IKUSHIMA HANROKU

Existence: ??? ~ 3 April 1704

Connection:

Career:

1687: his name is recorded for the first time, for a performance of a Kabuki troupe in a daimyô's palace.

March 1701: Hanroku's rank in the Edo hyôbanki, tachiyaku section, is naka no jô (superior in the middle class).

19 February 1704: Hanroku performs at the Ichimuraza in the drama "Watamashi Jûnidan"; He stabs to death the star Ichikawa Danjûrô I in his dressing room.

3 April 1704: Hanroku is executed in Edo.

Comments:

Ikushima Hanroku was a minor Edo tachiyaku actor who was active from the end of the Jôkyô era to the Genroku era. He found his place in Kabuki history, not on the level of Art, but as the murderer of the star Ichikawa Danjûrô I.

"Ikushima Hanroku was recorded as an actor of considerable ability, being ranked as first of the middle class. Accounts with regard to the motive prompting the deed are conflicting. Some say jealousy; others that this actor had a son who was a deshi, or follower, of Danjûrô, and had changed his name to Ichikawa; again that Hanroku was a man of evil character, and Danjûrô gave him some sound advice which he did not heed, and that this made Danjûrô indifferent to the son. Yet most accounts agree that the cause of the tragedy was Danjûrô's changed attitude towards the son. The result of this crime was that the proprietors of the theatres were summoned to the magistrate's office, and an order was issued that continuous plays could not be given, and only those of one act were allowed, the audience to be changed at the end of each act. Hanroku made good his escape from Danjûrô's dressing room, but was taken to prison on that day." (Zoë Kincaid in "Kabuki, the Popular Stage of Japan")

Ikushima Hanroku in an ilustration from the book
"Kokon Shibai Irokurabe Hyakunin Isshu" (January 1693)