Fast-Forwarding the Future: Takarazuka Revue’s Recalibration of Youth Cultures

Abstract Within a mixed-methodological framework, this paper analyzes Takarazuka Revue’s groundbreaking performances City Hunter: The Stolen xyz (2021, snow troupe) and High & Low: The Prequel (2022, cosmos troupe): famously rigid in its business model targeted at a clearly defined socioeconomic demographic (upper-middle and upper class female citizens aged from 35 up to 80s or even 90s), these two performances manifest a subtle paradigm shift in Takarazuka Revue’s performance strategy towards a consideration of younger audiences of both genders through the employment of a diverse narrative and musical material and the immersion into the problematic of global concerns such as family dysfunctionality, rampant loneliness and loss of valid role-models.