This interview with Flower Troupe Top Star Asumi Rio was published in the June print edition of Marisol magazine and then posted to their website on August 17, 2018. (Archive link here.) There’s a very pretty photo as well.

“Ever since I was 15, my heart has been in Takarazuka” – Asumi Rio Interview

“Whenever I hit a wall I think: I love Takarazuka, I love being an otokoyaku, therefore ‘I just have to do it’”

She discovered the Takarazuka Revue the summer she was 15 years old. Asumi Rio’s story began with one video a friend at her ballet school loaned her.

“I was so struck by that sort of world I’d never seen before, and I was obsessed the moment I saw it. The day after that, we left for a family trip to Hong Kong, but my head was full of thoughts of ‘I just want to get home soon so I can watch that video again’. I remember thinking that the Hong Kong cityscape at night looked to me like the onstage illuminations, and I couldn’t eat so I was thinner by the time I made it back to Japan (laughs). My parents love travelling, so they took me all sorts of places, but that vacation is the only one I don’t remember much at all.”

The way she pushed her way through by force of will when her parents opposed her application to the Takarazuka Music school is a well-known story. “I locked myself in my room for three days and nights crying, and in the end I ended up with a fever.” After entering the music school, “I was the kind of student who would desperately clean the spot that was known for being assigned to historic stars,” she says with a laugh.

And that girl is now the Flower Troupe Top Star. It’s unbelieveable the overwhelming presence that her delicate frame can hold, with acting skills that let her play a young boy even up to a sensual adult man, and in contrast to her onstage presence is her sweet face…although she attracted attention quickly due to her abundance of talent and began climbing the stairs to stardom, it was by no means a smooth path.

“When I was a junior actress, I was given a lot of child roles, and then I kept getting female roles as well. I entered Takarazuka so I could be an otokoyaku, but they don’t need me as an otokoyaku right now…I had times where I was really struggling with thoughts like that.”

While she was in Moon Troupe, she was cast in switch roles with then-Top Star Ryuu Masaki in the Takarazuka Grand Theatre. She is a unique star who has overcome all the unprecedented situations she has encountered.

“Ever since I was little my mother would keep telling me ‘You don’t have any willpower.’ But now I think that was probably a good thing. It made me think, no matter what the situation, I have to put in more effort than everyone else, I have to strive harder than anyone.”

Her secret to overcoming things is just ‘scolding herself’. Her main rival was herself.

“When I would feel in crisis as an otokoyaku, acting gave me confidence. Through acting, I learned that an otokoyaku’s appeal isn’t just from outward appearance but comes from the inner self as well. And people around me would often say ‘You really like acting, don’t you.’ That taught me that if I just work hard and do my best that things will get through.”

This year is her fifth year as Top Star. Before she realized it, she had one of the longest Top careers in all 5 troupes. Her motto has been the phrase ‘It’s never too late for beginnings’.

“Though my partners or the other troupe members keep changing, that means I can make new discoveries. Also, I keep feeling like I want to take on new challenges. I want to be an otokoyaku with both Takarazuka otokoyaku style and a new ‘me’, pursuing both stability and new thrills. Even in my fifth year as Top Star I keep thinking that I have to put in even more effort to accomplish that.”