Tsubouchi Shoyo (1859-1935) was a teacher of English and drama at Tokyo Senmon Gakko and subsequently, in 1928, translated the complete works of Shakespeare into Japanese for the first time. He was also a stage director who attempted to produce Shakespeare. Around 1920, he wrote an essay in which he recollected Shakespearean productions by two foreign travelling companies, the Miln Company (1891) and the Allan Wilkie Company (1912). Tsubouchi regarded the Miln Company productions as more “authentic” than those of the Allan Wilkie Company, because Miln's productions followed the “old-style productions of Shakespearean plays”. On the other hand he considered Wilkie's direction as “in his own style and petty”. My purpose in this essay is to ask where Tsubouchi's notion of “authenticity” came from. What was his definition of “old-style Shakespearean productions”?