Template:Interview 1

Interview with Tsuji Mitsuhito (P.A. Works producer) and Toba Yosuke (Aniplex producer)


 * '――"Buddy Daddies" is an original work, but how did the initial concept for the project come about?


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: I'd just started parenting children of my own, and I had a discussion with Toba-san about how it might be nice to do something with that theme - that was the start of it. To be honest, I'd brought this up to various producers before, but I was told that stories about "parenting" were a hard sell…


 * Toba Yosuke: Personally, I didn't say it was "impossible" from the start. I said first off, I'd go home and think it over. Building a new piece of entertainment around "parenting"... I thought about it, and in the past, there were foreign TV shows like the sitcom "Full House". Going with that general vibe, I thought it might be fun to have a story about people who have no affinity for parenting getting jerked around by children, and having to struggle through it. And also, I thought about including anime-typical action… For example, wouldn't it be fun if someone who usually murders people gets saddled with parenting? It might feel like "Léon" [1994 movie by Luc Besson] or "A Perfect World" [1993 movie by Clint Eastwood], wouldn't it? Something like that. And then Tsuji-san brought up the topic of the Netflix-distributed movie "Polar" [2019 movie, known for starring Mads Mikkelsen], and this became the story of a hard-boiled man raising a child.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: The protagonist of that story was an old assassin guy, so I tried to picture him raising a child.


 * Toba Yosuke: But characters who are "old guys" are a tough sell, so I wondered, what comes next? (laughs) And there's the common trope of an assassin taking in the child of a target they killed, but it seemed rather hard to set up a natural way for a killer to take in a child of their own accord. Like in the case of "Léon", the young girl Mathilda voluntarily seeks out the assassin herself - that's a good fit. But Tsuji-san said he didn't want the child to be old enough to make up their own mind and act on it themselves. He preferred a younger child.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: After all, it's incredibly difficult parenting kids in early childhood, when they're getting wilful and assertive. I wanted to create a character at that age.


 * Toba Yosuke: If so, I thought it'd be tough to develop things further… And then I met Shimokura-san [Shimokura Vio, writer for Nitroplus] on another project, and we got to chatting, and I asked for his opinion. And he said, "In that case, having a duo would work well." One of them is a guy who wants to ditch the child and leave them be, but the other's personality is the opposite, and the interactions and dialogue between these two inevitably create a back-and-forth. If you set up a scenario like this, it's bound to go somewhere, he said. I think Shimokura-san helped me immensely by coming up with this excellent idea. So I decided, let's go straight down the route of odd-couple assassins raising a child.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: And I think that's how the idea of this as a "buddy story" really got started. The protagonists were a bit younger than the original concept, but we got them up to around their late twenties to thirties.


 * Toba Yosuke: And I thought it'd be nice if these two men took on the roles of father and mother. The two men are bringing up a child without any blood ties to them - that's quite a modern story, reflecting how values are diversifying, and I figured this would work well. "Family with no blood ties" and "two people of the same gender raising a child" - I think both of those are really great themes.


 * '――In a so-called "buddy story", the way the main characters' dynamic is written is really essential - what did you focus on in the creation process?


 * Toba Yosuke: The two of them essentially get along well, but their personalities being direct opposites is easier to work with, so we used that as a base.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: One of the characters is in the mother's role, shouldering the main burden of parenting; the other character is a deadbeat dad who takes up the father's role anyway… Starting from this, we came up with their dialogue and personalities.


 * Toba Yosuke: A caring mother, and a father who takes his regular job seriously but does absolutely nothing once he gets home. We basically took that setup and changed them into assassins.


 * '――Since this is an original work that was created from scratch, was there anything you got especially hung up on?


 * Toba Yosuke: The question of how to depict "parenting". If I had to put it into words now, I'd say that "becoming a family" ended up being a major theme.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: (Kurusu) Kazuki has experienced lost love, and (Suwa) Rei is a character with no idea what love is, and all this changes through living with the child (Unasaka) Miri. So portraying the changes the two of them undergo is a big part of it.


 * Toba Yosuke: Another detail of the story is the inclusion of "relatable parenting moments". For example, how two men go about "hokatsu" (the hunt to enrol their children in daycare), or what reaction two men have the first time they visit a "specialty children's store"... that's fun to see, isn't it? A guy pedalling around with a child on his bicycle, and he's actually an assassin - stuff like that. I think that sort of minor detail brings out the comedic elements and makes the story more engaging.


 * '――So basically, making the details of parenting more realistic.''


 * Toba Yosuke: Of course. Since many of our staff on this project are veteran parents.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: There are also veterans among the writers, so they incorporate plenty of "relatable parenting moments".


 * Toba Yosuke: We have a scene along the lines of getting a call from the daycare while you're at work, and being told that your child has a fever, and thinking, "Seriously? I'm on the job (assassination) right now."


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: The protagonists are basically newbies to parenting, so how will they cope with this… I thought it'd be interesting to show that.


 * Toba Yosuke: After all, given their positions, they live in the shadows. There's no one they can discuss this with.


 * '――What is the appeal of Kazuki and Rei as characters?''


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: At the outset, Rei doesn't have much emotion, and has no idea about love - but over the course of all 12 episodes, he displays really subtle changes, and I hope the viewers will sense that evolution. I would be very happy if you get emotionally invested in his progression towards understanding love; it's charming and worth watching. Kazuki's buddy dynamic with Rei, and his parent-child dynamic with Miri, are a lot of fun. Toyonaga-san (Toshiyuki) plays Kazuki, and you get to enjoy his incredible range as an actor. He puts in flourishes that we never imagined, and it's delightful; I feel like he's enhanced Kazuki's charm.


 * '――We've already mentioned the actors, but Toyonaga Toshiyuki-san, who plays Kazuki, and Uchiyama Koki-san, who plays Rei, are both perfectly cast.


 * Toba Yosuke: I feel like Uchiyama-san is almost just playing himself (laughs), but Toyonaga-san suits the role so well it's like it was written for him. I was amazed just how well it fit. It's like Kazuki is Toyonaga-san and Rei is Uchiyama-san in disguise - it feels as if they themselves are on the screen. It's incredible. That's what I think, personally.


 * '――Was the casting this time determined by audition?


 * Toba Yosuke: We held auditions. But before that, there was already some talk floating around about how Rei was "very Uchiyama-san".


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: There were lots of opinions like that, about the atmosphere and the voices. Previously, I'd worked on another P.A. Works project with Toba-san, and Uchiyama-san played the protagonist there. Generally, in the anime world, you don't often reuse a previous lead actor in your next project, but this time we couldn't shake that feeling of "Uchiyama-san really would be great for this". So who would be good as Uchiyama-san's buddy Kazuki… And we decided on Toyonaga-san. The two of them were a duo in "Zetsuen no Tempest" about 10 years ago, and since then, they've co-starred in various works. They already had a strong rapport, so it seemed like they'd make a good match.


 * Toba Yosuke: When it came to this series, I really placed a lot of weight on that aspect as well. I requested that the performances feel a little raw, and as close to their actual selves as possible. So, rather than fitting themselves to the characters, the true goal was to fit the characters to the real people themselves. At that point, we could see Uchiyama-san doing that, and then we thought, "If Toyonaga-san is a good fit too…" And he turned out to be an even more perfect fit than we'd imagined. He's practically just being himself by now. (laughs)


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: Toyonaga-san comes to pretty much every audition for a P.A. Works project, so I knew that he'd tackled all sorts of challenges in his performances, and had a very wide range. Kazuki is a free-spirited character who isn't constrained by any mould, so I thought he'd be perfect for Toyonaga-san, who can throw himself so freely into his performances, and brings so much to every role. It also felt like P.A. Works had finally found a character that would let us work at full power with Toyonaga-san.


 * Toba Yosuke: In that sense, it feels like Kazuki was truly finalised as a character after Toyonaga-san was cast.


 * '――Unasaka Miri holds the key to this story - how about Kino Hina-san, who plays her?''


 * Toba Yosuke: Miri's performance was also mostly left up to Kino-san herself.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: Miri is a 4-year-old child, and personally, I wanted to depict a realistic child in anime. So, ever since the audition phase, I requested that everyone steer clear of the sort of stock phrases and mannerisms you find in so-called "kids' anime". If possible, I wanted a naturalistic portrayal of a child. And then I suddenly found myself very taken with Kino-san's performance. In that instant, Director Asai [Yoshiyuki] and I spontaneously glanced at each other, like, "It's her." After she graced us with such wonderful acting, it was a simple decision.


 * '――So you wanted the tone and vocal quality to be realistically childlike.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: That's right. I was aiming for a performance close to a realistic 4-year-old, but Kino-san is really smart, and gave a take that was uniquely hers. I'm grateful that I could watch the recording process with no worries as well. When all three of the main actors were present, it felt like witnessing a parent-child conversation for real.


 * '――You brought up foreign TV shows at the start - so did you consciously draw inspiration from foreign works when writing characters who were involved in the assassin trade?


 * Toba Yosuke: It was quite a conscious decision. As mentioned before, the cast's performances were fairly raw, and we were sticklers for realism. We wanted it to feel more like a work which had been dubbed [into Japanese]. We were envisioning something like those really straightforward foreign dramas, which are so-called crime/suspense stories containing comedic elements. I was thinking along the lines of, "This is something J. J. Abrams (American movie and TV producer) would make!" (laughs)


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: Or rather, let's get J. J. to make a live-action version. (laughs)


 * Toba Yosuke: A live-action foreign drama about an assassin raising a child has plenty of possibilities.


 * Interviewer: Now, please say what you think are the selling points of this series "Buddy Daddies".


 * Toba Yosuke: The ups and downs of the buddies' interactions. The comedic contrast of usually-cool assassins being jerked around by a 4-year-old. I think those are the most enjoyable parts to watch. Of course, like I said just now, the main theme is something like "murder and parenting, work and family, which to choose?!", and what conclusion they'll reach in the end… Those dramatic parts are another highlight.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: When Miri is riding roughshod over those two adults, she's animated in a really adorable way - I hope you pay attention to all her fun movements. Also, as mentioned before, I'd like you to carefully follow Rei's emotional development.


 * Toba Yosuke: By the way, Tsuji-san's child is also part of the production staff.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: I got them to draw Miri's drawings which appear onscreen.


 * Toba Yosuke: I said I wanted a real child to do Miri's drawings, and he was like, "Isn't there one right there?" (laughs)


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: My kid is 6 years old, but it's quite tough to get them to draw. Of course, doing all of it was out of the question, so I mostly asked them to draw the key pictures.


 * Toba Yosuke: That sort of realism can't be achieved by an adult, even a professional animator. Getting a child to draw it is significantly more convincing. We made sure to properly include them in the staff credits; I truly hope you look forward to seeing where this art is used.


 * '――Finally, please give a message to everyone who is anticipating this series.


 * Toba Yosuke: It's a really fun comedy, so I think it's just right to watch without getting too worked up. Just relax and enjoy yourself for 30 minutes.


 * Tsuji Mitsuhito: Personally, I hope that people who are tired out from parenting will watch this and feel that empathy of, "Oh, I'm not alone after all!" I'd like this series to bring them some relief. Of course, not just those people - I want people with no experience of parenting to also watch this and think, "Children are pretty nice."