How TV Stations Became a “Comfortable Space” for Celebrities who Bring their Child Along

On October 20, Yu Aoi appeared on “Premium Talk” of “Asa Ichi” (NHK). Yu Aoi is in NHK’s TV series “Boogie Woogie”. It was her first drama appearance after giving birth.

She gave birth to her first child, a baby girl, last August, and had to take her eldest daughter with her to the filming at NHK Osaka Broadcasting Station.

 

When MC Daikichi Hanamaru talked about the fact that a day-care center was built inside NHK in Osaka because the main character, Sakura Ando, was a mama-san heroine in the series, Aoi said,

“Thanks to Sakura-chan’s work on ‘Manpuku,’ NHK in Osaka has such a space and a lot of other things, so I was able to take some of that down.”

Ando is also known for an episode in the movie “A Certain Man,” released in 2022, in which she suddenly went home during filming, shocking her co-stars Satoshi Tsumabuki and Masataka Kubota. According to her, she wanted to see her children so much that she jumped on a train from the nearest station and had a family “hot pot” dinner.

 

Ando, who won the “Japan Academy Award” for best supporting actress for her role in the film, revealed that she is still struggling between acting and child rearing. The smiling face of her husband, Tasuku Emoto, who was in the audience, and the sight of soon-to-be-married announcer Asami Mizuto, who sobbed as she listened to the episode, were also much talked about.