Tim Etchells, artistic director of Forced Entertainment, the English company whose "The Coming Storm" was a highlight of last year's Festival/Tokyo, told me then that they now play abroad more than at home — mainly because festival organizers pay their costs. In contrast, producers are loathe to take any financial risk on non-mainstream works, he said.
In Japan, too, several cutting-edge theater companies are staging a similar exodus — and gaining soaring overseas reputations and followings.
Among them are Chelfitsch, led by 41-year-old playwright/director Toshiki Okada, and 38-year-old Kuro Tanino's Niwa Gekidan Penino — two pioneering cutting-edge companies I flew off to see in Berlin and Vienna in May and report on their activities off the domestic radar.