I watched this on Tuesday and it was the black version so the main cast was Jinnai Sho and not Mitsuya Ryo.





I went into this play expecting it to be serious and dark because A. it's about Sakamoto Ryoma so you'd assume it'd be a historical and about his life and B. I've never watched a Caramel Box productions but because they have a lot of older actors, I expected them to do more serious roles.

Oh boy I was wrong!

This was hilarious!!

Let me tell you the story first: We have Okamoto (Jinnai/Mitsuya) who works for a travel tour agency and in his head, he thinks Sakamoto Ryoma is the ideal men and constantly has conversations with him on how to be a better man. His boss Honda (Yamada), has just come back from his most recent tour when one of the girls on his tour asks him out for dinner. Enters his wife who is very hot-headed and accuses him of cheating. Thus the main story is about Okamoto being the middle man (trying to become a better man through Ryoma's lectures and teachings) between this married couple and trying to patch them back together. The girl who approached Honda also has a secret which causes a lot of violence and chasing.

Sound good? It was good!

As I've already said; this was hilarious. Okamoto is literally a wimp. He suffers from travel sickness, he's 27 years old and single with no girlfriend on the horizon and he'd rather cower and run rather than try to protect someone. Jinnai is PERFECT at the facial expression. Just from his expressions alone I was dying of laughter. Then there's Sakamoto who's just constantly trying to make Okamoto a better man and in the process he attacks Okamoto with his sword and/or slaps him on the ass and/or just has the best comebacks xD

For example, at one point he's trying to describe and rivalry he had and he was like 'It's like 7-Eleven and Lawson' and I (and the audience) died xD
I really like Sakamoto and Okamoto's relationship <3 they work so well.
OMG the most hilarious scene that actually got a full applause from the audience was the way Sakamoto created a boat out of the set pieces and THEN pretended to be the owner of the boat and took Okamoto and Honda's wife's tickets and was like 'enjoy your boat ride!' and the audience were just dying. And THEN he got his own boat to follow them xD Seriously so good!

I really hope this gets a DVD so you can see all the amazing and funny scenes!




^^ Either the theater director or the Caramel Box director was like 'there's a cut out outside of here, PLEASE take pictures of it. That's the point of it!' xD


I have four tiny negatives:
1. I feel Yamada Yusuke always plays the same type of character; a serious character who's so set in his ways that he frustrates you. If you've seen him play someone completely different please let me know! But I just felt like I wasn't seeing anything new from him in this.
2. MaeChan's feminine side. I'm not complaining but I feel I only ever see him play characters with a feminine side. In the beginning of this story he plays this real rough boy who has a gun and fights and grabs hold of women but at the story progresses his feminine side comes out (and he and Jinnai ended up holding hands at one point when Jinnai was supposed to be holding him captive <33) so I was a little sad; I wanna see him play a 100% mean guy or something. But still, Mae-chan <3
*has a brain fart*
3. They didn't use mics! I was lucky I was in the 10th row but I swear to god, if I was 19 rows back, I can't imagine I'd have been able to have heard them.
4. You know what I'm gunna say; the women, but more of the fact that they all had to practically shout cos they didn't have mics. BUT I think we're suppose to dislike the women in this story so that's okay! There's even a point where Sakamoto gets his sword (nothing sexual!) out to try and kill one of the women cos she's just being stupid, but Okamoto holds him back xD


But back to the positives!
While watching this, I was just hit with this aura of 'omg this is why I love the D-Boys'. Each of the boys did amazing! While I didn't like Yamada's character he was still perfect in the role! Although there was that laundry scene he did which was hilarious xD
Jinnai: Do you even know how to fold?
Yamada: Course I do!
*makes the tshirt into a triangle*
Yamada: I'll do it later!

xD

And I've already praised Jinnai enough! His facial expressions and his comedy were amazing and his chemistry with Sakamoto and the end scene where he's heartbroken was perfect too <3 His character arc and development was so good!

Then their's Mae-Chan and seeing him doing action and fighting scenes and seeing that rougher side of him <3 and his interaction with Jinnai while he was being 'held hostage' was so good <3 he looked nice in his baggy red shirt too <3

And then there's Mitsuya! It was SO refreshing seeing him play a NON-cute character <3 He played this serious Shinsengumi character (he was in the head of another company's boss) and he looked pretty manly like that. I wanna see more serious roles from Mitsuya too after yesterday! So again; if you know any  more serious roles of his then please tell me below!

They really are amazing <3 I LOVE D-BOYS!!!


Okay I'll stop fangirling over them ^_^





They got 3 encores cos people just wouldn't stop clapping xD But the very last time they were going off stage, Jinnai and Mitsuya went past each other and high fived!! ^_^


Also Jinnai and MaeChan had a facial mask moment together yesterday <3 see here.





*I am selling the Mitsuya Ryo and Yamada Yusuke ones if you're interested! Same price as the OOO Bromides so 160yen each. There's 5 of them.


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Overall: I got the complete opposite of what I was expecting and I enjoyed it SO much! While watching it, I was reminded just how amazing D-Boys are and just how much I love them <3 Wish I had the time and money to see the WHITE version. The story is actually really simple and stupid but once you include the comedy and the action, it's really enjoyable!
Rating: 7/10

I asked a few questions in this post so incase you forgot, or in case you only read the non-spoiler review: Can you let me know of roles and productions where:
- MaeChan's played a darker, rougher role without a hint of femininity
- Mitsuya's played a non-cute role
- Yamada's played something other than a salary man who's set in his ways and is thus annoying.