Actor Issei Takahashi appeared with actor Aoki Munetaka at the completion report meeting for the drama series "W 1972: Fireflies at the Beach" (WOWOW), in which he stars, held in Tokyo on October 6th. The drama was shot in Okinawa, where the series is set, and when asked about his memories of filming, Aoki recalled, "Okinawa was extremely cold," to which Takahashi nodded with a wry smile and said, "It was a cold wave-like cold that we weren't expecting."
Aoki continued, "It was really cold. It was so cold I didn't think it was supposed to be this cold," and Takahashi also revealed that it was colder than she had imagined, saying, "When we were trying on the costumes, they said something different. When we were trying on the costumes, they said, 'It's warm, so you'll be fine,' but the moment we arrived at the airport and got off, I thought, 'This is going to be cold (laughs)'."
Furthermore, Takahashi said, "I think the local people were saying it had been years since they'd been out," and Aoki said, "The hotel had already prepared a heater for us," revealing how they had prepared for the unexpected cold weather in Okinawa. Director Hideyuki Hirayama was also in attendance at the completion report meeting.
The drama is based on Sakagami's crime suspense novel "Hotaruhi at the Beach" (Futaba Bunko). In 1972, as Okinawa was being converted back to mainland Japan and the yen was being exchanged for dollars, a cash transport vehicle collecting dollar bills was attacked and $1 million was stolen. Concerned that if the Japanese or US governments were to learn of this incident, it could develop into a serious diplomatic issue, the Ryukyu Police formed a special investigation team led by Maeda Taichi (Takahashi) to solve the case in secret. With only 18 days until reversion, Maeda and his team worked hard to solve the case. The robbery was suspected to be the work of a local gang, but the US government's intentions lie behind it...
"Serial Drama W 1972: Fireflies at the Beach" will start on October 19th. It will be broadcast and streamed on WOWOW Prime and WOWOW On Demand from 10pm on Sundays. There will be a total of five episodes. The first episode will be broadcast for free.
