On the P.R. circuit to promote Mamma Mia!, Meryl Streep has been enjoying herself by telling interviewers how "mortified" her kids are at the thought of the 59-year-old actress prancing around the surf while crooning such deathless ABBA confections as "The Winner Takes It All." If Streep really wants to drive her offspring to scuttle around wearing Groucho noseglasses and fake foreign accents, she might consider a co-starring gig with Shigeo Tokuda, Japan's 73-year-old adult film star. Tokuda--that's his porn name--turned to on-camera balling after he retired from his gig as a travel agent and found that he "didn't have anything to do." (In a similar situation, my grandmother took up crocheting.) Now he takes on all comers, appearing with women from all across the age spectrum in the course of a career that has already racked up more than 200 titles.
According to CNN's Kyung Lah, the genre of filth for the old folks is one that Tokuda's production house "helped pioneer by accident. Ryuichi Kadowaki, president of Ruby Productions, says they started producing adult videos with people in their 30's to good sales. They creeped up to 40 year old actors and they sold even better. Kadowaki says they went up to actors in their 50's, then 60's, and now they're producing an entire line of adult videos with actors in their 70's." Kadowski theorizes that "our older customers must feel a sense of security by watching videos with an actor who is in the same generation." In the select group of septuagenarian adult film stars, Tokuda is the undisputed king. Tokuda, touting himself as a role model--and, believe me, he's preaching to the converted on that one-- notes that "Seniors get depressed because they don't have anything to do. They go crazy." Ruby Productions has just completed a deal to begin making Tokuda's films available in the U.S., so it won't be long before Americans have the chance to see Japan's sanest man hard at work in his second career. This is one Christmas where shopping for Grandma is going to be a breeze.