Back in the 1990s, actor Tomoko Yamaguchi often appeared in trendy dramas — TV shows that portrayed the lives of middle-class people who, whether married or not, only worried about what to buy and who to love. Once she turned 35, Yamaguchi was no longer considered suitable for such roles, but trendy dramas became untrendy anyway and she had managed to accrue enough star power to do other things.

Now her name has become associated with something else that, in a way, has some bearing on her past career playing housewives and single women looking for romance.

In a "long interview" that appeared in February in the women's magazine Frau, she frankly discussed her decision to not have children. Twenty years ago, when she was 31, she married another actor, Toshiaki Karasawa. She told the magazine she has "no regrets" about being childless because she never intended to be a mother.