The Second Nakamura Nakazo in the Role of Sadakuro in "Chushingura"

This 1795 print by Katsukawa Shunei (1762-1819), held in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, depicts the second Nakamura Nakazo in the role of Sadakuro, the villainous masterless samurai turned bandit in the perennially popular Kabuki cycle Kanadehon Chushingura, the dramatization of the forty-seven ronin vendetta. Shunei was a leading designer of the Katsukawa school, the studio founded by Miyagawa Shunsui and brought to prominence by Katsukawa Shunsho, whose disciplined approach to yakusha-e, or actor prints, transformed Edo ukiyo-e by rendering specific performers with recognizable features rather than idealized stage types. By the mid-1790s Shunei was at the peak of his career, and his treatment of Sadakuro reflects the role's established stage iconography: a gaunt, predatory figure whose menace was visualized through pale skin, lank hair, and a dripping black umbrella, costuming choices the second Nakazo himself had helped codify. The Met's impression preserves the careful color blocks and crisp outline characteristic of Shunei's mature work, with the actor's likeness rendered to be legible to Edo audiences who would have known both the role and the performer's distinctive interpretation. Chushingura, first staged as a puppet play in 1748 and almost immediately adapted to Kabuki, was a staple of the theatrical calendar, and prints commemorating individual performances by celebrated actors functioned as both publicity and souvenir within Edo's print market. Sadakuro's appearance in the fifth act, the rain-soaked highway robbery scene, was one of the most anticipated moments of the cycle and a touchstone for actor portraiture. As an example of late-eighteenth-century Katsukawa school yakusha-e, this sheet documents the intersection of stage history and woodblock publishing that defined Edo ukiyo-e at the close of its classical phase. Reference: Metropolitan Museum of Art, accession 36796.