Animation icon Studio Ghibli acquired as it struggles to find Miyazaki successor
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A man posing next to the character No Face from the Studio Ghibli movie Spirited Away during a media preview for The World of Studio Ghibli's Animation Exhibition Bangkok in June.
PHOTO: AFP
TOKYO – Studio Ghibli, the animation house behind Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro and other movies, will become a unit of Nippon Television Holdings, part of an effort to ensure its future as the home for world-renowned movies.
The network will make Ghibli a subsidiary and hold 42 per cent voting rights, the companies said in a statement on Thursday.
Nippon Television promised to support the studio’s management and respect its autonomy, vowing to “forever protect the ‘craftsmanship’ and brand value of Studio Ghibli”.
Hayao Miyazaki, studio’s leading director and main visionary, is now 82 years old. Although his son, Goro, is also an animation film director, he “firmly declined” taking on the responsibility of running the studio, which led to the decision to entrust its future to Nippon Television, they said in the statement.
Ghibli gained greater international recognition when Spirited Away won the Oscar for best animated feature film in 2003, after it set a US$300 million (S$410 million) box-office record.
It was at a spa in 2022 that representatives from Ghibli and the network met to discuss the studio’s future and protect its ability to make films, they said.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Nippon Television was the first to air Miyazaki’s Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind in 1985. The network also supported the debut of the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka, where guests are greeted by the fictional Totoro at the entrance. BLOOMBERG
