Zettai Kareshi

What a day I had today! Waking up earlier that I have ever done since coming to Japan, I took myself down to Shibuya, one of the southernmost centers of Tokyo, well before rush hour had even hinted at starting. There I met up with a representative of one of my agencies, along with a bunch of other gaijin who were there for the same job. Walking to a buss, we then went south for three hours before reaching a place in the mountains where the shot were going to take place.

It would prove to be quite a sight: twenty foreigners dressed in black suits with black ties and back sunglasses, portraying a task force of Agent Smith-like robots. And most of what we did was running. We did a lot of running - grouped into two parallel lines we dashed downhill more times than I remember, from the black SWAT-like car we were supposed to have exited at one end, to the small car we were chasing at the other.

All in all we were out there for about eight hours, with the bus taking three hours in each direction, adding up to a total of 14 hours. We left Shibuya when it was still dark, and came back not before the darkness had returned. Kinda cozy, that neon-lit darkness. As for the pay, I will get around 25 000 yen for the day. Not too bad for doing something as enjoyable as this.

The name of the series is 絶対彼氏 (Zettai Kareshi, or Absolute Boyfriend), a romantic drama about a girl falling in love with a robotic guy.

There will be one more shooting at the same location before the end of the month, which I am almost guaranteed to be part of. I may also be selected for two other shooting occasions - one at Narita Airport and one in a studio - but as they won't need as many people there it remains to be seen whether I will actually get those jobs. Though I am quite confident that I will.

A fun tidbit is that a few of the other guys I worked with looked a bit like American celebrities. There were two guys who had a resemblance to Gary Sinise and (a younger version of) Kurt Russell respectively, and this one guy who looked very much like Bill Maher.