida again in Japan, related to Japanese Mamma Mia! Last month I happened to see Mr. Keita Asari at the theatre. He is the director of Shiki company. I asked him again about the appearance of ex-ABBA members on the stage of MM (I asked him that question before) and this time I asked him about 'only their appearance as the audience', he just replied, "NO BOUNDS". I don't know what it meant. Of course my question to such a big person was rude. We ABBA fans in japan only want them to come here again in this big chance. I wonder what the background of all this is. A kind of 'rule' like as the Japanese SUMO events, where women are not allowed to step on the wrestling ring? It would be big news here and we ABBA fans would be incredibly happy if they come to Japan to see Japanese MM even if they don't appear on the stage. I think it is good manners to invite them to the opening night as other countries did. 3 months later MM in Fukuoka will open!

12 February 2007, Osaka, Japan Final

Oh, the day has come at last! Yes, of course, I know well about no-one of ex-ABBA member here. I also know it is the Karaoke musical without orchestra. But I was sure that I would really enjoy this show anyway. Donna is my favorite cast, and she will retire for a while - it means 'quitting off the record'. The same situation as the cast in MM in the past. It was a hard job again to get these tickets. Even we members of the SHIKI group cannot buy the tickets for the final show without having to take part in the lottery. I don't know how many members the SHIKI company has, but I know that most MM fans buy the tickets on the auctions at last. It always costs us the same amount as an airplane ticket to Europe. Even I, who saw Japanese MM more than 200 times, took that choice.
 

Indeed, it was only recently that the audience of Osaka MM was full. We know well that there were much vacant seats for several months. It must be caused from casts. Besides they have a large veriety of cast - changing casts and sometimes try to have several combinations! So we want to see them and contine to buy tickets. We usually can buy 40 tickets at a time, but we buy again after the new cast is announced or a new combination of cast has been heard.

The audience today was very serious. Even during the scenes people normally laughed about, today's audience stayed quiet. It meant that they were regular customers. Especially for Chizu Hosaka who played the Donna, it would be the last show. I of course cannot stop crying when 'Thank you for the music' was played, just remembered somethings in those 4 years and 2 months. Thinking about the things I experienced and about poeple who saw MM with me. During "The winner takes it all", the audience was in the mood for...I don't know how to express my words. I knew the feeling of the audience. ABBA fans would be in sad mood, we would remember the "divorce of them". When "Slipping through my fingers" was played, Rie Yoshizawa as Sophie could just barely say 'I'm really proud of you, Mum' in true tears. It seemed to be natural mother and child.

I sincerely want the poeple overseas to see the curtain call view of us, the audience of Japanese MM. We usually dance the same as the casts does. Especially we wave our arms from right to left, then left to right, to 'Dancing Queen'. Of course the curtain call continued several times.

MM in Osaka,
The Record Long Run in Kansai
680 thousand people for 25 months / 689 times

I really thanks for MM in Japan though my hope their coming has not come true.

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