The Yanai Initiative for Globalizing Japanese Humanities presents The Art of the Benshi Western U.S. Tour, 2026 from February 25-28, 2026.
Following on the success of The Art of the Benshi 2024 World tour, the Yanai Initiative is thrilled to partner with three new venues to offer audiences a rare opportunity to experience the mesmerizing artistry of Japan’s celebrated benshi—“movie orators” who, since the days of Thomas Edison’s Kinetoscope, have been breathing life into silent film. Master benshi Ichiro Kataoka will be joined by pianist Makia Matsumura for the Art of the Benshi Western U.S. Tour, 2026.
February 25
Brigham Young University International Cinema, Provo UT
250 KMBL
5:35 PM
A Page of Madness (Teinosuke Kinugasa, 1926)
Liberty (Leo McCarey, produced by Hal Roach, 1929)
Chongire hebi (A Snipped Snake, Jun’ichi Kōuchi, 1930)
February 27
American Cinematheque, Los Angeles
Egyptian Theater
7:00 PM
Apart from You (Mikio Naruse, 1933)
Every-Night Dreams (Mikio Naruse, 1933)
February 28
UC Santa Barbara Carsey-Wolf Center
Pollock Theater
2:00 PM
A Page of Madness (Teinosuke Kinugasa, 1926)
Liberty (Leo McCarey, produced by Hal Roach, 1929)
Chongire hebi (A Snipped Snake, Jun’ichi Kōuchi, 1930)
The Yanai Initiative for Globalizing Japanese Humanities is a collaborative project of UCLA and Waseda University in Tokyo. It was established in 2014 to realize a sustainable, equitable, globally interconnected future for the Japanese humanities. Its activities include the advancement of scholarship on Japanese, literature and the arts; support for literary translation; public programs on performance, film, design, music, art, food, and architecture; and the creation of digital educational content and smartphone apps. Its Japan Past & Present is a global information hub and repository that promotes research and teaching in the Japanese humanities across disciplinary, temporal, and geographic borders.
For more information, please visit yanai-initiative.ucla.edu.
