Life Lessons with Uramichi-Oniisan

On the set of the morning children’s program “Together with Mama,” a team of worn-out adults forces on-camera cheer while teaching wide-eyed preschoolers. At the center is Uramichi Omota, a former gymnast whose polite smile barely contains his exhaustion—and who has a habit of puncturing the show’s sunny tone by letting slip the sobering realities of adult life, even with the cameras rolling.

Offstage, any hope of a quiet routine is complicated by the people around him: the show’s rabbit and bear mascot performers and singers, Utano Tadano, who is fixated on getting married, and Iketeru Daga, a good-looking coworker with a blunt, off-color streak. Between smoke breaks, workouts, and sudden bouts of bleak honesty, Uramichi’s “life lessons” often reveal far more than the script ever intended.