Actress Nakatani Miki (30) is to make her return to the world of horror. Seven years after appearing in “Ringu 2”, she will star alongside Toyokawa Etsushi (44) in Kurosawa Kiyoshi’s “Lofuto” (The Loft) this autumn. The movie plot is based around a thousand-year-old mummy, and Nakatani promised horror fans a spine-chilling experience.
• It was revealed on Friday that struggling comedian Matsumoto Ryusuke (49) is in a coma after suffering a stroke at his home in Osaka on Wednesday night. From the mid-70s to mid-80s he was one half of the manzai duo Shinsuke Ryusuke with popular talento and emcee Shimada Shinsuke (50). They shunned the standard suits for rockabilly hairdo and a “yankee” look, launching a new style of “tsuppari manzai”. From 1985 he had a briefly successful solo career but ended up in bankruptcy after leaving the Yoshimoto Kogyo management agency in 1997. He has tried several times to get his career back on track, including teaming up with his son in 2002 to enter a talent contest (they lost in the first round).
• Popular NTV announcer Nishio Yukari (28) was recently spotted spending the night at the Tokyo home of a high-flying TV commercial planner, according to weekly magazine Friday.