Pinoy kids and cultural dancers featured in music video for coming Tokyo Olympics

Kids from Marikina among those featured in “Paprika”

A group of Filipino kids and a team of cultural dancers from Marikina City are featured in the music video of the hit song “Paprika,” which is the official cheer song of the rescheduled 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.

This was disclosed by award-winning children’s film director Rommel “Milo” Tolentino (“Andong,” “Nenok” and “Orasyon”), who provided the clips for the video produced by NHK, Japan’s national broadcasting company, for the extremely catchy song “Paprika” that was written by J-pop artist Kenshi Yonezu.

“One of the producers is a Japanese whom I’ve known from the film festivals [I’ve participated in before]. He got me to do the Philippine part,” Tolentino told Inquirer Entertainment. “We wanted to feature the different festivals in the country because they’re very colorful and there’s so much dancing.”

The director said he also aimed to highlight the different Philippine churches since “most festivals conclude their celebration with parades that end in these historical buildings.” However, due to problems in logistics, Tolentino ended up shooting only the Sapatos festival, which features Marikina’s main product—it’s leather shoes.

“Paprika” was originally recorded by the Japanese child singers Foorin. Intended to drum up excitement for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, it was released in December 2019. It was rerecorded by a group that calls itself Foorin Team E, which is composed of English-speaking child performers.

The Olympics was eventually rescheduled to July 2021 because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The clips, which Tolentino said took him two days to shoot, are showcased in the “Paprika” video featuring the Foorin Team E.

“The [Filipino] kids and the cultural dancers, who are all part of the ensemble, had to practice the dance steps. We also had to work on all of their colorful costumes. The local government of Marikina helped us a lot,” he recalled.

“We ended up having so much footage, but we already know that many other countries will be sending their own, too. I hope we would be allowed to make our own version of the video after the Olympics,” he shared with Inquirer Entertainment. “They [Japanese producers] also asked us for behind the scenes photos. I guess they really liked what we did because they included five clips from us in the video.” INQ