J-Pop stars get wax treatment at Madame Tussauds

Rihanna, Beyonce and Gaga. Bruce, Brad and Johnny. Exactly the types of stars you'd expect to meet at a wax museum. At Madame Tussauds Tokyo, though, you might run into some more unfamiliar faces--unless you know your Japanese J-Pop.

The exhibition opened Sept. 30 at the Decks commercial complex in Tokyo's Odaiba area, where it will continue for three months. Japanese figures aren't unusual at the venerable Tokyo Tower Wax Museum, where astronauts Mamoru Mohri and Chiaki Mukai can be found. But which local personalities have made the big time in wax, at the rather more well-known Tussauds?

The answer is right there at the entrance--available for poses even without paying the 500 yen ($6.50) entrance fee: Ryuichi Sakamoto. Perhaps the country's most famous musician, Sakamoto fronted the band Yellow Magic Orchestra before appearing in the films "Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence" and "The Last Emperor."

Step inside the exhibition and you'll run smack into another musical legend, Yoshiki Hayashi, leader of the glam-metal band X Japan.

The only other Japanese featured in the exhibition (with the exception of a figure of Osamu Tezuka's Astro Boy) is also a musician. With his big jowls and curly locks, Taro Hakase is an immediately recognizable celebrity among Japanese. International audiences may know him as the violinist behind Celine Dion on the U.S. version of the 1997 hit "To Love You More."

Some 150 places on the subject's body are measured for the wax depictions, which can take up to four months to produce and cost as much as 19 million yen. Seventeen figures make up the Tussauds Tokyo show, with two more expected to join later. The display can be seen through Jan. 4, 2012.