Word: basho
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Basho persuades Shogo's prime minister to go back with him to the deep North and enlist the aide of the "barbarians" in defeating Shogo and freeing the city. The barbarians turn out to be a British Commodore whose favorite saying is "ignorance is bliss," and his sister Georgina, a tambourine-waving soul saver. They all return to the South and a series of battles between Shogo's armies and the soldiers of the Commodore follow, with first one then the other side victorious, until finally Shogo is defeated and killed...
During the course of the play we learn that the difference between the outlaw and the British imperialists is one of means rather than end--what the one accomplishes through atrocity and terror the other gains through morality and guilt. As Georgina explains to Basho...
Bond's point, though, is that tyrants become the victims of their own philosophies. "People who raise ghosts become haunted," he has Basho say, none too subtly. By the end of Narrow Road, Shogo is a dismembered corpse and Georgina is locked in the madness of her own sexual fantasies...
...beyond the first and most obvious stage in developing his idea. So many characters are introduced in a relatively short time that we can glean only hints about their motivations. One of the most interesting characters, the young priest Kiro, who, in his search for enlightenment, is rebuffed by Basho and turns to Shogo, is also one of the least articulate characters and the reasons for his suicide are only partly explained...
...quality of the acting varies from the high level of Rebecca Goldman's taut portrayal of the schizophrenic Georgina and Ed Baran's glassy-eyed baby-talking Commodore to the awkward self-consciousness of some of the bit players. Demetrious Athens plays a detached and rather pedantic Basho and Rick Hagan, as Kiro, and Thomas Nolan, as Shogo, both have a lot of stage presence but their speaking voices lack variety of intonation...