Th e heroine of Th e Curtain Remains Blue Tonight is a girl named Mejiro Tsu-gumi, the younger sister of the stage actress Mejiro Chidori. In the opening scene, Chidori suddenly screams and faints on stage (fi g. 9.1). Th e curtain falls, the show is stopped, and she is rushed to a hospital. Th e doctors soon discover that seeing a certain shade of red causes Chidori to have a panic re-action. Tsu gumi and the show’s director visit Chidori at the hospital. Th e di-rector informs her that her role will be covered by actress Kasa Sagie. When Chidori returns home, she tells their old nurse about the incident. Th e nurse seems alarmed.
Th e understudy, Kasa Sagie, (fi g. 9.2) turns out to be not only less than ade-quate in the role, but also (seemingly) malicious toward Chidori and Tsugumi.
When Chidori returns home and throws a dinner party, Sagie shows up wear-ing a red coat and holdwear-ing red balloons. When Tsugumi attempts to hide the coat from her sister’s sight, Sagie accuses her of trying to steal it. During the course of the evening, Tsugumi also receives a mysterious note that says, “Your sister’s life will be in danger tomorrow at noon.”
Later that night, Tsugumi hears a strange noise. She goes to her sister’s room to fi nd a red handkerchief left in the hallway. Chidori, having seen the hand-kerchief, has gone mad; she does not even seem to recognize Tsugumi. After attacking Tsugumi, Chidori faints and falls down the stairs. While Chidori is unconscious, their old nurse reveals a surprising secret to Tsugumi: Chidori is not her biological sister, but an adopted child from a foreign country where Tsugumi’s father, a diplomat, had lived before she was born. A war broke out and the members of the royal family were all tortured and killed, except for the baby princess, whom the couple rescued and took with them to Japan. A red whip was used to torture the royal family, which explains Chidori’s reaction to
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the color red (fi g. 9.3). Th e nurse further warns that an assassin from Chidori’s country had been trying to fi nd and murder the princess. Tsugumi immedi-ately goes out in the middle of the night to see Chidori’s fans, asking for their help.
Th e next day, Tsugumi and the two fans go to the theater with Chidori. Chi-dori does not seem to remember anything about the incident the night before.
Th e show begins just before noon. Th e two fans sneak in as ensemble mem-bers of the show (fi g. 9.4), and Tsugumi watches the show from the stage left wing (fi g. 9.5). During the performance, Tsugumi notices that there is a red curtain, which is not used in the show, hanging in the fl y system. Tsugumi
re-Figure 9.1. Opening scene, Curtain wa konya mo aoi [The Curtain Remains Blue Tonight]. © Tezuka Productions. Reproduced with permission.
alizes that the assassin is going to drop the curtain in the middle of the perfor-mance, which may cause Chidori to die from shock. Tsugumi runs to the op-posite wing where the fl y system is operated, but it is too late. Th e curtain falls onto the stage, covering Chidori. It turns out, however, that it was the blue cur-tain that fell. Th e show is stopped, but Chidori is safe.
Th e story quickly comes to a close: Kasa Sagie turns out to be a detective in disguise, suspicious that the show’s director is an assassin. Sagie, who foresaw the murder plan, switched the ropes for the red and blue curtains before the performance. Now Sagie has got the director at gunpoint. When he attempts to run, the two fans lower a set piece of a giant temple bell, capturing him in-side (fi g. 9.6). Th e would- be killer is caught, the sisters embrace, the curtain falls for the last time, and the epilogue is delivered by the would- be assassin, or, more precisely, the actor who played the part (fi g. 9.7).
Th e plot of this short comic is organized chronologically, except for the scene of Chidori’s babyhood that appears in the nurse’s speech (see fi g. 9.3).
Th e narrative structure may therefore appear less complex than the structure of Tezuka’s other works during this period, such as Cave- in, which alternates present and past sequences, or Shokei wa sanji ni owatta (Th e Execution Fin-ished at Th ree), which depicts the psychological turmoil of a man who is about
Figure 9.2. Kasa Sagie in The Curtain Remains Blue Tonight. © Tezuka Productions. Reproduced with permission.
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to be executed set in the short time between blindfolding and death. Th e Cur-tain Remains Blue Tonight gains the sense of suspense and surprise through what David Bordwell calls a “deceptive” narrator, initially misleading the read-ers into believing false information. For example, readread-ers are led to believe that Kasa Sagie is a jealous actress who tries to sabotage Chidori’s career. Th e “mean”
impression of Sagie is accentuated by her facial expressions and body language, as well as by the placement of close- up shots in the story. Th e scene where the director tells Sagie that Chidori is returning to the stage the next day is fol-lowed by a silent close- up of Sagie’s face, seemingly displaying the expression of resentment and disappointment (see fi g. 9.2). Th is panel is “framed” in a man-ner reminiscent of a theatrical portrait. Th e “framing” of close- up images ap-pear periodically in this comic, inviting the readers to dwell on the image for a moment. At the end of the story, readers may reread this image as the expres-sion of a contemplative and analytical detective.