The play "Ogu" is put on the stage between April 30th (Friday) and May 1st, 2010 (Saturday) at Gimhae Arts and Sports Center. The play "Ogu" has been actively put on the domestic and the foreign stages almost every year since 1989 when it was first performed at the Seoul Theater Festival. If we consider the fact that it is hard to put a properly established play on the stage in Korea, it is hard to find any play which has been continuously put on the stage for twenty years.

The play "Ogu" was performed for more than a month every year between 1997 and 2001 at Chongdong Theater. The play showed remarkable average ticket sales of 97%. Because of such a record, it was even called as 'the haunted play' by the audience and the press.

Also, it was officially invited to the 1990 Tokyo International Theater Festival in Japan, the 1991 Essen International Theater Festival in Germany, and the 1997 World Theater Festival, showing its ability to overcome the limit of the play with lines. It is recognized as the play with the most representative feature of Korea in the global theater industry. The play 'Ogu' has been made by the actors and the audience for twenty years. It reflects the sweat and the passion of the actors.

The story of the play "Ogu" is as follows. The play starts when an old mother asks her son to execute the San-o gut, a kind of exorcism, after having a premonition for her death. While the San-o gut is being executed, the old mother dies and the ceremony becomes a funeral. Even if the complaint of the old mother who has spent her entire life for raising her child alone without her husband and expects her death soon is painful, her comical facial expressions and gestures make the audience laugh. By showing the traditional funeral ceremony for the deceased mother in the comical way, the distance between life and death is removed.

The play shows the Korean-styled humor and sublimates the deep resentment in the mind as humor. Also, it shows the death and the vivid life of the living people after the death of their loved one. It is our way of life to overcome the death of our loved one by dancing, singing and laughing. Through such a way, we can forget the death of our loved one and overcome sorrow and fear. It shows the Korean-styled optimism.

Kang In-Jung  cutejung88@changwon.ac.kr

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