Why am I so drawn to the geisha?
To those mysterious creatures who whisper
secrets to each other,
And hide their laughter behind parasols?
So wonders Gillian Burke (Pam Dawber), the heroine of the television movie American Geisha, as she arrives in Japan to study the geisha society. Based on the experiences of Liza Dalby, a former Stanford graduate student of anthropology and the first foreigner to study and train as a geisha, the telefilm, which aired September 11 on CBS, adopted as its premise the personal and cultural conflicts that could arise from such an endeavor. Lushly produced on location in Japan, it evidences an exacting attention to detail about the geisha traditions. However, adapted and fictionalized into dramatic television fare, it speaks more, perhaps, about the culture that produced it than the culture it portrays. Although the geisha tradition portrayed in the program sometimes conveyed sexual implications, in its purest and original form, its main function in Japanese society was simply to provide an atmosphere of chic and gaiety. Indeed, exquisite dress, contemporary gossip, and musical ability play a predominant role in geisha life, rather than sexual favors.
America's relationship with Japan is, of course, decidedly complex. But whatever else Japan means to us politically and economically, whatever the particular exigencies of the moment, romantic notions about that country's geisha pervade our popular culture. Japan's traditions are depicted as a kind of eternal Eastern Other, readily identifiable, to be feared or held in wonder, but associated with neither the sophisticated yet decaying European legacy of grandeur nor the guilt-ridden Judeo-Christian temperament that America grew up with. Simple and gracious, the aesthetic of Japanese tradition seems to belie many of the achievements and side effects of industrial and post-industrial society. (Indeed, many depictions do not consider the paradoxes raised in Japan itself over this issue, or at best present them with Western condescension.)
Geisha represents a critical juncture in this cultural dynamic: a place where curiosity mixes with fantasy, where fascination mingles with desire. If the depth of our interest in Japan borders on a longing to know it intimately, certainly this is its most dramatic rendering. Such is the personal quest of Gillian Burke, whose intellectual endeavors are matched by inner, spiritual drives. Her study derives from the hope of "a sense of belonging and true family," which she seeks to find in the sisterhood of the geisha. Japan's non-Western "difference" seems to offer an extension of her own identity: "The strangeness of Japan has always made me feel that my strangeness has a place," she says. Ignoring the many refusals for entry into the geisha society, she finally convinced one okasan (manager of a teahouse) to allow her first to observe geishas and then to actually participate with them. But as Gillian moved from being an observer to an object of spectacle herself, the plot accelerated from cultural insight to tawdry melodrama.
Not to suggest that melodrama must abstain from insight. Indeed, one of the greatest of Japanese filmmakers, Kenji Mizoguchi, specialized in films that bristle with the conflicts of past and present societies, focusing on the condition and treatment of women. Incorporating details of decor and composition with fluid camera
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