NEW YORK REVIEWS : ‘Shimada’: The Bashing Continues

With all the Japan bashing lately, one might be forgiven for thinking “Shimada”--a drama about a Japanese purchase of an Australian bicycle factory--might have something useful to say about the queasy relations between Japan and the West today.

Considering that the $1.5-million show has almost a third of its budget from a Japanese businessman and boasts the first simultaneous Japanese translations in Broadway history, we had reason to hope--just maybe--we’d find something at the Broadhurst worthy of this cross-cultural gesture.

And since the cast--Ben Gazzara, Mako, Ellen Burstyn, Estelle Parsons--includes many reputable actors who don’t work enough, we could anticipate some power performances, at least, and perhaps even an understanding about what, besides a job, they saw in this script.

Fat chance. “Shimada,” reportedly a hit in Australia in 1987, is a lame piece of sit-dram--more situation than drama--with stick-figure characters, obvious conflicts and, most surprising of all, pretty unpleasant Japanese stereotypes.

There isn’t much these actors can do to deepen Jill Shearer’s play and, for the most part, they don’t do much.

Gazzara plays Eric, an aging executive in a failing bike factory who believes a Japanese investor (Mako) is really Shimada, the sadistic guard of a jungle prison camp in World War II.

Thus, while Eric fights against the sale, he keeps having stylized flashbacks to his POW days with his buddy Clive (Robert Joy), a heroic figure who later established the company, and Billy (Jon Matthews), a sensitive soldier who, when not being beaten, was forced to put on a kimono and sing torch songs.

Simon Phillips, who staged the world premiere of “Shimada,” signals flashbacks with green lights and fog machines and microtonal strings. Every so often, a samurai figure (Ernest Abuba) appears, usually on the roof of Tony Straiges’ cheesy office-hut of wooden slats, to approximate some broad idea of Kabuki movement.

Gazzara, the solid veteran who hasn’t been on Broadway in 16 years, plays the sad, weak Eric with a sad, weak spirit. Burstyn is competent, but seems disengaged, as Sharyn, recent widow of Clive. Clive and his selfish grown son are both played by Robert Joy. He and Parson’s plain-talking Denny--spunky head of the workers’ union--seem to have some feeling about their characters, which is a nice change. She gets to articulate most of the Western panic about Japan. Mako, who hasn’t been on Broadway since “Pacific Overtures” in 1976, plays Shimada, the standard-issue WWII monster, with the requisite guttural barks.

Clearly, Shearer wants to address the ongoing rawness of war wounds, suggesting that only the sons will be able to “move forward together.” It’s hard to argue, but her optimism is outweighed by paranoia about Japan’s “100-year war of revenge” and the blast of neon signs with Japanese logos and, a personal favorite, the scene where Shimada asks, “What means ‘humane’?”--as if the concept were foreign to an entire nation.

In the program, producer-businessman Nobunao Furuyama says he hopes “Shimada” will “foster a greater understanding between Japan and the U.S.” Instead, the play fosters more bashing--and even supplies the club.

Drama by Jill Shearer, directed by Simon Phillips. With Ben Gazzara, Ellen Burstyn, Mako, Estelle Parsons, Robert Joy, Tracy Sallows, Ernest Abuba, Jon Matthews. Set by Tony Straiges, costumes by Judy Dearing, lights by Richard Nelson, music by Ian McDonald. Broadhurst Theater, 44th Street west of Broadway.