+act. May 2018 - Director Miike on Sakurai: “The Charm of Sakurai Sho as Actor, as Human” Part 2

[arashitranslation]

+act. May 2018 - Director Miike on Sakurai: “The Charm of Sakurai Sho as Actor, as Human” (Abstract) Part 2

In terms of acting, he has some technical points that have improved. Though I am not sure if it is good or not… the biggest characteristic of his acting is that his ability to reproduce the scene is tremendously high. His acting is stable. No matter how many times he acts, at the same timing, he would act this, then this, then this… he did not practice for this. He is just able to repeat his acting many times “naturally”. I think he has gone through special trainings and has accumulated experiences that other actors don’t have. Because he has concerts every year in which he needs to perform on stage, check his position on stage according to the lighting, and perform in front of tens of thousands of people in a very tense mood… he has overwhelming sense of stability.

Therefore, he is also good at dubbing that can be said to be No.1 even in Japan. According to the situation of sound recording, a day or two has to be reserved for dubbing for changing the nuance of the scenes. In a long scriptline, in the phrase “though so, is should be ○○”, only the “though so” need to be dubbed (giggle). Even for such slight scriptline, he manages to connect the dubbed one to the rest smoothly, the timing of him saying the scriptlines and his partners saying the scriptlines is just inborn in his mind. Therefore, I just need to explain a bit and then he gets it and can straight go to dubbing and make it in one shot even he doesn’t watch the video clip. I think this is indeed one of his characteristics.

His “concentration” is beyond our imagination. He is totally concentrated at that moment. When they have live performance, once they have done it they would imprinted it in their mind. Like the choreography of the debut song which they have done many times, they would have no problem dance it now, right? Because these things are imprinted in their mind. Such ultimate practice is like Ichikawa Ebizo. It is like classical art performance. For us who work in movie industry, in the first place there is no such thing as “same thing”. There is no such thing as “same scriptline”, when a scriptline is said, “it’s done!” and then we put this scriptline aside and go to the next scene. But for them, they have to repeat what they have done… like dance the same song, sing the same lyrics, so they have to imprint what they have to do in their mind. This is indeed the marvel of Johnny’s. They have gone through the trainings since young and they are used to it.

He is an extraordinary person, very extraordinary. He makes others feel comfortable. He has good sense and sincerely work on his jobs… in entertainment industry there are many people who are just the opposite, who get attention that “they’ve done something skillfully” but actually they haven’t. But somehow… he is the type who lives earnestly and works earnestly. And he is not arrogant and takes every chance as challenge. He is interesting. In the future if there is such fate, of course I want to work with him again. Although it’s the same for all actors, when a work is done we’re like “I hope to work with you again”, but it doesn’t mean a promise. I can’t promise that I shall be directing in the future, perhaps he is the same too. … Especially it’s very tough to be leading actor. Even “just to be here” is a difficult thing… Especially for the leading actors, in addition to such awareness, if they don’t have the awareness and resolution of working to their earnest, they can’t continue to be leading actors. Among them, probably… he “is here”. He “is here” well “as ARASHI”, as well as “as Sakurai Sho in ARASHI” and “as actor Sakurai Sho”.

Sakurai-kun, frankly saying, is not the type with extraordinary personality. He has a sense of stability that he can be in anywhere. The character Aoe is also a person with no much characteristic. But because of this, Sakurai-kun has a lot of similarities. A person who loves geochemistry… this is such a big scale. A subject to study the university through the Earth with hundreds of million and billions of years as unit. And then to look for the joy, sadness, anger, sorrow, and fortune of people in it from this viewpoint. This is already not a viewpoint of either an actor or an idol. He has to draw himself apart from it and look into himself objectively. He can only act the character by looking into this. In this sense he has a lot of similarities with Aoe.

- - -
Director Miike on Sho:
Part 2: https://arashitranslation.dreamwidth.org/151842.html [Fin]
Part 1: https://arashitranslation.dreamwidth.org/151633.html

Sho-san’s individual interview:
Part 3: https://arashitranslation.dreamwidth.org/151343.html
Part 2: https://arashitranslation.dreamwidth.org/150521.html
Part 1: https://arashitranslation.dreamwidth.org/150190.html

Comments

[sarahjohnsf_89]

Thank you for the translation.

[hashiridase]

Thank you for translating!

[roo_kie]

Thank you so much!!!
I love the description of Sakurai-san in Director Miike eyes,
"He is the type who lives earnestly and works earnestly. And he is not arrogant and takes every chance as challenge. He is interesting".