Ai Mikami Talks ‘Chastity High,’ Netflix’s First YA Japanese Series

Over the last three years, Netflix has steadily expanded its Young Adult (YA) slate across the Asia-Pacific region, including the recent premiere of its first YA series in Japan, Chastity High.

The streamer’s YA slate includes school dramas like India’s Class and Kota Factory, Korea’s Hierarchy, Australia’s Heartbreak High and Japan’s youth-focused romance drama Drawing Closer. Themes revolve around high school life, academic pressures, relationships and self-discovery.

The streamer announced in May that Heartbreak High will be renewed for a third and final season. The first season debuted at number six on Netflix’s global top 10 English series list in September 2022, remaining in the list for three weeks. The second season also ranked in the same list in April 2024.

Netflix’s first YA series in Japan, Chastity High, ranked in the streamer’s global top 10 list for non-English series in the first week of September, receiving more than 1M views globally.

The series is set in a prestigious high school attended by the children of wealthy families. The school bans dating between students, but a mysterious social media account exposing scandalous secrets soon puts relationships to the test.

As part of the creative team’s research and preparation for the series, they conducted numerous interviews with current high school students to gain a deeper understanding of how the younger generation approaches relationships.

“We discussed various topics such as how they approach romance, how they express their feelings towards someone they like, what captures their interest, how they spend their time and money, and how they use their smartphones,” said Soushi Matsumoto, one of the three directors on the series. “By centering the discussion on their views on romance, we explored their overall lifestyle. I found it fascinating to see both differences and similarities between their generation and ours.

“Since the project is centered around romance, I feel like there were plenty of opportunities for the staff to naturally talk about their own love stories,” Matsumoto added. “It’s pretty rare to have casual conversations about love between staff members of different generations, so that was quite interesting.”

The series stars Ai Mikami in the lead role of Ichika Arisawa, as well as actors Ryubi Miyase and Kyoya Honda. Production spanned almost seven months.

“One of the enjoyable aspects was working with many young and talented actors,” Matsumoto added. “Some of the main cast members had almost no acting experience, but they all brought an incredible amount of passion to the project, which made every day a lot of fun. In a few years, I’m sure some of them will be at the center of the Japanese film industry, so that’s something to look forward to.”

While preparing for the production of Chastity High, Mikami said that she reflected on her time in high school so that she could draw on those experiences for her character. Since she was around 22 years old during production, several years had passed since high school, but she still remembers the burgeoning “sense of self” from that period.

“Looking back at my high school days, I remember it as a time when I was still gradually building my identity while dealing with others and various situations,” Mikami said. “Sometimes, I would blurt out things I didn’t really mean and I wasn’t very good at controlling myself. The process of gradually recalling that mindset during the preparation and filming was quite challenging.”

Reflecting on what it means to her to star in a series about Japan’s younger generation, Mikami added: “In a world where diversity and individuality are emphasized, there are inevitably moments when words seem to take on a life of their own. The words and concepts that were meant to help us live authentically and protect those we care about, can sometimes turn into weapons that harm others. Right and wrong aren’t always black and white; I believe we can find our own answers through empathy and consideration for others.”

On the region’s YA slate, Minyoung Kim, VP of Content, APAC (excluding India) said: “We want to entertain our members with compelling homegrown content, including young adults across Asia Pacific and beyond. Whether it’s the Aussie slang of Heartbreak High or the dating drama of Chastity High, we want audiences to connect with truly local and entertaining stories.”