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Live-Action Tonde Saitama Film Casts JAGUR as Emperor Chiba

Toei revealed on Tuesday that the live-action film adaptation of Mineo Maya's Tonde Saitama manga has cast Chiba prefecture-based musician, "local talent," and "Chiba's hero" JAGUR in the role of Emperor Chiba. (Note: While Toei's press release spells the actor's name as JAGUR, the actor's website uses the spelling JAGUAR.)

Hideki Takeuchi (live-action Nodame Cantabile, Thermae Romae) is directing the film, and Tomokazu Tokunaga (live-action Densha Otoko) is writing the script. Hanawa is performing the film's theme song "Saitama-ken no Uta" (The Song of Saitama Prefecture).

The film will open in Japan on February 22. There are two parts to the film: a "legend part" that focuses on Rei and Momomi, and a "modern part" that focuses on a certain Saitama family through whom the legend is told.

The film stars:

• Fumi Nikaidō as Momomi Dannoura
• GACKT as Rei Asami
• Masaki Kyōmoto as Duke Saitama
• Yūsuke Iseya as Shō Akutsu
• Ryō Narita as Haruto Igarashi
• Haruka Shimazaki as Ami Sugawara
• Brother Tom as Yoshimi Sugawara
• Kumiko Asō as Maki Sugawara
• Shōtarō Mamiya as Saitama young man
• Tsubasa Masuwaka as Okayo
• Kumiko Takeda as Keiko Dannoura
• Akira Nakao as Takezō Dannoura
• Akaji Maro as Sōjūrō Saionji
• Naoto Takenaka as Kanagawa prefectural governor
• Ryō Katō as Nobuo Shimokawa

In the story, those who live in Saitama Prefecture are ruthlessly persecuted by those who live in Tokyo, so the citizens of Saitama Prefecture hide this fact from others. High school student Momomi Dannoura is the son of the governor of Tokyo, and he is also the student council president at Hokuhodo Academy, the top high school in Tokyo. One day, he meets Rei Asami, a mysterious transfer student who has returned from America. Rei and Momomi are captivated by each other, but Momomi knows Rei is from Saitama Prefecture. The manga tells the story of two people split by a prefectural border, a Saitama "Romeo and Juliet." The couple try to elope and start a revolution to liberate Saitama Prefecture.

Maya originally launched the one-volume manga in Hakusensha's Hana to Yume magazine in 1982. Takarajimasha published a new compiled version of the manga in 2015 titled Kono Manga ga Sugoi! comics Tonde Saitama. The manga has 660,000 copies in print.

Source: Press release