Anime distributor AnimEigo and parent company MediaOCD have announced the debut of Episode 5 of The Anime Business, a first-of-its-kind documentary series featuring interviews with a variety of pioneers of the Western anime industry. The latest episode features an insightful interview with Andy Frain, the founder of Manga Video/Manga Entertainment who was a visionary entrepreneur who played a pivotal role in popularizing anime in the UK and later North America throughout the 1990s.
Episode 5 is available now on the official AnimEigo YouTube channel at:
https://www.youtube.com/@
Frain recounts the early days of the savviest anime publisher in UK history and founding Manga Video / Manga Entertainment with the legendary British record producer and Island Records owner, Chris Blackwell. The company’s popularity in the UK exploded following the release of Akira and it expanded into North America and Australia in 1993. A pivotal moment arrived when Frain became a co-executive producer for Ghost in the Shell, which was the first-ever Japanese-Western anime co-production. As Manga Video / Manga Entertainment gained traction throughout Europe and in the U.S., it became known for bestselling home media releases such as Macross Plus and Ninja Scroll.
The Anime Business is an ongoing series featuring a wide range of entrepreneurs and visionaries that helped to pioneer and shape the North American anime industry. It is produced and hosted by industry veteran and MediaOCD founder and AnimEigo CEO Justin Sevakis.
All episodes of The Anime Business will be available in English. Japanese subtitles will also be available via a special grant from the Kleckner Foundation. Additional episodes and interviews are in production now. AnimEigo and MediaOCD invite fans that would like to help support and crowdfund future episodes of The Anime Business to donate at: https://www.mediaocd.com/plans-pricing
Episodes 1-4 of The Anime Business are also now available to stream on the AnimEigo YouTube channel. Episode 1 features the first half of the interview with John O’Donnell. Episode 2 features an interview with Robert Napton, the former Director of Marketing and Producer of US Renditions and Managing Editor at Bandai Entertainment. Episode 3 features Pater Tatara, an entrepreneur who launched Anime NYC and helped to build the annual event into North America’s second biggest anime convention. Episode 4 features Part 2 of the extensive interview with John O’Donnell.
Justin Sevakis was the original founder of Anime News Network in 1998, and he contributed many of the site’s most popular columns for many years, in addition to co-hosting ANNCast, the #1 anime podcast worldwide, from 2009-2015. Sevakis was the first in-house video and subtitle editor at Central Park Media, a prominent 2000s era anime distributor, and worked on Grave of the Fireflies, Project A-ko and many other bestselling releases. With his current company, MediaOCD, he has produced more than 1,600 Blu-ray discs for North American market and pioneered restoration efforts for classic anime including Project A-ko, Digimon Adventure, Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie, and the forthcoming Macross II. He acquired anime distributor AnimEigo in 2024
Source: Press Release
