Popular kabuki actor Ichikawa Danjuro (59) is taking an extended break to undergo treatment for leukemia. He was first diagnosed with acute promyelocytic leukemia in May 2004, and he had treatment which was thought to have been successful. He made his comeback for a performance in Paris last October with his son, the current Ichikawa Ebizo (27). He and his son toured around Japan in June in celebration of the younger actor’s succession to the Ebizo name. The reoccurence of the disease was discovered during a regular checkup this month.
• Singer Kuraki Mai (23) has been doing the rounds in a yukata (light summer kimono) to promote her new album. “Fuse of Love” went on sale on August 24 and is her first release in a year and eight months. Her yukata is purple, which she says is her lucky color. It seems to have helped, as the album is currently at No.3 in the Oricon daily album chart.
• Meanwhile, top of the weekly album chart for the second week is the “Disco Zone” album by East-European group O-Zone. The infectious single “Koi no Maiahi” is still sweeping the country and popular as ever with young music fans. Actually sung in Moldovan, an online animation that put Japanese “lyrics ” to it caught the public imagination on 2Channel, the country’s biggest BBS.