SINGAPORE — On a beach at high noon, two fierce rivals face off in a defining duel that will ultimately see one of them die. Except that the vanquished doesn’t, which sets the stage for legendary Japanese director Yukio Ninagawa’s highly enjoyable samurai romp Musashi.

It’s the second show under the 3 Titans Of Theatre mini-season by the Esplanade and Singapore Repertory Theatre (with Peter Brook’s The Suit later this month). And for those who were able to catch the exquisite Shun-kin in August, this proves to be a clear-as-day 180-degree shift from Simon McBurney’s thematically and tonally dark piece.

Taking off from the famous eponymous novel by Eiji Yoshikawa (which, in turn, is about a real-life legendary ronin or wandering samurai named Musashi Miyamoto), the late playwright Hisashi Inoue takes the duel between Musashi and enemy Kojiro Sasaki and imagines the latter surviving. Which takes us, years later, into a temple in a forest where the titular character is on a Zen meditation retreat. But Kojiro arrives and it’s payback time. They’ve got three days until the re-match and, just to be sure his opponent doesn’t run away, Kojiro stays put in the temple as well. And takes part in the retreat. With his mortal enemy.

At the age of 78, Ninagawa has enough imagination, mischief and zest for life for two people (or more) — Musashi (the play) is a multi-genre piece with bits of drama and action, hints of murder mystery and the supernatural, and, of course, hilarious comedic moments as it rolls out gag after gag (culminating in a seemingly-out-of-nowhere tango dance sequence). There is ease in how western and Japanese theatrical elements are combined, too. But throughout all the shifts, this rollicking fun ride through samurai-land is a critique (masked by irreverence) of its people’s very way of life and the idea of living and dying by the sword (while slyly having a jab or two at Zen as well).

Despite clocking in at three hours, there’s a breezy, animated quality to it (not least because of a set that manages to simultaneously give the impression of intricate class as well as having come straight out of a live period TV show, as well as the perpetually moving bamboo trees).

And while the title might be Musashi (played cool and stoic by Death Note’s Tatsuya Fujiwara), we are ultimately drawn to his nemesis Kojiro (Junpei Mizobata), the character around which everything pivots. Not only has he got some eye-roll-worthy hang-ups regarding his defeat (this close to accusing his rival of cheating) and was abandoned as a child, he represents perhaps the purest version of the samurai whose life is measured by his success with the blade.

But this is hardly a two-man show, and the rest of the cast are a hoot, led by Kohtaloh Yoshida as Munenori Yagyu, an advisor to the shogun who has Noh aspirations, channeling Kurosawa regular Toshiro Mifune in his bumbling swagger.

Musashi runs until Nov 9, 8pm, Esplanade Theatre. Tickets from Sistic.