Osamu Tezuka’s Phoenix is returning to the stage. A new play, Hi no Tori Mirai-hen ZEROMDISTANCE (Phoenix Future Arc ZEROMDISTANCE), will run at Sakura Hall in Shibuya Cultural Centre Owada in Tokyo from February 6 to 8, 2027, adapting the Future arc of the manga.
The cast includes Jutta Yuki as Masato, Narumi Yasuda as the voice of the Phoenix, Moro Morooka as Dr. Saruta, Adone Kudō and Shiina Yuzuki as Tamami, and Kaiki Ohara as Rock. Ryusei Kudoh is directing and writing the play, and he is also serving as executive producer. Ryo Oguri is producing, with Nao’ymt handling the music.
About the Future arc
Tezuka wrote the Future arc between December 1967 and September 1968. It is one of the most reprinted pieces of the wider Phoenix project, partly because it sits at the far end of the manga’s timeline. The Kodansha USA release of the Phoenix Deluxe Edition opens with the Dawn and Future arcs together, which gives English readers a direct way to reach the story the play is built from.
Phoenix itself is a strange work to adapt. Tezuka kept adding arcs for decades, following the same bird across different eras, and he serialized new parts until the 12th arc, Sun, wrapped in 1988, the year before his death. The stories move across past and future without a single continuous cast, so each adaptation tends to pull one arc and treat it as its own story.
A regular source for stage productions
This is not the first time the manga has been staged. A play based on the Karma arc ran at Theatre West at the Tokyo Metropolitan Theater in July 2024. The manga also inspired a live performance called Mangalogue: Hi no Tori, which ran from April 22 to May 16 at MoN Takanawa: The Museum of Narratives.
On screen, Phoenix has had just as many lives. A four-episode anime, Phoenix: Eden17, debuted worldwide on Disney+ in September 2023, based on the Nostalgia arc, and a film version with a different ending followed in November 2023 under the title Phoenix: Reminiscence of Flower. Older anime films and OVAs adapted separate arcs between 1978 and 1987, and a television anime aired in 2004.
Why it matters
Phoenix is one of the clearest examples of a classic manga that keeps generating new work long after its author’s death. Stage versions let the material reach audiences that do not read manga, and each one tends to focus on a different arc, so they do not repeat each other. The Future arc is a natural choice for that model, since it stands on its own and already carries name recognition from the Deluxe Edition. It is part of a wider habit of returning to older manga for new projects, from Zoids: Chaotic Century to other revived series.
The original manga is still in print in English through Kodansha USA’s Deluxe Editions, which group the arcs in order. The first volume pairs the Dawn and Future arcs, so the stage production is drawing from material English-language readers can pick up in a single book.
For anyone in Tokyo, the run is short, three days in early February. Tickets and further details are handled through the production’s own site.
Source: Anime News Network, citing the Phoenix Future Arc ZEROMDISTANCE play’s website and Comic Natalie
Featured image: Art from Osamu Tezuka’s Phoenix manga, via Anime News Network.
