BANGKOK — The convenience store is the setting for a daring Japanese director’s darkly satirical take on his country’s consumer culture, and next month he’s bringing his art to imitate the life in another capital city.
Toshiki Okada’s “Super Premium Soft Double Vanilla Rich” observes seven lives unwinding in a market. As sweet as the title sounds, the play is a light-hearted, dance-oriented performance filled with bitter black comedy to satire contemporary Japanese values.
The play portrays the store’s part-time staff, manager, customers and visiting head office supervisor being soothed by store music from J-pop to Bach’s “The Well-Tempered Clavier.”
Okada is the founder of the Chelfitsch Theater Company and has earned awards and acclaim for his plays “Five Days in March,” “Current Location” and novel “The End of the Special Time We Were Allowed.”
The performance will be in Japanese with Thai and English surtitles.
Tickets are 600 baht (300 baht for students) and can be bought online or at the venue.
There will be four performances at the Sodsai Pantoomkomol Centre for Dramatic Arts located in the Arts Faculty at Chulalongkorn University from March 10 to 12, with 7:30pm shows on Friday and Saturday, and 2pm matinees on Saturday and Sunday.
