Tomohisa Yamashita X Ashita no Joe

By Tenkaijapan - Last updated: 月曜日, 3月 8, 2010 - Save & Share - One Comment

(C)高森朝雄・ちばてつや/講談社

The live-action film adaptation of “Ashita no Joe” will open early 2011.

“Ashita no Joe”（あしたのジョー/lit.Tomorrow’s Joe) is a critically acclaimed boxing manga created by Asao Takamori and Tetsuya Chiba in 1968-1973.The manga is among the most critically acclaimed stories in Japanese popular culture.
Joe Yabuki(矢吹丈）, the hero of the manga, is a troubled young man who runs away from an orphanage. Wandering through the Tokyo slums, he meets former boxer Danpei Tange（丹下段平）.

Tomohisa Yamashita

Tomohisa Yamashita (山下智久),also known as Yamapi (山P/Yamapi). will star as Joe Yabuki. Yamashita (born April 9, 1985) is a Japanese idol.he is undergoing training for the physical rigors of the role.

Teruyuki Kagawa (香川照之) will play Danpei Tange. Kagawa ( born 7 December 1965) is a well-known boxing “otaku” who even writes his own column in Baseball Magazine company’s monthly Boxing Magazine and provides commentary on WOWOW’s live televised boxing matches.

Joe’s opponent Rikiishi and other characters are still being casted.

One weekly tabloid claims that TBS plans to have a drama version before the live-action film and actress Keiko Kitagawa (北川景子) would co-star next to Yamashita. But her agency denied her involvement in anything related to Ashita no Joe. “That’s a groundless rumor. There are neither plans for Kitagawa to appear in the movie nor a drama.”