A dance of history begins this summer.
The official website and social media accounts of the upcoming anime “World Is Dancing” have revealed additional cast, staff, a teaser promotional video, and a new illustration by original creator Kazuto Mihara.
The anime is set to premiere in July 2026 on Tokyo MX, BS Asahi, and other TV stations.
The official teaser trailer:
The new illustration:
“World Is Dancing” anime details
The newly announced cast includes:
- Simba Tsuchiya as Ishiya
- Maaya Uchida as Kogane
- Romi Park as Masujiro
- Katsuyuki Konishi as Kanoami
- Haruki Ishiya as Junigorou
The main character, Zeami Motokiyo/Oniyasha will be voiced by Yugiri Hanamori.
Toshimasa Kuroyanagi directs the anime at CygamesPictures, with Keigo Sasaki designing the characters. Sawako Kawamitsu handles series composition and script.
Additional staff includes Shuuhei Fuchimoto as assistant director, Iori Hisatake as sub character designer, and Odashi as prop designer. Hiromasa Ogura and Kazuhiro Inoue serve as art directors, with Mamio Ogawa as art designer.
Reijirou Tsumura oversees Noh movement, while Kaiji Moriyama and Mikiko Kawamura handle choreography. Kohei Kawaguchi is credited for Noh supervision, and Katsuyuki Shimizu serves as historical supervisor.
Naoko Satou and Kumiko Naruke are in charge of color design, with Yoshinori Nakano as 3D director and Yuutarou Kikuchi as director of photography. Daisuke Hiraki edits the series, Yukio Nagasaki serves as sound director, and Daisuke Shinoda composes the music.
The manga, written and illustrated by Kazuto Mihara, was published in Kodansha’s Morning magazine from March 2021 to October 2022. The story is a fictional account of the life of Zaemi Motokiyo/Oniyasha, a pivotal figure in the Japanese Noh drama form’s development in the 14th century.
Kodansha publishes the series in English and describes the plot as:
Born into a life of acting and dance with a traveling theatre 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.