Details
Title: 薔薇の十字架
Title (romaji): Bara no Jyujika
Also known as: Cross of Roses
Genre: Love, Dark, Family
Episodes: 10
Viewership: ratings 8.6%
Broadcast network: Fuji TV
Broadcast period: 2002-Oct-10 to 2002-Dec-12
Air time: Thursday 22:00
Theme Song: Cry by Faith Hill
Synopsis
Togo is 37, married, has no kids and lives with his mother. He is a television commercial director and has won numerous awards for his works. What he most wants to do is make commercials that people will long remember. It is the commercials that he personally doesn't like though, that gain the most recognition. He's even complained to one of the younger guys that he works with about his boss getting on his back for trying to put too much artistic creativity into his commercials. His boss wants him to simply make commercials the way the clients ask for.
Togo's wife Sumiko, who is not even pregnant, receives baby presents on just about a daily basis from her mother-in-law. She tries to play the "good daughter-in-law" by politely accepting the gifts. Her mother-in-law seems to be mentally punishing Sumiko for not giving her a grandchild, but it appears that Sumiko really does not want to get pregnant.
Not being able to have children, and work not going the way he wants starts eating at Togo. It is just at this time that his life takes a big turn...One day when he is supposed to meet a model that his friend wants to introduce him to; he mistakenly takes a woman by the name of Aki for the model. After getting to know her, Aki tells him "I don't want a relationship or to get married. I just want you to help me to have a child," and things begin to heat up from there.
Aki, who works at a foreign-affiliated computer manufacturer, is your typical career woman. Her parents divorced when she was young, and she lives with her mother and younger sister Masami. Because of a traumatic experience that she had when she was young, she has lost all faith in men.
Before meeting Aki, Togo was about to give up on have a bigger family. So the more he meets Aki, the more he seriously starts considering her offer. The plan they come up with is after Aki has the baby, they won't ever see each other again. But after the baby is born (a boy, whom Aki names "Seiji"), both Togo and Aki start having a change of heart.
Sumiko later finds out about Togo's secret. And just when Togo has made up his mind to leave her for Aki, Sumiko starts striking back. Both their friends and families wind up getting involved, and before you know it Aki and Togo begin slipping apart.
Who should Togo really be with?
What has possessed Aki to go this far just to have a child?
How will Sumiko get revenge?
This is an all new kind of melodrama about a man that wants children, but can't have them with his wife; and a single-woman that wants to have a child of her own. It is also about what children mean to both sexes. --Fuji TV (corrections by Surge79uwf)
Cast
Mikami Hiroshi as Kudo Togo
Amami Yuki as Takahata Aki
Ishida Yuriko as Kudo Sumiko
Katsumura Masanobu as Kitamura Jin
Sato Aiko as Hirayama Masami
Tamayama Tetsuji as Kamiyama Kyosuke
Nishiyama Mayuko as Mimura Hinako
Goda Masashi as as Ihara Junya
Nekoze Tsubaki as Yamazaki Eri
Miyaji Masako as Kitamura Midori
Osanai Minako as Takahata Yuriko
Shishido Miwako as Morimoto
Yajima Kenichi as Mr. Konishi
Tanaka Oga as Takahata Seiji
Tayama Ryosei as Mr. Sakota
Nakao Mie as Kudo Sae
Tsukaji Muga
Nakane Toru
Shida Mirai
Fukuda Mayuko
Nagauchi Minako
Matsumoto Rina
Production Credits
Screenwriter: Asano Taeko, Nankai Emiko, Nagata Yuko
Producer: Kita Reiko, Makino Tadashi
Director: Mitsuno Michio, Mizuta Narihide, Kimura Tatsuaki
