She would entrance her audience with the same verve she had shown when she entertained her clients as a geisha.

ECONOMIST: Kiharu Nakamura, a geisha, died on January 5th, aged 90

She had something to sell, her experience as a geisha and of Japanese culture, and she worked hard to market it.

ECONOMIST: Kiharu Nakamura, a geisha, died on January 5th, aged 90

The dramaturgy is crudely repetitive: as Hatsumomo, Gong Li is required to throw so many hissy fits that she seems less a geisha than a Mean Girl.

NEWYORKER: Memoirs of a Geisha

The thriller, whose subtitle translates as The Beast in the Shadows, involves a novelist who comes to the aid of a geisha during a promotional visit to Tokyo.

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But then the teen-age Chiyo (Ziyi Zhang) is rescued by a good fairy, Mameha (Michelle Yeoh), a retired geisha who treats her kindly and teaches her the intricacies of her craft.

NEWYORKER: Memoirs of a Geisha

In 1929, a country girl, Chiyo, is sold into bondage at a Kyoto training house for geishas, a house ruled by the foul-tempered Mother (Kaori Momoi) and a nasty top geisha, Hatsumomo (Gong Li) the equivalents of a wicked step-mother and stepsister.

NEWYORKER: Memoirs of a Geisha

The most beautiful of cities, with the paint still wet on the late Bellinis and Titians, Venice also had wonderful music, geisha-like courtesans, and a life of endless, mostly free conversation.

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Following dinner, the geisha may dance to music provided by a jikata, who plays the traditional, three-stringed shamisen.

BBC: Kyoto's living art of the geisha

Geisha may also engage the guests in a variety of drinking games, at which they excel, almost always resulting in guests getting progressively sozzled.

BBC: Kyoto's living art of the geisha

In its heyday half a century ago, Kagurazaka was home to some 700 geisha-san.

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