Namiki Shōzō I
Namiki Shōzō I was a prominent Japanese playwright who produced roughly 100 works for bunraku and for kabuki. Shōzō is also credited with inventing the revolving stage, one of many tricks of stagecraft used extensively in kabuki, and with popularizing the use of trapdoors.
Shōzō left bunraku in 1751; adapting plays from bunraku to kabuki was a very common practice, and it is likely that many of Shōzō's kabuki plays began as puppet productions.
His roughly one hundred plays were mostly jidai-mono, and include Keisei ama no hagoromo, Sanjikkoku yobune no hajimari, and Sanzen-sekai yarikuri ōrai.
