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YUZU Member Yujin Kitagawa Performs One Piece Kabuki Play's Theme Song

Yujin Kitagawa, member of musical group YUZU, will perform the theme song for the previously announced kabuki play based on Eiichiro Oda's One Piece manga. The play's staff will reveal more details about the theme song in the future.

The play's lead actor Ichikawa Ennosuke IV is close friends with Kitagawa, and asked him personally to perform the theme song.

YUZU have performed theme songs for such anime as the 2011 Hunter × Hunter, and the Hunter × Hunter: Phantom Rouge and the Hunter × Hunter -The Last Mission- anime films. They also performed the theme song for the live-action adaptation of the Silver Spoon manga. Most recently, they contributed their song "Ola!!" to the Eiga Crayon Shin-chan: Ora no Hikkoshi Monogatari ~Saboten Daishūgeki film, which premiered in Japan on April 18

The staff of the One Piece kabuki stage play project revealed a photograph of Ichikawa Ennosuke IV in costume as Luffy in July.

The kabuki stage play's full cast is as follows:

• Ichikawa Ennosuke IV as Luffy, Hancock, Shanks
• Ichikawa Ukon as Whitebeard
• Bandō Minosuke II as Zoro, Bentham, Squard
• Nakamura Hayato as Sanji, Inazuma
• Ichikawa Shunen II as Nami, Sandersonia
• Ichikawa Kōtarō as Hatchan, Sentomaru
• Ichikawa Juen as Avalo Pizarro
• Ichikawa Emisaburō as Nyon
• Ichikawa Enya II as Jinbei, Blackbeard (Teach)
• Ichikawa Emiya II as Nico Robin, Marigold
• Ichikawa Omezō VI as Magellan
• Ichikawa Monnosuke VIII as Tsuru
• Seiji Fukushi as Ace
• Noritoshi Kashima as Brook, "Akainu" Sakazuki
• Kazuyuki Asano as Rayleigh, Ivankov, Sengoku

The play will adapt volumes 51-60 of the manga, a portion of the story known as the "Paramount War Saga." In the story, Luffy attempts to find his brother Ace and save him from execution, while a war erupts between the World Government and the Whitebeard Pirates.

Ichikawa IV said that the creators would "like to approach the script from the eyes of someone who is not familiar with the story, while also not discounting the audience who have already read it. It would best if we could make a story that was fun even for people who haven't read it." He added that "kabuki has never shied away from not showing the beginning and ending of a story and only portraying one side of it. So I think a long story like One Piece is a perfect fit for adaptation to the stage."

The play will run from October 7 to November 25 at the Shinbashi Enbujō in Ginza, Tokyo. Tickets for the October shows went on sale on August 20, while tickets for the November shows will go on sale on September 20.

The play is one play in the Super Kabuki-gi II set of plays featuring Ichikawa IV as the lead.

Source: Comic Natalie