Day 25, or just: The Highlight
Makoto Tsubasa!
If Hiromi is my love, Mami is my star. They are both so fundamentally different personalities, that they'll never have to compete for my affection. I'll just have both and be happy with it. Still, if I had to choose only one, Mami ranks above Hiromi. But only in life-or-death situations. I'd never let go of either of them without any serious threat of fatal consequences if I don't.
I don't know what to say about why I love Mami or what I love about her. The answer would have to be: Everything. I love her looks, her voice, her style, her sense of humor, her big heart, her sharp wit and intelligence, her stubbornessperseverance, her sensibility and her penchant for crack (and, as ekusudei put it, "the balls to pull it off").
With Hiromi a lot was about Hiromi herself and her relationship with others. Mami is all about her relationship with the audience. Mami loves the stage, she loves her audience, and she loves to perform. Rika wrote that to her being an otokoyaku was a job. And I think Mami thought so, too, but she also really loved her job. :P She loved being an otokoyaku. I think they worked well together. To Rika, it was important to deliver a great performance, and to Mami it was important to deliver a great show. Together they worked on a great illusion. :P
So yes, above all, Mami is a real showgirl. She loves putting on a show, on stage and off stage, which makes it really difficult to grasp the 'real' person behind the glitter. I simply stopped trying and accepted that show is part of who Mami is, and if she doesn't want to expose more of herself, she'll have her reasons. She wants to control who and what we see and I'll respect that and go with it. It's easy because she's so good at what she does. She wants to create the perfect show, and she delivers.
My Mami love started with a short article mentioning Takarazuka and top star Makoto Tsubasa. I looked up her name on the internet, but all I found was a japanese website with a tiny picture of her. There was also a picture of Wao, but I remember liking Mami better. :P I couldn't get much information back then and let it rest, but I kept the picture and dragged it with me through several computer generations and hard drive failures. xD Many years later much more information was available, plus there was youtube and one of the first things I did was go back and search for Mami stuff. The two videos that sealed the deal were the Blue Moon Blue finale, which remains one of my all-time favorite parts, and a number from ESP!.
Mami was committed to delivering the perfect show and when something wasn't perfect she fixed it without interruption.
Mami also happens to be my favorite Tod. She proved that she can do it during one of her dinner shows and a TCA special. I really don't know why they didn't let her have it. :-/
Gawd, her Tod would have been such a vain and smug bstrd... just imagining it makes me squee.
But who knows, maybe the Austrians didn't like her *shrug*
Another favorite roll of hers was Jaqueline in Me And My Girl. Goodness, she and Yuri were so perfect!
On stage, she is hilarious when she's doing crack and beautifully heartbreaking when she's doing drama, and awesomely cool when she's being a macho. There's also plenty of proof that she is a lot of fun off stage. But every now and then there is a hint of her empathic side. Like in her dinner show "Who? What. Why!", in which she performed a song in sign language and just maybe it was her idea, because it looks like she's the one teaching Dan-chan sign language.
This post is not nearly half of what I would want to say or show, and I think the point, if it's there, is buried beneath too many words, but I'm on tight resources in terms of time and material, and this is a hobby and I refuse to feel bad for anything. I love Mami. In my eyes and in her own way she is perfection. I wouldn't trade her for anyone.