Opening Night, Print

The rich velvet curtains pull back to reveal the show’s two lead actors. Costumed in meticulously sewn seams and lavish fabrics held together with hooks and buttons, the inaugural audience lays their fresh eyes on the starring pair. The scene opens outside the Colosseum with a young man and a woman locked inside a lion’s cage raised on a platform, being dragged behind a horse-drawn carriage. Elizabeth cowers behind her husband Jacob, who stands upright and defiant against the vicious crowd. “Feed them to the golden cats!” they chant, eyes wild with anticipation for a show of blood.

Jacob closes his eyes and quietly prays, while Elizabeth drops to her knees, clasping her elegant, bloodied hands. Suddenly, a brilliant white light streams down from above, freezing all actors in place except the two protagonists. The pulsing light shifts through colors, each beat resonating like a heartbeat, and the cage vanishes as though it had never existed.

When the stage lighting returns, Jacob and Elizabeth stand atop a table in a crowded downtown Tokyo izakaya. The family at the table—four people, yakitori skewers in hand—stares in disbelief. The teenage Goro blinks at the scantily clad woman standing over his plate of kani korokke. The daughter reaches out, curious, but her mother sharply pulls her back, muttering something about hygiene. The father is mostly concerned about his now-smeared food and the precarious balance of his sake cup.

Jacob glances at Elizabeth, who is wide-eyed and still catching her breath from the sudden shift. He shrugs faintly and says, with all the gravity of a man who has witnessed both the absurd and the divine: “Shalom!” The curtain closes, leaving behind the scent of fried seafood, the faint pulse of colored light, and a theater audience unsure whether to applaud or call for an exorcist.

Heal collection