Today was a press conference for Ueto Aya's (24) upcoming dorama "Zettai Reido" that is all about a special investigation unit working solely on cold cases similar to popular US TV series "Cold Case." Ueto is going to play the role of a detective for the first time in her career and had various struggles adapting to her new role. "I didn't want people to get tired of my usual image and decided to show a completely new side of me this time. It was my own suggestion to play such a role, but I didn't expect that it would be so difficult for me to lose myself in the role," she revealed. For someone like her who used to portray bright and energetic characters almost all the time it's quite understandable to be struggling with such a different kind of role.
Japan actually just established a new department that specializes on cold cases in November last year. Their goal is to settle case that are about to come under the statute of limitations for the sake of the victims and their families. Each episode is going to focus on one case and all the efforts trying to find new evidence also thanks to the advanced technology that hadn't yet been available a few years back.
The director had a clear vision of what he was trying to achieve and mixed with Ueto's struggles some scenes had to be redone over 20 times until completion. "I think it never has been so straining and difficult for me to get an OK in a dorama. Every day I immediately collapsed into my bed when I returned home," Ueto commented. She's putting all that hard work into this role and in the end it's not even going to be one of those typically cool detectives. Her role, Sakuragi Izumi, actually earned herself the nickname "kame" (turtle) for being so slow at work. "I've seen detective doramas with actresses in the leading roles, but it wasn't really helpful that all of them have been really cool characters. This dorama focuses on the loneliness that can't be seen that often but comes with the job of a detective. I still tried to look cool, though." Her last commented made people laugh at the event.
Miyasako Hiroyuki (40), Yamaguchi Sayaka (30), Maruyama Tomomi (35), Kitagawa Hiromi (29), Kimura Ryo (21), Nakahara Takeo (58), Sugimoto Tetta (44) and Kitaoji Kinya (67) attended the event as well. Zettai Reido is going to start on the 13th (first episode will be 15min longer).
Credits:
Kawaii-Joyuu