London, New York, Paris, and Berlin are generally considered the great theatrical capitals in terms of history, diversity, scale, and quality. However, when the field of vision is expanded to the East, it is said that Tokyo has more plays in more genres spanning more centuries of tradition than arguably anywhere else in the world. To validate this hypothesis, a survey was conducted with actual documentation of performances occurring on a random day, 24 November 2012, a typical Saturday in the busy autumn culture season during a three-day Labor Thanksgiving holiday weekend.

Included in the survey were national, public, and private theatres, as well as theatre/dance festivals spread across the Tokyo metropolis. Also included were the theatres and festivals in the Greater Metropolitan area with a population of 35,000,000 people (13,000,000 in Tokyo itself), who could easily access in an hour from Tokyo on public transportation lines. We covered theatre performance, dance performances, operas, musicals, circus spectacles, traditional theatres (kabuki, noh, kyogen), and storytelling (rakugo), but not music concerts and manzai comedy (Japanese vaudeville).

Performance information was gathered from the following sources:

1. • Theatre Guide, the monthly theatre listings (all performances)

2. • Pia cultural magazine's Data Analysis Department all performances)

3. • CoRich Butaigeijutsu! website (fringe and small venue performances)

4. • Real Tokyo website (interdisciplinary art performances)

5. • Shochiku official website (kabuki)

6. • Nōgaku Taimuzu monthly magazine, November 2012, listings (noh, kyogen)

7. • Nippon Engeki Kyōkai (Japanese Association of Theatre) Annual Report (primarily national and public theatre performances)

The productions were categorized according to:

1. • Venue type: national, public, or private

2. • Size: large (800 plus), medium (400 plus), or small (under 400)

3. • Genre: traditional or contemporary

4. • Subgenres: original plays, revivals, operas and musicals, dance, and other.

Traditional and folk festival performances, typically held annually at local shrines and temples, were not catalogued. We chose not to list, or could not gather information concerning, the myriad amateur, community, and closed performances known only by word-of-mouth or micro-promotions: flyers, posters, and personal websites. These hundreds of amateur shows, attended by eager, bouquet-bearing friends, families, and alumni, include high school and university club performances, amateur recitals in ballet and modern dance, and noh dance or nagauta singing.