is a musical theatre production featuring many performers from Johnny & Associates. The theme of the show is friendship, peace, and dreams of future by boys in juvenile prison for various reasons. Since its premiere in 1969, Four Leaves played the lead roles until 1975, and since its restoration in 2010, many young members, mainly trainees affiliated with Johnny's, have appeared in the show.
The musical theatre Boys was premiered in 1969, using songs from Four Leaves' 1969 LP record Boys: A Little Resistance. This play was revised and performed in successive productions, and became known as Boys musical theatre series. In 2010, after 34-year absence, the play was revived starring A.B.C-Z and Kis-My-Ft2, trainee groups at the time. After that, it has been performed by young trainees. Since 2015, the theme of "War and Peace" has been incorporated into the show. It was also made into a movie Ninja Drones? in 2019.
This production was written, planned, composed, and directed by Johnny Kitagawa. Hideaki Takizawa has been directing the show since 2019, after Kitagawa's death, and Hikaru Iwamoto of Snow Man has been directing the show since 2023, when Takizawa left the company.
Story The main outline of the story is basically the same. The setting is a juvenile prison. One day, a new boy arrives. Then he meets other boys who are imprisoned for various causes. However, the imprisonment]boys are divided into two teams and are at odds with each other and fighting every day. As the days go by unchanged, a new prison officer arrives who is Violence|violent and cruel. The situation around them changes in various ways, but the boys come up with the idea of a prison escape, and the two opposing teams join forces to carry out their escape plan. After the first act of the main program, the second act is a showtime of singing and dancing.
Production history Early performances (1969–1975) This production was premiered by Four Leaves in 1969 as Boys: A Little Resistance and was followed by a series of productions from 1970 to 1971, the sixth in the series. In 1975, the trainees performed The Boys – Four Leaves Immortal, but the performance of the series was interrupted after this. In 1976, Boys 2 was performed as a live musical during Four Leaves' 10th anniversary concert.
YearTitleTheatreNotes 1969 Boys: A Little Resistance Festival Hall, Osaka, Nissay Theatre Starring Four Leaves 1970 Musical '70 "Boys: Complete" Nissay Theatre Starring Four Leaves 1970 Four Leaves Musical, "When We Run Barefoot" Starring Four Leaves 1971 Four Leaves Musical "Boys from the Sun" Starring Four Leaves 1971 Four Leaves Musical "Friendship Without Tomorrow" Starring Four Leaves 1971 Four Leaves Live Musical "It's Us Who Live!" Imperial Theatre. Touring Nagoya and Osaka. Starring Four Leaves 1975 Live Musical "The Boys – Four Leaves Immortals" Starring trainees 1976 Live Musical "Boys Part II – Light and Shadow of Youth" Starring Four Leaves
Boys: Prison without Bars (2010) This production was revived in the summer of 2010 for the first time in 34 years, starring a group of trainees. Kansai Johnny's Jr., trainees working in the Kansai region in Japan, performed at Osaka Shochikuza in August 2010, and A.B.C-Z and Kis-My-Ft2 performed at Tokyo Nissay Theatre in September 2010. Although the title is the same, most of the direction was left to the performers. The performers each shared their opinions, and they were presented in a way that made the most of their individual characters and specialties. Therefore, the composition, show time, and other content differed between Osaka and Tokyo. At the press conference held on August 3, 2010 to announce the production of the Tokyo performance, a video letter was delivered from members of Kansai trainees.
At the performance at the Nissay Theatre in Tokyo, even though joint rehearsals were not possible, meetings were held over Skype and other methods and a dance competition between Koichi Goseki and Kento Senga, a drum performance by Yuta Tamamori, and danced with a tub at bathing scene, later called "tub dance", were performed. At the time, Kis-My-Ft2 and A.B.C-Z had not yet debuted, and were performing as trainees, Kitagawa decided to let Kis-My-Ft2 make their CD debut after seeing this performance. Kis-My-Ft2 consisted of seven members at the time, and five of them, excluding Wataru Yokoo and Takashi Nikaido, were cast in that show. According to Hiromitsu Kitayama and Taisuke Fujigaya, Kitagawa initially planned to debut Kis-My-Ft2 with five members, excluding Yokoo and Nikaido. So they appealed directly to Kitagawa that they should debut together, and in 2011, they debuted as a seven-member group.
2010 + Place Osaka Tokyo Date August 3 – 28 September 3 – 26 Theatre Shochikuza, Osaka Nissay Theatre, Tokyo Director Johnny Kitagawa Main cast
Boys: Prison without Bars (2011) In August 2011, Kansai trainees performed Boys: Prison without Bars at the Osaka Shochikuza, and in September, A.B.C-Z and Kansai trainees performed Boys: Prison without Bars at the Tokyo Nissay Theatre. As Fumito Kawai had to perform in a wheelchair after dislocating and breaking his left leg during his performance on July 23rd in the stage Playzone '11 Song & Danc'n., it was suddenly decided that Fuma Kikuchi would perform as a supporting actor in the Nissay Theatre performance. Therefore, the actual performers differed from those listed on the official posters announced in advance in July. The "tub dance" was performed as it was last year. Before and after the stage play at the Osaka Shochikuza performance, there was a Show Time, during which Kansai trainees performed about 20 numbers. At the Nissay Theater performance, they sang two of his best-known songs, "Kaimono Boogie" and "Blue Mountains," accompanied by a piano by Blüthner, which was given to Kitagawa by the late Ryoichi Hattori.
2011 + Place Osaka Tokyo Date August 3 – 27 September 5 – 29 Theatre Shochikuza, Osaka Nissay Theatre, Tokyo Director Johnny KitagawaMain cast
Boys: Prison without Bars (August 2012) In August 2012 at the Osaka Shochikuza, Kansai trainees A new group "Naniwa Oji", formed by Ren Nagase, Daigo Nishihata, and Ryusei Onishi, was first unveiled. Onishi is a fifth grader who has only been with Johnny's for a month. Even though he has already been dancing for five years, his unusually early appearance at the event attracted a lot of attention.
August 2012 + Place Osaka Date August 4 – 27 Theatre Shochikuza, Osaka Director Johnny KitagawaMain cast
Boys: Jail in the Sky (September 2012) Starring A.B.C-Z. Since Ryoichi Tsukada injured his right leg ligament during rehearsals on August 21 and was diagnosed with a three-week recovery, he changed his appearances to focus on talking instead of doing acrobatics.
September 2012 + Place Tokyo Date September 5 – 29 Theatre Nissay Theatre, Tokyo Director Johnny KitagawaMain cast
Boys: Dream of The World...Children Who Don't Know War (2015) At the Tokyo performance, SixTones and Snow Man played the lead roles for the first time. From this production, elements of a war story based on Kitagawa's experience have been added, and the message of war and the wish for peace are now more strongly expressed. The conflict structure between the two teams in the prison remains the same, but a story is added in the middle of the play in which one of the boys, Jesse, is deported back to his home country, United States, and sent to the battlefield as a soldier.
2015 + Place Osaka Tokyo Date August 2 – 26 September 4 – 27 Theatre Shochikuza, Osaka Nissay Theatre, Tokyo Director Johnny KitagawaMain cast
The Boys, Crisis! (2016) Continuing from last year, SixTones and Snow Man played the lead roles, and the four members of HiHi Jets (Ryo Hashimoto, Mizuki Inoue, Soya Inogari, and Yuto Takahashi) appeared in a double appearance with Dream Boy at the Imperial Theatre, appearing only in the first half of the second act in this production.
The role of the cruel prison officer chief, who had appeared in previous performances, was played by Teruhiko Aoi, using only his voice. In the second half of the first act, which depicts 12 young people imprisoned for different reasons clashing in prison, the "tub dance" returned for the first time in four years. The song "Akanezora" written by Yuya Tegoshi with lyrics by Taiga Kyomoto was used as the song of the second act. Jesse, who was deported and joins the army after his release due to his foreign citizenship, and Marius Yo, a boy whose youth was stolen by the war, play the central roles in the serious war scenes, while the eleven people who are released from prison and start pursuing their own dreams are portrayed cheerfully, and the contrast between them brings the tragedy and fear of the war more into relief. The ending of the play was also serious, with the death of a friend in the war, but the song "", a Four Leaves' traditional song from this musical series, was performed many times in the play to convey the message that war is still happening somewhere in this world and that this is why every ordinary day is a happy day.
2016 + Place Tokyo Date September 5 – 29 Theatre Nissay Theatre, Tokyo Director Johnny KitagawaMain cast
Boys: Snow Falls on a Southern Island (2017) Elements of the stage play Another, a possession play that once starred SMAP and others, were added. Another was first performed by SMAP in 1991, and KinKi Kids, who was a trainee at the time, also appeared on the stage.
August 2017 + Place Osaka Date August 2 – 27 Theatre Shochikuza, Osaka Director Johnny KitagawaMain cast
Boys: Born Tomorrow (2017) For the third consecutive year, SixTones and Snow Man starred in this production, which ran for 71 performances, the most in the series, including the Osaka performances. With the theme of anti-war and friendship, the script this time reflected Kitagawa's real-life experience of war when he was a teenager, and more serious and realistic depictions of war were added, such as hiding alone under a bridge to escape U.S. military air raids on Japan. The annual "tub dance" was also performed. Snow Man performed "Vanishing Over" and SixTones performed "Beautiful Life" in the main program, but two more new songs by both units were performed in the 20-minute show time after the main program. "Guys Snow Man" was choreographed and composed by Hikaru Iwamoto, and "Japonica Style" by SixTones incorporated "Japanese" in their costumes and lyrics.
September to November 2017 + Place Tokyo Osaka Date September 7 – 28 October 27 – November 12 Theatre Nissay Theatre, Tokyo Shochikuza, Osaka Director Johnny KitagawaMain cast
The Boys Live (2017) Live performances of songs from the stage play Boys were held in four cities across Japan.
+ Place Toyohashi, Himeji, Wakayama, Hiroshima Date October 2017Main cast
Boys: Running Through Tomorrow (2018) The cast has been completely changed from Boys: Snow Falls on a Southern Island. The story is about a blue team led by Nishihata and a red team led by Onishi, who have spent most of their time fighting, escape from a violent prison guard and plan to team up to escape from prison in search of freedom. Three new songs, "Super Rocket," "Let Me Go!" and "Midnight Devil," were also performed during show time after the main play.
August 2018 + Place Osaka Date August 4 – 30 Theatre Shochikuza, Osaka Director Johnny KitagawaMain cast
Boys: And then... (2018)