Thursday, September 29, 2016

Production press conference of TV Tokyo drama SP "Boukyou"

The production press conference of TV Tokyo drama SP "Boukyou" was held on 24 September which was attended by Minato Kanae, the author of the original novel and cast members Hirosue Ryoko and Ito Atsushi. The drama SP consists of three stories namely "Mikan no Hana", "Umi no hoshi" and "Kumo no Ito" set at islands in the Seto Inland Sea which feature Hirosue, Ito and Hamada Gaku as the leads respectively.

Filming was done at Innoshima in Hiroshima Prefecture which happens to be Minato's hometown. Minato commented that even though she is supposed to be very familiar with Innoshima, she couldn't help but marvel at how nice her hometown is while paying a visit to the crew and staff who were filming there. Despite the poor weather conditions as they filmed during the rainy season and plans were affected by typhoons too, Hirosue enjoyed herself during the process and revealed that the locals had come to play extras in the drama. However, it is not confirmed if the Innoshima residents can actually watch this drama because it is dependent on the local TV stations to buy the broadcast rights so Hirosue called upon the related personnel to try to make it happen. As for Ito, he joked that his story might be successful because the younger version of his character was played by Kato Seishiro and said that the rainy conditions probably coincided with his character's emotional state and cleared up towards the end of the story. With the number of rainy days they encountered during the filming, Ito was concerned that he might be labelled as a "ame-otoko" for bringing in the rain to which Minato chipped in to say that it was very coincidental that they happened to be there at a time when Innoshima had the most amount of rain in the last few decades. Ito concluded with a comment that he wishes that the drama will make people feel hopeful and optimistic after watching it.

When asked how their lives would turn out if they were born on an island, Hirosue said that her hometown in Kochi feels almost like an island to her and there were only two private television stations in the prefecture. However, since she had always aspired to join showbiz since she was a child, she thinks that she would have still headed down the same path as she did even though there were no auditions held in Kochi then. As for Ito, he revealed that he was born in Chiba and entered a theatre group at the age of 3. If he had been born on an island, he might have remained there and worked in a different job by now. During this segment, Hirosue said that she had been a fan of Ito when he was a child actor playing Chibi Norida in the FujiTV programme "Tonneruzu no Minnasan no okage desu" which made Ito very happy even though he hardly remembered what he did then.

The theme song of the drama "Kougen" is written and sung by Yamazaki Masayoshi who also appears in "Kumo no Ito" as Hamada's senior.

Sources: Oricon / Nikkansports / Sponichi

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