At a glance
She’s calm. She’s beautiful. And she kills without blinking an eye.
A female assassin from Japan is at the heart of the new Shadowbox Live show “Circle of Blood,” based on David Mack’s best-selling “Kabuki” series of graphic novels.
The multi-media production, which will open Friday in the troupe’s Brewery District theater, boasts a score by Light, the company’s concept band, and video excerpts from the novel’s illustrations.
“Shadowbox Live and (Artistic Director) Stev Guyer have been wanting to adapt a graphic novel to the stage for years,” chief writer Jimmy Mak said.
“What was challenging was translating the story from the graphic book, so full of action and gore and interesting future technology, with its (Quentin) "Circle of Blood" Shadowbox Live 503 S. Front St. 614-416-7625, www. shadowboxlive.org 7:30 p.m. Friday and 7:30 and 10:30 p.m. Saturday; 2 and 7 p.m. Sunday and various days through Nov. 5 $25 to $40, or $20 for students, senior citizens and active military personnel
Tarantino-esque vibe of a woman’s revenge tale.”
Mack, a best-selling artist and writer who has also created Daredevil comic books for Marvel, will visit Columbus to attend the opening-night performance and participate in a talk-back.
“This is very much their interpretation. I realize it’s something different, ... a live experience of what touches them personally from my work,” Mack said in an email interview during a trip to Singapore.
Mack gave Shadowbox Live permission to adapt his graphic novel after seeing “The Tenshu,” the company’s 2015 adaptation of a Japanese fable.
“They are a very inspired art movement. It is fascinating to see how they interpret things and present them in a multimedia way; it’s experiential,” Mack said.
Shadowbox writer Mak, who considers himself a huge fan of Mack’s work, has been reading the writer’s graphic novels and comics since 2005.
“His imagination and storytelling are so vast,” Mak said. “He’s not afraid to splash his stories across the page,” Mak said.
The two-hour, two-act work adapts “Kabuki: Circle of Blood,” the first book in Mack’s seven-volume “Kabuki” series.
“It’s easy to get caught up in the story, images and action in a graphic novel — and we’ve gotten a reputation for immersing people in video — but what we wanted to do was make the characters human,” Mak said.
“‘Circle of Blood’ is a woman’s journey to find herself, redemption and peace in a violent world.”
Amy Lay plays Kabuki, a stone-cold killer who still struggles with her identity in a Tokyo of the near future.
“She’s very cool and calm in her many violent assignments, but her flaws are a deep-seated anger and frustration,” Lay said.
“Kabuki constantly goes back to her mother’s grave to think of her and wistfully wonder if her mother would be proud of her.”
J.T. Walker plays Kai, a criminal mastermind and Kabuki’s secretive enemy.
“He’s sociopathic, powerhungry and evil,” Walker said.
His challenge, Walker said, is making Kai human.
“I love playing a villain because no one is a villain in their own story,” Walker said.
“Kai had a scarred childhood and felt abandoned by his father, a general off fighting wars. He thinks he’s been wronged by the world, so power gives him a sense of control. He doesn’t really know what happiness is.”
Chief video editor David Whitehouse, working with video editor Zach Tarantelli, created the video design.
“Aside from some abstract colored panels, every single image starts from the comic book,” Whitehouse said.
“The source material is very poetic and beautiful.”
Each image from the book is animated. For example, moving clouds and flickering building lights are added to a black-and-white city.
“We want to show the city is alive,” Whitehouse said, “rather than a static panel of artwork.”
Most fighting is portrayed in video close-ups on five screens.
“We didn’t want to spend a year trying to perfect martial arts,” Whitehouse said, “and still fall short of the acrobatic, superhuman demands of the genre.”