I found this on a blog.

–What was your first impression of the script?

I personally thought the script, or rather the manga, was very interesting, but to be honest, I thought it would be difficult to adapt it into live action. There are limits to expressing parts like the characters muttering to themselves in video, and while manga uses still images so the audio can be freely interpreted, that’s not the case with video. Also, one of the good things about the manga was that they were seen as pets, but with humans playing the roles, I think it would inevitably be perceived as a male-female relationship, so I thought that was a difficult aspect.

–In that sense, are you performing the characters differently from the manga?

I think there are some parts that need to be consistent in terms of image, but since they’re being played by humans, I’d like to create a slightly different style from the manga. Sumire is my own version of Sumire, and Momo is Matsumoto’s own version of Momo.

–What are your priorities when playing Sumire?

She’s incredibly intelligent, an elite at a newspaper company… That said, she’s not the type of character who thinks about a lot of things and speaks slowly, so I give her more lines than necessary. I also practice speaking quickly, so I can speak without thinking. Sumire is a very sensitive person, so I’m always trying to show her emotions. I think there are a lot of modern women like Sumire. They’re a certain age, have a high social status, and work hard… but I think the reality is that these women can’t balance their work and personal lives, so I thought it was a realistic role.

–What do you empathize with about Sumire?

She’s incredibly honest. I think her ability to keep quiet about unreasonable things and know when to speak out is a good thing.

–On keeping a man as a pet

It’s hard to do so many things for him (laughs).

–About becoming Momo

When I first heard about the role, I thought it was incredibly interesting, and it was my first love story, so I really wanted to do it. However, I struggled a lot with how to act it. I hadn’t played any cheerful characters recently, and I’m not a particularly cheerful person, so it seemed really strange for me to be cheerful. But as I read the script, met with Koyuki, and started doing script readings and rehearsals, Momo started to come into my life more and more. We’ve shot three or four episodes so far, and the more I do it, the more Momo comes out.

–What do you pay attention to when playing Momo?

I’m not usually very active, so if I’m “still,” then Momo is “active.” So at first, I was thinking about how to make the action scenes sound like a dog’s, or how to make him seem a little strange, and I also paid attention to the delivery and tone of my lines.

–About dancing contemporary dance

It was incredibly difficult and I was anxious. I knew almost nothing about modern dance, so when I heard about this opportunity, I looked at a lot of different things, but I thought, “This isn’t good.” To be honest, I was very nervous because the form was completely different from the dances we’d danced with Arashi up until then. About a month before the show started, I took lessons from Nohmi-sensei, who actually teaches on this show, looked into various aspects and did my best. Contemporary dance is very similar to acting. Until now, I’d thought that dance was all about choreography and form. But this dance feels like acting even while dancing, so it’s actually very interesting. It’s deep. I think I’m hooked.

–Is there anything about Momo that you can empathize with?

I don’t think there are many 20-year-old boys who are as mature as Momo. I think he’s a 20-year-old with the mental age of a 30-year-old. It’s amazing that he can think about things like not showing how hurt he is, or deliberately not showing how hurt he is because he knows people will dislike him if he shows it, and still think about others when he acts. I think that’s cool. It’s not that he sacrifices himself, but he does everything he can to protect others, so in that sense Momo is strong. I kind of admire him. I couldn’t support someone with that much full power. It’s precisely because he’s strong that I can really sympathize with Momo’s weak side, which he doesn’t show to Sumire, and although he does some crazy things, he’s a very humane person.