A TV anime adaptation of Kazuto Mihara‘s Noh-themed The World is Dancing manga will begin airing during the Summer 2026 anime season. A teaser visual and announcement trailer have been released, with the latter teasing an experience brimming with powerful animation and visuals.
Yumiri Hanamori is voicing lead protagonist Oniyasha, the person who would later be known as Zeami and be credited with establishing the currently known form of Noh theater. On the production side, Toshimasa Kuroyanagi (Backflip!!) is directing the anime at CygamesPictures, with Keigo Sasaki (Umamusume: Cinderella Gray co-character designer, The Millionaire Detective Balance: Unlimited) handling character designer duties.
©三原和人・講談社／『ワールド イズ ダンシング』製作委員会
The World is Dancing manga began serialization in the pages of Kodansha’s seinen magazine Morning in March 2021. Its sixth and final volume was released in November 2022. Kodansha USA describes the manga’s synopsis as such:
Born into a life of acting and dance with a traveling theater troupe in 14th-century Japan, 12-year old Oniyasha has one problem-he doesn’t know what the point of any of it is. Why must I step with the left foot here instead of the right? Why is one performance good and another, bad? Why do people dance at all? It all seems perfectly arbitrary, until a chance encounter in a run-down shack sets him down a path to revolutionizing the art form and influencing much of Japanese culture to come.
A fictionalized account of the early life of Zeami Motokiyo (Oniyasha), the founder of modern Noh theater-the world’s oldest surviving theater art-this coming-of-age artist’s journey vividly brings to life a man far ahead of his time during one of Japan’s most culturally and socially vibrant eras.
Source: @wid_anime
