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Interview: Studio Ghibli Production Coordinator Hirokatsu Kihara

Kihara showed Miyazaki's self-portrait from the late 80s of what Miyazaki thought he would look like in 30 years. It was him in a hot rod with a speech bubble that said “You ready to rock and roll, baby?”

What a humble interesting man. I need to meet him, or see him on a panel.

It really punches home that anime is MUCH more mainstream here in the USA than it is in Japan. It's kinda crazy that where it is made is such a smaller and underground market than here. But bigger is that I can be open about being an anime fan as a working adult, where as in Japan that is a BAD idea.

But there is always a sense of preservation with Kihara's presentations. “Back then the studio's job was to make a film. So when it was complete, this was all waste,” said Kihara. “Can you believe that? They would put [the production materials] in the trash. At the time I thought 'No, this is wrong. This must be preserved.' People may not care about it in two or three years, but five, ten, 15 years down the line this is going to be worth it. It should be used for future animators to study from. I really want inspiring creators to see the real thing.”

I think saying it's more mainstream here than Japan is a bit misleading; if by mainstream you mean in the open, then yes, it is more mainstream in the US, but that has more to do with the way the Japanese deal with their interests; people tend to be much more guarded over there with their interests, and keep things to themselves in general, whereas people in the US are way more comfortable with "letting their freak-flag fly", as it were. As for sales numbers, Japan still leads the pack, and that's where the majority off all industry revenue comes from, even today, although the gap has narrowed somewhat in recent years.

That said, a lot of that is because a relatively small handful of otaku tend to be major purchasers, who are way more hardcore fans than fans in other countries.

With that in mind, I'd be interested in knowing what the percentage of people are in each country who are into anime, so you could actually determine in which country it is more "popular," although I have no idea how one would operationalize a study like that. Could be interesting.