After finishing its run in Tokyo, Studio Ghibli‘s Spirited Away play is making its way to Hulu. The presentation is a limited engagement, so mark your calendars accordingly. Hayao Miyazaki‘s Spirited Away stage adaptation ends in Nagoya, Japan, where Hulu will set up shop. The final stop will film its two performances for streaming, bringing subscribers as close to the stage play as possible.
According to Hulu, one version of the play will stream on July 3, while the other performance will air on July 4. Hulu has yet to confirm whether the performances will be archived for later viewing. In other words, you’re going to want to set a reminder for either presentation’s start time of noon JST.
Spirited Away is considered by many (including myself) to be one of the greatest animated films of all time. If you’ve managed to miss it and don’t know what Spirited Away is all about, you can check out the movie’s synopsis below:
Chihiro’s family is moving to a new house, but when they stop on the way to explore an abandoned village, her parents undergo a mysterious transformation and Chihiro is whisked into a world of fantastic spirits ruled over by the sorceress Yubaba. Put to work in a magical bathhouse for spirits and demons, Chihiro must use all her wits to survive in this strange new place, find a way to free her parents, and return to the normal world. Overflowing with imaginative creatures and thrilling storytelling, Spirited Away became a worldwide smash hit, and is one of the most critically-acclaimed films of all time.
I am excited to hear that the live-action adaptation of Miyazaki’s Spirited Away play is coming to Hulu. There’s no way that I’m going to be able to make it to Japan while the show is still running, and this is the next best thing. I’m curious to see how the gods and demons are represented in the play and some of the movie’s more majestic locales. It strikes me as a significant undertaking to bring this story to life on the grand stage, and I can’t wait to see how it turns out.