A couple highlights from the Yamada/Yoshida interview in Newtype thanks to 2ch poster 2KkKMl4b:
Yoshida: Tamako is very active in the shopping district and towards mochi, but there's very few motion scenes from Tamako's POV in this series. If I'm pressed, the scenario is comprised of the POV from people around Tamako and their reactions to her subtle emotions. Tamako is something like a showgirl for the shopping district, or rather someone who loves her family's trade in the shopping district. I think she's a girl who's composed of a lot of "love" including the people around her. She would never refuse someone else. She's just a well-raised daughter.
Yamada: Actually, this series had much more fantasy elements built into it when we started. Things like Tamako having a special power. Everything steadily changed to what it is now with only the bird being left from that fantasy story.
Yoshida: At first the bird didn't stand out like it does now. Before we knew it, he pushed aside the protagonist to stand out. It was because we wanted a point of view from an outsider. He started off just as an introductory role for the district and the people who lived there, but he became more important. In the beginning, he spoke like bloody fool, but the supervisor wanted him to speak more nobly.
Yamada: That is because it is the bird of a royal family.
-Will the prince of the country where the bird was born appear in this story?
Yamada: Yes. This story was actually about Tamako and the Prince at the beginning. When I heard about the new project, I asked if we could move the setting from Kyoto to a "Rome" vacation-like place.
Yoshida: When I first received the story, the love story between the two was still the main focus.
Yamada: Eventually, it went in a extremely different direction.
Yoshida: This is a one-cour series, so just doing a love story would be difficult. I thought it would be better organized with having a long-awaited shopping district as the setting. I converted it towards an adolescent plus kindness type direction.
-And will love be a factor?
Yamada: What do you mean? Someone liking someone? (laughs) I think this series feels like a story about gathering everyone's "love" and building kindness and affection. It's a work wrapped in affection rather than passion. By the way, the story starts at the busiest time of the year for the mochi shop: near New Years Eve.
