I see where the stage adaptation of the popular anime film Spirited Away that played in Tokyo a few years back has transferred with the original cast to London, performing in Japanese (with English surtitles). I noted at the time that the Tokyo production seemed a “trial run” for a future production in the more profitable theater worlds of London or New York given the foreign talent involved, starting with director John Caird (whose wife is Japanese). The show appears to have received a rapturous welcome in London by both critics and audiences despite the language barrier and will be playing for an unusually long stay of four months. With London’s recent wonderful English-language staging of that other Japanese anime classic, My Neighbor Totoro (soon headed for the West End), the stage may be set, so to speak, for a flood of other anime adaptations, which have already taken Tokyo by storm in musical, Kabuki and other versions. Here is my take from the Tokyo run.

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