BRAND

WHAT IS "BRAND" ALL ABOUT:  Singer Miki Imai stars in Brand and also sings the program's theme song "Goodbye Yesterday." She is a fresh face but not a new face. It has been eight years since she appeared in a TV drama. (That probably explains why she has not had her eyebrows sculpted to the latest fashion standard.) In her return to the small screen, Imai plays Midori, a fashion industry executive who is dedicated to her job but beginning to wonder if she is not missing something in life.

     Company colleague and former lover Eisaku Yoshida suggests she needs a husband and children and appears ready to take on the assignment. But Imai insists it is a deeper, more internal question like: "Why was I born and what am I supposed to do in this life?" Little does she know she is about to meet Koichiro, the heir to a tea ceremony empire and a young man who has had all those questions answered for him since birth. Kabuki actor Somegoro Ichikawa, who is seldom seen on TV, plays this role convincingly, having probably dealt with the same questions in his own life.
     When the company tells Midori that she is worn out and to take a week off, she has not yet quite absorbed that, at 35, she has become so patently efficient at her job that she may be on her way out the door.  While floundering about looking for something to do with all that time, she finds herself in front of the monkey compound at the zoo, where she runs into Koichiro. He has one year left of the three-year reprieve he talked his father into giving him before he must return to his assigned cage in the iemoto system, and he has just unsuccessfully applied for a job at the zoo. His father has also chosen a fiance for him, a traditional woman who is patiently awaiting his return.
     Koichiro has spent two years flitting about the world and now wants some job experience before settling down to the tea whisk.  The only two unattached singles in the zoo, Midori and Koichiro start chatting but get off on the wrong foot when Koichiro neglects to pay for the snacks he tosses to the monkeys and criticizes Japanese girls he has seen on his travels paying high prices for designer brand goods.  Midori gives him a quick lesson in the true meaning of the brand concept, which she says really represents the proud history and craftsmanship of the companies' artisans.
     They part sneering at each other, but her words have an effect on the man who is soon to take over his own tea ceremony "brand." Later, after seeing Midori's picture in a magazine, he decides to get himself hired as an assistant in her department--the first male to take such a post. She is not impressed, and so the love-hate scenario begins. Although it did not receive much pre-season hype, this one looks like it just might hold viewers' attention. (By Wm. Penn / Daily Yomiuri)

STARRING: Imai Miki, Uchikawa Somegoro, Sato Aiko, Yoshida Eisaku, Kajiwara Ken, Hiraizumi Sei, Enami Kyoko, Utsui Ken
THEME SONG: "Goodbye Yesterday" by Imai Miki.
DURATION:  January through March 2000
NETWORK:  FUJI TV
REVIEWS:  

Imai Miki looks so beautiful in this drama. It shows how difficult it is to be a business woman in Japan, where males dominate the workplace. The supporting case is quite good too. You'll stick around for the ending.