TBS drama VIVANT Season 2’s set became the scene of an incident, according to Weekly Bunshun: director Katsuo Fukuzawa shoved an assistant director off a stepladder, causing a fracture that will take a month to heal. Per Bunshun, TBS treated the matter as classified information and handed down only a light punishment. Fukuzawa is also known as the great-great-grandson of Yukichi Fukuzawa (the historical figure on Japan’s 10,000-yen bill). On 5ch, discussion centered on exactly what happened — “he didn’t punch him, he knocked the ladder out from under him” — alongside a strong sense of unfairness: “Fuji TV got dragged through the mud just for yelling at an actress, but TBS breaks someone’s bone and gets away with a light punishment?” A few posts, however, seemed to excuse the violence outright, leaving opinions split.
VIVANT Season 2, the smash-hit sequel following the further adventures of undercover agent Yusuke Nogi, has been a huge success. But behind the scenes, harassment by the director was reportedly rampant on set — serious enough that TBS treated it as classified information. And then, the incident finally happened!
It happened last December, at TBS’s Midoriyama Studio in Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture. During a rehearsal for the hit drama VIVANT, an angry shout suddenly rang out across the set.
“How many times do I have to tell you the same thing?!”
Source: bunshun.jp / Original article here
Are you stupid or something
That's not the era we're in anymore
That's flat-out assault, a crime
That's not normal, that's messed up
Should've called the cops and pressed charges
Come on, that's not okay
Jumping straight to violence just proves you're incompetent
Headline
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He shoved the assistant director off the stepladder he was standing on
I'm more curious how Julie's comeback is going (likely a reference to Johnny & Associates exec Julie K. Fujishima)
If the victim had been a celebrity cast member, he'd have been fired on the spot and pulled from every show, no questions asked
Sounds like it wasn't a punch — he knocked the ladder over, the guy fell, and broke a bone, so there's kind of an accidental element to it too
Did he kick the ladder out while the guy was standing on it?
Shoving out a ladder someone's standing on isn't an "accident," lol
They say even a one-meter fall can kill you
When you lose your balance on a stepladder, your foot catches and you end up falling head- or back-first
The TV industry has always been basically no different from a crime syndicate
This reminds me of when comedian Shinsuke Shimada kicked out the stepladder a young Momoko (of the comedy duo Hi-Heel) was standing on, after she botched timing the laps at the Suzuka 8 Hours race
I saw that clip about a week ago and felt bad for the girl in it — turned out to be Momoko, lol
Getting dragged into Shinsuke's antics and knocked around like that really is way too pitiful
But then he ended up kicking me again anyway, so I punched him full-force in the face — and got arrested for it
Well, I guess that's only natural
There's a smarter way to do it — get evidence with a voice recorder beforehand, or file a police report first and take it step by step
Nobody wants to watch some boring-ass show made by a goody-two-shoes
Unlike actors, a real creator can't just be replaced
A guy who gets violent at work has no talent
If the show's a hit, that's because the cast and everyone else involved are the actually skilled ones
He just gets full of himself because a bunch of dumb fangirls hype him up
Guess the assistant director just wasn't trained enough (sarcastic dig implying the abuse mirrors the show's torture scenes)
Barely any men watch that one, so that's hardly a fair comparison, lol
Great-great-grandson of Fukuzawa Yukichi
He's straight-up upper class
Well yeah, obviously, lol
These days middle-aged men don't have human rights, you know? lol
Social media and 5ch are bad too. And the tabloids just quietly correct their made-up stories without ever owning up to it
It's an industry that's gotten away with doing whatever it wants without anyone calling it out
They're quick to criticize other industries, yet they're the most behind of all themselves
I saw him at some awards ceremony and he didn't look like that to me
Just recently there was also a story going around that the director of Bayside Shakedown (Odoru Daisousasen — also Fukuzawa) was joking about this whole thing
And the story about the assistant director from a production company who died by suicide at the TV Asahi building just recently has already disappeared from the news too
Doesn't count since the victim wasn't a woman
Background and Key Points of This Story
Under Japan’s power-harassment prevention law (a 2020 amendment to the Act on Comprehensive Promotion of Labor Measures), employers are legally required to take steps to prevent workplace harassment. Film sets, however, are considered an industry where a closed hierarchy topped by the director tends to persist, largely shielded from outside scrutiny. A fracture requiring a month to heal is serious enough that, depending on the exact circumstances, it could amount to criminal assault — but the reporting so far rests solely on Bunshun’s own investigation, and it’s not yet clear how TBS will explain the details of its disciplinary response. Within the thread, descriptions of what actually happened varied from post to post — some said he “kicked the ladder,” others said he “shoved” it — so the facts should be checked against Bunshun’s original article text. Many commenters also drew comparisons to Fuji TV’s past scandal, but how severe a punishment turns out to be depends heavily on the specifics of each case and the company’s own response policy, so such simple comparisons have their limits.
*This article is compiled from excerpts and a summary of the 5ch (Sports & Entertainment News+) thread “[Bunshun] TBS Is Covering Up VIVANT Director Katsuo Fukuzawa’s (62) “Fracture Power-Harassment” — Month-Long Injury, Ridiculously Light Punishment [Ailuropoda melanoleuca★].”
