Comedy duo “La Parfait” makes headlines for “copying a senior comedian” in the M-1 quarterfinals.

I was allowed to copy New York’s material completely in the quarterfinals of last year’s M-1, so I had to bear a tremendous cross. …… This year, I was unexpectedly chosen as the last performer in the quarterfinals, so I took it as a sign that I was expected to do well, and I quickly shifted my focus to impersonations. I won with a material that wasn’t cheating, but I had to take responsibility for that, you know (laughs).

Takuya Tsuru, 31, a member of the comedy duo La Parfait, revealed the story behind the “copying a senior comedian’s material” that he performed in the M-1 quarterfinals. He and Tomoshi Omi (31), who plays the lead role, were classmates in junior high school and formed the duo in 2006. Originally, they performed traditional comedy, but in 2007, Tsuru’s impersonation of Hiroshi Abe (61) attracted attention, and in the quarterfinals of last year’s M-1, they completely copied the material of their senior duo, “New York. In this year’s quarterfinals, they performed a perfect copy of “Male Swing”. The M-1 Grand Prix official YouTube page uploaded their material from the quarterfinals, and it has become a “sensation” with more than 1.6 million views.

Why on earth does “La Parfait” continue to take on such unorthodox challenges? The two revealed a surprising truth.

Why do they continue to go down the “wrong road?

Tsuru: To be honest, I had no intention of going down that road this year, but the audience liked my material and I was doing well up to the third round, so I thought I would just go with the same material until five days before the quarterfinals.

Omi: Of course, the material that won was not the “senior impersonation” type of material. We were also challenging ourselves with our own material that wasn’t “cheating”.

Tsuru: But you were the last performer in the quarterfinals. I felt that this was probably due to the fact that I had done “New York” last year, and that they were expecting me to do it again this year. I was quite worried.

Omi: Because the “big winner” in the quarterfinals was “Reiwa Roman” last year, and “Yarends” and “Vacuum Jessica” in the past. We are in a position where we are the favorites. But we don’t have a track record. …… I guess that’s what they meant by being last (laughs).

–Did you already know that you were going to do a “male trapeze” imitation?

Tsuru: I had never done an impersonation of a “male trapeze artist,” so I had to start from scratch, including choosing costumes and material.

Omi: The order of appearance was decided on November 13, and at midnight on November 14, I received a message from Tsuru on LINE saying that he was going to change the material. At that point, there were only four days until the quarterfinals. It was on the 14th in the waiting room at the place of business that we decided to go with “Male Blanco,” wasn’t it?

Tsuru: I had called Omi and told him I was going to change the material, but I had not decided what we were going to do. At first, I thought of a material from “Chocolate Planet,” which we had done once at a live performance, but it didn’t look anything like the face of “New York” from last year. When I thought about giving it the same impact as last year’s “New York,” I thought it looked a lot like Masaaki Hirai (38) from “Male Blanco. When I actually tried on the makeup, I thought, “I can do this! I thought.

Omi: Well, it was a lot of work. The only place I could perform my material in public before the quarterfinals was at the live performance at our office on the 16th. The rest of the days were spent doing business and on location, so we only met a few times for material, and the rest of the time we just did rehearsals.

Tsuru Even so, Omi input everything from Mr. Hirai’s speech to his movements so perfectly that even on the day of the event, the audience was surprised that Mr. Hirai had appeared, so I was surprised at Omi’s high level of perfection.

In the paid version of “FRIDAY GOLD,” he talks about everything from his thoughts on his peers “Reiwa Roman” and “Lalande” to his ditan prediction for the “M-1 Grand Prix Final” to be held on December 21.