When 645 guests descended on Tokyo's New Takanawa Hotel last month to celebrate the marriage of 46-year-old former pop idol Hideki Saijo to Miki Makihara, a 28-year-old "office lady" he'd been dating since the fall, the starstruck media gushed at length over the "super gorgeous" event.
To many Japanese, though, the 100-million yen bash with its A-list celebs like Beat Takeshi came across not so much as super gorgeous, but simply "super uncool."
Extravagance for its own sake, even where it was almost traditional not so long ago, is no longer the stuff of most people's wildest dreams -- not even of many of those who could well afford it. Saijo apart, in recent months other celebrities have been notable for shunning fancy ceremonies and glitzy receptions in favor of greater simplicity. Among these more personalized, surprisingly low-key celebrations have been the marriages of singer Kyoko Koizumi to actor Masatoshi Nagase, idol Takuya Kimura to pop diva Shizuka Kudo, and actress Nanako Matsushima to actor Takashi Sorimachi.