Fuji TV Starts Actively Featuring ‘Atarashii Chizu’ Eight Years After End of ‘SMAPxSMAP’

Fuji TV has announced the appointment of former “SMAP” members Tsuyoshi Kusanagi (50) and Shingo Katori (47), now working as the joint project “New Map,” for its summer special programs in succession.

Kusanagi will appear in the August 15 broadcast of the variety special “Ozumou Room Rivalry! Kusanagi will be the first MC for a variety show on the station in eight years and four months, since “Kusanagi Tsuyoshi no Ganbatte Taisho” (Tsuyoshi Kusanagi’s Ganbatte Award) in April 2004. Katori also starred in one of the dramas in the annual omnibus-style horror entertainment “Really Scary Stories: 25th Anniversary Special (hereafter, “Honsaku”)” broadcast on the 17th of the same month. This will be his first appearance in “Honsaku”.

Incidentally, Goro Inagaki (50) of “New Map” is the leader of the “Honsaku” club, and this year marks the 20th anniversary of his appointment as the storyteller of “Honsaku.

The three members of “New Map” started working on this project after leaving the former Johnny’s office in September 2005. At the time, it was an unspoken understanding that if you left Johnny’s, you could not appear on terrestrial television. Therefore, Mr. Katori’s regular Fuji variety show “Ojamap! ended in March 2006.

However, Fuji continued to use Mr. Inagaki for “Honsaku” despite the discovery of the old Johnny’s. It is true that the “face” of the program was not the same as that of the old Johnny’s, but it was the same as that of the new Johnny’s. Indeed, he has become the “face” of the program, so Fuji must have considered the psychology of the fans of “Honsaku” and continued casting him.

After leaving the former Johnny’s, the three members quickly teamed up with ABEMA, an Internet TV station, and also made full use of SNS, which they had not made use of during their time with the former Johnny’s. However, in July 2007, a tremendous “tailwind” blew for the three members. In July ’19, a tremendous “tailwind” blew for the three.

NHK reported that the Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) had issued a warning to the Johnny’s office on suspicion that it had pressured TV stations not to allow the three members of “New Map” to appear on the program, citing possible violations of the Act Concerning Prohibition of Private Monopolization and Maintenance of Fair Trade (Antimonopoly Law). This is a common practice in the industry.

The story was common knowledge in the industry, but if the JFTC had intervened, it would have been a big deal, and in September 2009, NHK became the first broadcaster to feature the three in an educational program for children on E-television called “Waruiko Atsumare”. The program has become a regular feature.

In the same year, Kusanagi was cast as Yoshinobu Tokugawa in the historical drama “Seiten wo Sukuke”. Then, other stations gradually lifted their ban on the use of the three actors. In the January season of last year, Kusanagi played the lead role in the drama “War of the Trap” produced by Fuji’s affiliate Kantele,” said a reporter in charge of broadcasting.

Although this is a favorable situation from the standpoint of fairness in the use of talent, at present, NHK and Fuji are the two most prominent companies actively using the three actors. Fuji, however, has a clear goal in mind.

Fuji has recently been producing programs with an emphasis on the number of views of missed broadcasts on Tver and other media, individual viewership, and core viewership among viewers aged 13 to 49, rather than household viewership. As a result, the ratings for the major special program “FNS 27 Hours TV: Japan’s Most Enjoyable School Festival! received an overall individual rating of 4.0% (Video Research, Kanto region, the same below) and a core rating of 4.6%, placing it at the top of both the individual and core ratings for the same time slot.

Fuji’s programming objectives are to use former SMAP members, including the three members of “New Map,” at the upper end of the core viewership target age range of around 49, and with many fans in the age range of the members, the use of the members can be expected to boost the core viewership ratings. The fact that other commercial key stations are not actively using the members may also be to Fuji’s advantage.

Fuji is a familiar station to the three members of “New Map” as they aired the variety show “SMAP x SMAP” until the breakup of SMAP at the end of 2004, so they must be deeply moved by the fact that they are being actively used.

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