This is a long interview with Sena Jun that goes into her TMS years and her journey to becoming Top Star. It was originally published in Smart Flash on August 10, 2017. (Archive link here.)

This was translated with some editing and assistance from chemicalperfume.

Smart Flash is…a bit of a tabloid, but this is direct text of an interview so I felt comfortable translating it. There are other articles about Takarazuka they have done but they feel more invasive, so probably you won’t see any other Smart Flash content unless they do more interviews like this.

Please note that many of the rules discussed have since changed due to reforms in TMS discipline guidelines.

Interview with former Takarazuka Top Star Sena Jun: why she thinks ‘Takarazuka and AKB48 are alike’

As a commemoration of the 25th year of her career, Sena Jun, former otokoyaku Top Star for the Takarazuka Revue, gave her first interview for FLASH. From details of her experience at the extremely strict Takarazuka Music School (‘you must turn exactly at the corner of the corridor’ ‘you mustn’t let the chime sound on the microwave’) to ‘why middle-aged men are into Takarazuka’, she looked back on her career and told us everything frankly!

In her early childhood she tore her Achilles tendon and began studying ballet

What were you like in your early childhood?
I’m originally from the Suginami Ward of Tokyo. I didn’t like being in front of people or standing out much. While I had good motor skills as a young child, I didn’t like being active very much. I especially hated sports. When we would play dodgeball, I was the type to run away until the very end. Sometimes one of the boys would start taking it way too seriously and really come after me but then I would just catch the ball…and therefore I just ended up standing out in the end, I suppose (laughs). The one exception was that I took classical ballet, starting from the middle of kindergarten.

What was the reason you started taking ballet?
Before starting kindergarten, my leg was caught between the tires of a bicycle and it tore my achilles tendon. However, I had a a successful operation, and even though it was completely severed, once it was healed it was stronger than a normal person’s. However, the tendon was shortened due to the operation and the doctor suggested that exercise would be good to make it grow again. My mother had also taken ballet in the past, so I began ballet lessons along with my rehabilitation. At that time, it would start really hurting during the rainy season (like the weather is now), or if I started running too abruptly.

Why did you decide to aim for Takarazuka?
I ended up growing really tall. (I’m currently 168cm.) When I would wear toe shoes I was taller than the boys. I also had a larger build, so the characters I could perform in ballet were very limited. It so happened that the ballet school I would go to had something called a ‘Takarazuka Exam Prep Class’. I had seen Takarazuka when I was little, so I thought ‘that might be nice’. It wasn’t that I had some deep yearning, or that I was a huge fan. I became a huge fan after entering the Revue. ‘Wow, what a wonderful place I’ve joined’ I would think.

At the TMS entrance ceremony, she couldn’t hold back her laughter…

How old were you when you entered TMS?
I took the exam at the end of my first year of highschool, and was a TMS student for 2 years starting with my second year of highschool. There are 4 chances to take the TMS entrance exam: When graduating from middle school, at the end of the first year of highschool, at the end of the second year of highschool, and when graduating from highschool. Since it depends on the specific person, and there are people who try every time, when entering TMS there are a lot of age gaps between people in the same class. In my class of 40 people, I was the third youngest. There’s no hierarchy between classmates of different ages, however. There was one girl from the highschool I went to who was my senior, but she passed at the same time I did and ended up in the same class. At the beginning I couldn’t help but feel it was a bit strange.

We hear that the relationships between class years is very strict…
It starts from the very first day at the school. In TMS the junior students are called ‘yokasei’ and the senior students are called ‘honkasei’; there are only those 2 years. Right after the entrance ceremony, the honkasei hold a guidance session for the yokasei called ‘Interview Seminar’. It’s like an orientation. We were lectured first on our posture and manner of walking as we came into the hall. After that all the yokasei and honkasei get in a circle facing each other, but the angle of our feet had to be precisely 60 degrees. Once, the girl next to me opened open her feet more than 60 degrees. Then one of the seniors angrily told her ‘Ms. X, you are standing incorrectly. Your feet are open too far.’ After that, all the yokasei had to say ‘we’re very sorry’ and apologize all together. After apologizing, the girl next to me moved her feet back to around 60 degrees but then they were angry again and said ‘don’t just fix them as you please!’ You had to say ‘Excuse me. Please allow me to correct the angle of my feet’ and get permission first.

It sounds like it would make you extremely anxious.
Honestly, at that time it seemed so strange I was struggling not to laugh the entire time.

What? When you were being scolded?
‘Why are they getting so seriously angry about something so petty?’ I thought, and the laughter just started bubbling up. And then, the girl next to me who was scolded said “I’m very sorry” in a really annoyed way. At that, I was like, I can’t take this any more, and I just started laughing. ‘Ms. Doi (Sena’s real name), are you laughing!’ …the honkasei were very angry. But that just made me laugh more (laughs).

It sounds like you’re the type to think about how things look in the big picture?
That might be something like it.

Bowing deeply to the trains from the station platform…

We hear that there are other special rules. Is it true ‘junior students are not allowed to let the chime sound on the microwave’?
If you live in the dorm, you’re not allowed to make any noise at all. When I was a student, there were yokasei on the floor above me, but honkasei on the floor below. Therefore, when I was in the dorm I had to slide my feet to get around. Since otherwise, the sound would reach the floor below. And obviously this included the chime on the microwave. You needed to open it just before the timer was about to go off.

And is it true that ‘the cleaning duties are so strictly enforced the location of all the furniture is decided down to the millimeter’?
That’s true. For example, whoever was assigned to cleaning the bathroom would have to put a flower in a vase on the sink. If the vase was supposed to be precisely between two of the mirrors, it would be a matter of exactly which tiles to set it between. If it was the slightest bit off they would get very angry with you.

Is there anything else?
When you were on the station platform, you had to bow deeply to any train coming in…that kind of thing.

What was that? (laughs)
Since there was a chance one of the honkasei might be on the train, you had to bow every time. We would wait on the platform in two lines. Of course any private talk was strictly forbidden. If a train came we would bow, no matter if it was on the platform we were boarding from or going the opposite way. And if they saw you didn’t bow they would get angry with you.

And when they would get angry with you, what was it like, on the whole?
They would call you out and make you stand in the hall, or the honkasei would lecture you in a classroom at night, that kind of thing. It was never the teachers, the tradition was for the seniors to scold you.

It sounds intense enough to put traditional baseball academies to shame
If I think back on it now, it was really ‘foundational things’ that they taught us, I feel. Be considerate to your superiors, get permission before doing something, greet people properly…really the basics of getting along in society. There’s a rule that comes up a lot, ‘yokasei must turn precisely at the corners when on the stairs or in the hall’; even that originated from the foundation of ‘in order not to run into a honkasei, we ought to just walk right at the edge’. You get out of the way of people who are above you, right? If we were to walk in the middle of the hall, we would only get in the way of the honkasei. Therefore you end up with extreme rules like ‘you must walk at the edge of the stairs or hallway and turn exactly at the corner’.

Did they get angry with you very often, Ms. Sena?
Not at me, no. There was a rule ‘everything you wear or carry must be brown, navy blue, or black’. In any case, it had to be very plain. Now, I was a Shibuya-style girl, so I couldn’t bear that. We were allowed to have one color item, so I wore nothing but Ralph Lauren polo shirts. ‘Well? You can’t get angry about this, can you?’ was my attitude. I was a very saucy yokasei (laughs).

And what about when you became a honkasei?
I never really got angry with my juniors. I was young in age, and my classmates spoiled me a bit, so I was very free spirited. However, I thought scolding others was a learning process in its own way; ‘you have to take responsibility for your words, you have to talk to the other person and convey to them what the issue is.’ My classmates would get angry with me and say ‘you really have to lecture the juniors about such and such’.

And did you get properly angry?
No, they would always figure out ‘somebody else told her to come scold us’ right away. From the very start, most of the juniors would just say ‘I dont really remember’. And outside of class, I never went to the after-school one-on-one lessons and just slept in my room.

What? You don’t have to go to lessons?
As long as your attendance in the classes is perfect, they don’t get angry. Honestly, I was so sleepy every day! They would call me ‘the rare character who never appears’ (laughs).

How many peoples’ ‘fave’ can you become…

You graduated TMS and joined Flower Troupe in 1993, is that correct?
When I graduated, I had a debut with all 40 members of my class. It was our first and last chance to be all together as a class on stage. That’s like our presentation, and after that, we were split up into the different troupes. Each of the 4 troupes took 10 people. In my time it was Flower, Moon, Snow, and Star, making 4 (now there is also Cosmos). Each troupe’s producer selects who they want, you can’t choose for yourself.

What are each troupe’s specialties?
To put it roughly, at the time they were called ‘Dancing Flower Troupe’, ‘Drama Moon Troupe’, ‘Nihonmono Snow Troupe’, and ‘Gorgeous Star Troupe’. But that is the way the fans see it, and it’s not like performances are organized to fit the categories from this side.

After performing in Flower Troupe for more than 10 years, you moved to Moon Troupe in 2004 with the plan being for you to become the next Top Star. In 2005 you became Top Star. Is that kind of thing common?
At the time it was rare, I suppose. ‘Becoming Top Star straight after transferring,’ that kind of situation.

How do they decide who becomes Top Star?
The top management of the company makes the decision.

Why did you decide to become an otokoyaku?
I thought ‘what’s the first thing anyone thinks of about Takarazuka? Otokoyaku!’

Personally, why do you think you became Top Star?
Well…let me think about that. When I was in Flower, I felt ‘since there are so many different sorts of otokoyaku here I should at least try to be cool’. There were lots of otokoyaku good at singing, and lots who were very strong in dance…in general, a lot of people. But I didn’t excel at anything in particular. I was especially bad at singing. I thought ‘it’s not like I have to be particularly good, but I should at least be passable at all the main components’, so I put a lot of effort into singing. After that, started considering how, among all the other otokoyaku, I could make myself into peoples’ ‘fave’¹.

‘Fave’?
Yes. I think Takarazuka is a bit like AKB48. Fans see people who make a lot of effort and appreciate that. For example, in order to make it easier for the people sitting in the very back of the balcony to see you, ust trying to make your stance in the dance maybe even 1 centimeter wider than the others’. As I continued doing just those little things, the number of fans supporting me grew. AKB48’s catchphrase is ‘idols you can meet’, but you can do things like demachi, so you can also meet Takarasiennes. We don’t have elections based on CD sales (laughs), but demachi numbers and sales of tickets and goods are indicators of popularity. Takarazuka fanclubs are unofficial, so the company doesn’t recognize them, but that also means there are no extreme restrictions on them. AKB48 also has a theatre, but if you go and see one of their stage shows you can tell at once who gets the good and bad casting…

They’re really alike, I see.
When I see what AKB48 is doing, I just think ‘this is stuff Takarazuka has done for ages’. They say that the fans make the stars. Takarasiennes with strong support will gradually get more and more central positions; it feels like watching a race. Middle-aged men are also into that, I think. My father is a normal salaryman who never had any interest in Takarazuka before, but he says that more than the stage shows ‘the system is really interesting.’ He’ll theorise ‘maybe this person will be next’, or realize ‘this girl has been standing out since she was really small’; that kind of thing is really enjoyable to him. Therefore, even though when I became Top, he was always looking at these young kids, not me (laughs).

The movie system piques her interest

You retired in 2009. What was your reason for quitting?
After I was given the starring role in ‘The Great Gatsby’, I felt that as an otokoyaku I’d done it all, and there wasn’t any more I could express. After that, I talked to the company about leaving. I had burnout for a while. When I quit I didnt think I’d become an actress afterwards at all. But while I was still in the Revue, there was some talk of ‘Elisabeth’ and I thought ‘that I’d like to try’ so I ended up having my next job settled.

You’re holding concerts for the 25th anniversary of your career in Tokyo and Osaka, but you said ‘I was bad at singing’? It is amazing that you’d even do concerts.
I don’t think I’m that good even now, but up to about my 10th year in the business I really couldn’t sing at all! I want to tell that terribly-singing past self ‘you can do it!’. But it’s quite different singing as an otokoyaku compared to singing as an actress, so it’s a matter of trial and error still.

How did you work on conquering your poor singing?
I took lessons in order to give myself some confidence, at least. Besides that, experience on stage helped. I learned more from one performance on stage than ten rehearsals.

What kind of work will you be doing after this?
I’d like to be in movies. I don’t there the are genres in acting itself; I just want to know what it would feel like to be on a movie set. I’m interested in how they film it. How does it all come together, and such. For a stage play, we rehearse everything for about a month and a half, but for film it’s all out of order and they don’t film it chronologically. You have to think carefully ‘when is this happening to me’ when you perform. I’m really interested in how it all becomes a movie.

You’re looking at the big picture again.
Oh! I really am (laughs).

1 – Idol fandom term ‘oshimen’ which is slightly different from Takarazuka fandom concepts of a favorite performer (the standard Takarazuka fan term is ‘gohiiki‘) although Sena uses it for both purposes.