Japanese TV Hopes To Hit It Big With Soap

INTERNATIONAL DISTRICT

Will the homely hero, a middle-aged foreman of a construction company, win the favor of the winsome heroine?

Or will she fall for the orchestra violinist?

Yes, soap opera fans, there's a new show - but with a twist.

This one's a 12-episode Japanese production called "The One-Hundred-and-First Proposal." It was one of last year's most popular TV series in Japan and Seattle viewers will be able to check it out, with English subtitles, beginning Oct. 10.

"This show interests me because it shows Japanese life in a way that is entirely different from the portrayal in traditional Japanese drama," says Noriko Goto Palmer, president of JEN TV Inc., the Seattle company that is bringing the show here. "It's about modern life in Tokyo. I watch it almost as a social study."

"They call it a `trendy drama' in Japan," says Palmer's partner, Junko Sakakibara. It's a show aimed at Japan's well-heeled yuppies that goes heavy on modern relationships, the latest fashions and pop music.

The show's theme song, "Say Yes," was the top-selling compact disc in Japan and the most popular tune in karaoke bars for months.

Palmer came to the U.S. in 1962 to attend college on the East Coast, married an American and, with the exception of a five-year stint in Tokyo after graduation, has been here since.

At the urging of Tomio Moriguchi of Uwajimaya stores, she managed a weekly Japanese-language radio service with a minuscule budget in Seattle beginning in the early 1980s.

She had decided to either find a way to get on the air daily or quit when in 1989 she met an energetic group of Japanese women who had just arrived in Seattle, including Sakakibara.

Sakakibara, who had been an editor at a Tokyo magazine and accompanied her businessman husband to Seattle, had up-to-date knowledge on Japanese business practices that Palmer lacked - important knowledge since much of the Seattle-area audience for Japanese-language programming consists of Japanese executives stationed here with their families.

The two began working together, first on radio, then breaking into television by purchasing satellite feeds of one of the most popular Japanese evening news programs, and buying daily air time from KTZZ-TV. It's broadcast on channel 22, but the channel may vary on cable according to the provider.

The news show is produced by Fujisankei, the largest of Japan's private TV networks. English subtitles are added at the production company's New York office and the program is beamed to such cities as Los Angeles and Seattle, where it appears at 6:30 a.m., just a few hours after it is shown in Tokyo.

JEN TV - the acronym stands for Japanese Entertainment Northwest - sells ads to support its programming and reports steadily increasing interest since the news program began to air two years ago.

Palmer estimates the audience for JEN's programming at somewhere between 35,000 and 40,000, including Japanese businessmen and their families, Japanese students, U.S. students studying Japanese and visiting scholars at area research facilities.

Though a quite small slice of the area's roughly 1.5 million TV households, it also is an affluent one. Japanese executives stationed abroad are well compensated. Before they return home they often make large purchases of household items that are much more expensive in Tokyo, such as china, silverware and crystal.

Palmer says Japanese parents often tend to send students what they'd need to survive in Tokyo - a much more expensive city.

"Some of these kids are getting $2,000 or $3,000 a month," she said. "It's incredible."

Besides upscale shops and banks, JEN lately has been getting calls from advertising agencies wanting to buy time for such big U.S. companies as AT&T and American Airlines, Palmer and Sakakibara said.

They are now booking ads for "The One-Hundred-and-First Proposal," which they believe has the potential to attract English speakers who want an entertaining look at today's Japan, and hope to gradually add other programming.

They are particularly interested in a sports program that provides coverage of sumo wrestling. Three Americans are moving up in sumo - including No. 2-ranked Konishiki, a 581-pound Samoan from Hawaii - and they believe it's only a matter of time before one becomes grand champion.

Meanwhile, those interested in the adventures of the ordinary Tatsuro Hoshino, played by Tetsuya Takeda, and the dishy Kaoru Yabuki, played by Atsuko Asano, may want to program their VCRs.

"The One-Hundred-and-First Proposal" will air from 7 a.m. to 8 a.m. on Saturdays.