Hot Springs and Our Banquet

A theatre in the form of a banquet: people fresh out of the bath gather to drink, relax, and witness a performance that defies convention.
Directed and hosted by Kumiko Ueda—who introduces herself as the MC of the evening—the piece interweaves her unscripted reflections on loneliness with a fragmented tale of a bit-part actor and a solitary worker, performed by Kaoko Takenaka and Ryo Mikawaya. As fiction and reality blur, the performance spirals into a kind of organized chaos—dragging the artists themselves, and the banquet format, along with it.

The venue: the banquet hall of Kamata Onsen, a beloved local bathhouse in Tokyo’s Ōta ward.

Diversity, perhaps, is the act of allowing discomfort to exist. Or maybe it’s about eating, drinking, and existing together while our differences remain untouched. Surrounded by steam and the scent of kettle-cooked rice, strangers—performers and audience alike—share a peculiar and unsettling moment suspended in time.

Directed and Performed by
Kumiko Ueda

Performed and Co-Created by
Kaoko Takenaka, Ryo Mikawaya

Stage Assistant & Performer
Terunobu Osaki

Venue
Banquet Hall, Kamata Onsen (Ōta-ku, Tokyo)

Dates
January 24 – February 3, 2025

Lighting Advisor: Masayoshi Takada (RYU)
Sound Supervision: Tadashi Wada
Stage Manager: Hogara Kawai (Ressenchka)
Visual Design: Aiko Koike
POP Writer: Shimamura
Video Documentation: Shingo Ota
Photography: Kazuyuki Matsumoto
Special Thanks: Kiyomi Maeda

Production Team: Rin Terada, Mao Furukawa, Mihoka Kawamura (syuz’gen)
Projectumï Operations Support: Yūko Takahashi, Ikoma Hishida, Keiko Kawano, Akihito Hirano

Presented and Produced by
projectumï

Sponsorship
Open Road Associates Inc.

Grants
Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and Culture, Arts Council Tokyo [Grant for Tokyo Art and Culture Creation and Promotion]
The Saison Foundation