Brush Up Your Life” is doing well! The Uncanny Rise of “Comedian Scriptwriters” in Drama Productions | FRIDAY DIGITAL

Brush Up Your Life” is doing well! The Uncanny Rise of “Comedian Scriptwriters” in Drama Productions

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The number of TVer favorites for “Brush Up Life” (NTV), a drama written by Bakarhythm (47), exceeded 1 million. It became the No. 1 drama broadcast this season.

Heroine Ando (right) and her classmate Kayo Noro (39), who plays the role of Ando, filming “Brush Up Life” in Tokyo. This is Ando’s first starring role in a commercial TV drama.

The film is a human comedy in which the main character, played by Sakura Ando (36), is killed in a car accident and repeatedly time-travels in order to be reborn as a human being. While attention was focused on “Daihyoin Sukyo” (NTV) starring Sho Sakurai (41), who has many fans, and “Trap’s War” (Fuji TV) starring Tsuyoshi Kusanagi (48), who will appear in his first commercial TV drama in six years, the Heisei retro story in the time jump destination is also popular among teens, and Ando, Kaho (31) and Haruka Kiminami (37) are also in the cast of “The Tale of the Tiger” (Fuji TV). In addition, the funny dialogue between Ando, Kaho (31), and Haruka Kinami (37) has been well received, and many have recommended it as the number one show of this season.

8 People Don’t Watch TV,” a TVer-only spin-off drama of “Elpis: Hope or Disaster” (Fuji TV) that aired last year, was written by Sho Hasumi (25) of the eight-member unit “Dow 90000. Sho (25) of the eight-member unit “Dow 90000” wrote the script. The number of works by comedian scriptwriters is increasing.

In addition to the rise of distribution services, TV stations have increased the number of drama slots they have available, creating a competition for popular scriptwriters, and with many stations placing importance on buzz on social networking sites and online news, it is doubly delicious to have a comedian scriptwriter who becomes a topic of conversation simply by being used. Brush Up Your Life” is also being marketed as a Bakarhythm production,” said an ad agency official.

Netflix’s “Asakusa Kid,” which began distribution in ’21, was directed and written by Gekidan Hitori (46). In the case of talented comedians, their abundant experience as performers is also an advantage.

Contempers usually try to put together a story in about five minutes, with a lot of plot twists and turns and foreshadowing. If you have the ability to create condensed fun in a short period of time, it is probably not difficult to create a drama or movie as an extension of that. Also, since they can understand the feelings of the people they are playing, many actors want to appear in them,” said a broadcaster.

In fact, Udai Iwasaki (44) of Kamomentaru, winner of the “King of Conte,” has been active in the theater world as well, having been nominated for two consecutive years for the Kishida Kunio Drama Award, also known as the “Akutagawa Award of the theater world,” for his theater company, “Kamomentaru Theater Company.

Katamari Mizukawa (32) of “KUKI KAIDAN,” who wrote the script for the omnibus drama “Script Geinin” (Fuji TV), also wrote the script for the drama “Toothless Gourmet: Melting without Chewing” (TBS), starring his partner Mogura Suzuki (35), and has been called “the closest comedian scriptwriter to Bakarhythm and Iwasaki. He has been called “the closest comedian scriptwriter to Bakarhythm and Iwasaki” by some. Mizukawa has a reputation for writing outrageous material, and if his scriptwriting work increases, it is likely to create a new wave of interest in the drama industry.

Mizukawa’s YouTube planning skills are also outstanding, and he is attracting attention as a behind-the-scenes producer as well. However, Tetsuya Morita (41), who can also MC, is being inundated with offers to appear on TV, and since he is being selective about the jobs he accepts, he is not likely to get around to writing screenplays.

With the rise of comedian scriptwriters, Reiwa’s dramas are likely to be brushed up.

From the March3and 10, 2023issues ofFRIDAY

  • PHOTO Kenji Sugawara

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