Hirata Oriza is a playwright and director. He is President of the Professional College of Arts and Tourism and the leader of Seinendan. He serves as Artistic Director of Ebara Riverside Theatre and Komaba Agora Theatre. He was born in Tokyo in 1962. In 1995, Hirata won the 39th Kishida Kunio Drama Award with Tokyo Notes. In 2019 he won the 22nd Tsuruya Nanboku Drama Award with Nihon Bungaku Seisui Shi (The Rise and Fall History of Japanese Literature). In 2006, he won the Montblanc de la Culture Arts Patronage Award. In 2011, France’s Ministry of Culture honoured Hirata with the Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters. In recent years, he has been conducting international collaborations with different countries, especially France, and in 2016 he wrote and directed a play for the Hamburg State Opera, Stilles Meer – Silent Sea.
