Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu

A rakugo performance heard in prison gives a young ex-convict a direction for his life. Upon his release, he begs the celebrated storyteller Yakumo to take him as an apprentice and receives the name Yotaro. In Yakumo's household he also meets Konatsu, whose attachment to the art is inseparable from her anger over her father's death.

Behind the master's polished voice lies a history shared with the brilliant, unruly Sukeroku. As Yakumo recalls their apprenticeship, rival ambitions and tangled affections, the stories told onstage become bound to the lives, loyalties and losses of the people telling them.