74-year-old actor Takeshi Kaga appeared on Tetsuko Kuroyanagi's long-running talk show "Tetsuko's Room" (TV Asahi) on July 31st. He talked about his past "near miss" with Tamori.
A video was shown of his first appearance on the show, four years after he left the Shiki Theatre Company at the age of 30. According to the video, Tamori was his neighbor when he lived in Koenji, Tokyo, as a young man.
Apparently, they were unaware of each other's relationship at the time. Kaga's fans brought stuffed toys, flowers, cakes, and other gifts to his house, and when Tamori returned home after work, he found a cake at the entrance, thinking it was a present for himself, so he took it home and ate it. There was a letter inside that said, "Thank you for your hard work on stage," so Tamori realized it was a present for his neighbor, not himself.
After watching the video, she said with a smile, "Tamori back then was known for speaking in many different languages (such as playing four-language mahjong), so I would sometimes overhear him and thought there was some strange foreigner there. I never imagined it would be Tamori."
