Even in the Showa era, it’s OUT!
The Inappropriate Life of Yoshinobu Nishizaki, creator of Space Battleship Yamato
by Tatsuji Nagano
Published May 6, 2024 by Magmix (see the original article here)
In the Showa era (1926-1989), when manga and anime were in their infancy, there were creators who left behind anecdotes that would be unthinkable in today’s world. These were the legends who succeeded in creating great hits because they were not bound by conventional wisdom. We look back on the unprecedented life of hit maker Yoshinobu Nishizaki, producer of Space Battleship Yamato.
50 years after the first voyage of Space Battleship Yamato
In the year 2199, a spaceship carrying the fate of humanity departed from Earth, heading for the planet Iscandar in the distant Magellanic Galaxy. Space Battleship Yamato (NTV), a landmark of SF anime, began airing on Sunday, October 6, 1974, at 7:30 p.m. Many viewers were fascinated by the outrageous story of the battleship Yamato, which was sunk during the Pacific War, being converted into a spaceship and setting off into space to save humanity.
2024 marks the 50th anniversary of Space Battleship Yamato‘s TV broadcast, and various events are planned. Dark Invasion, the first chapter of the remake series REBEL 3199, will be screened from July 19 (Friday), and a Space Battleship Yamato artbook planned and edited by director Hideaki Anno is also scheduled to be published.
When talking about Space Battleship Yamato, which sparked the anime boom that continues to this day, one person who cannot be forgotten is producer Yoshinobu Nishizaki. What kind of person was he, who left behind so many anecdotes?
He always had a “private secretary” around him!?
It’s safe to say that a person who has received as much praise and criticism as Producer Nishizaki is rare in the Japanese anime world. Originally a producer in the music field, he was in charge of local performances such as singing shows. He had connections with Min-On, a music culture group affiliated with the Soka Gakkai, and expanded his business widely, but he fled to Europe due to financial troubles.
He later returned to Japan, but was unable to return to the music industry, so he infiltrated the nascent anime world. His entry point was Mushi Pro Shoji, a subsidiary of Osamu Tezuka’s Mushi Productions.
In the anime world of the 1970s, when many people were working hard to create anime that would give children dreams, Producer Nishizaki was a different breed. It seems that he entertained TV station employees at high-class clubs in Ginza and even gave them money. He was a man who would stop at nothing to succeed.
Excellent in negotiation, he secured TV broadcasts for Tezuka’s original works Wansa-kun and Triton of the Sea. Then, with Mushi Productions on the brink of bankruptcy, he jointly planned Space Battleship Yamato with veteran animator Eiichi Yamamoto. He sold it to Yomiuri TV and managed to get it made into a TV anime by his own company, Office Academy.
The Man Who Created Space Battleship Yamato: The Madness of Yoshinobu Nishizaki (Kodansha), co-authored by Nishizaki’s assistant Tetsuhisa Yamada and freelance journalist Yasumasa Makimura, depicts the true face of producer Nishizaki in detail.
After gaining wealth and fame from the success of Yamato, he not only drove around in a luxury cruiser and high-end cars, but also employed many beautiful women, calling them his private secretaries. Many of them became the mistresses of the married producer Nishizaki. Even in an era when the word “compliance” did not exist, this would have been “out.”
All the huge profits he earned from Yamato were squandered
Aspiring to be an actor when he was young, Producer Nishizaki was good-looking and prided himself on his resemblance to Dessler, the villain in Yamato. He was a strong speaker and good at presentations. He also had a keen eye for talent.
He invited popular composer Hiroshi Miyagawa to compose a number of songs for Yamato that later became famous. He also recognized the talents of directors Yoshiyuki Tomino and Yoshikazu Yasuhiko early on. There is no doubt that he was a producer with drive and the ability to book excellent staff.
Science-fiction writer Aritsune Toyota was also one of the brains behind producer Nishizaki. The basic concept of Yamato, in which a spaceship heads to a distant planet to save Earth from extinction after an alien attack, was Toyota’s idea. However, since he was also listed as one of the original writers for the rival program Monkey Army (TBS), his work was credited as “science fiction concept” rather than an “original idea”.
After the first series, Nishizaki asked Toyota to provide various other ideas, such as, “How can we bring Captain Okita back to life?” However, Nishizaki would always transfer only half of the agreed-upon fee to the bank. After a long time had passed, and the rest of the money had been transferred, Nishizaki contacted Toyota again asking for more advice. “What kind of concept should we use next?” Should we call this stingy, or perhaps clever…?
In his book The Truth About Space Battleship Yamato (Shodensha), Toyota says the following:
“Even Leiji Matsumoto, essentially the original author, was not paid a commensurate income. This was surprising. Nishizaki completely squandered the huge income that Yamato generated, said to be 20 to 30 billion yen, on women, yachts, motorcycles, and cars.”
Memorial service, photo by Anton Kholodov
What did he buy with the 200 million yen original fee for the live-action version of Yamato?
Although Nishizaki was hailed as a darling of the times, he was not able to produce any hits other than Yamato, and he became infamous for tax evasion, company bankruptcy, drug use, and gun possession. After his release from prison, he released Yamato Resurrection (2009), which he directed himself, but he was unable to recover.
On November 7, 2010, Producer Nishizaki fell off his yacht (named Yamato) while swimming, and passed away at the age of 75. The fee for the live-action Yamato movie (2010) was purchased for 200 million yen. His was truly a life that shared the same fate as Yamato.
Some have described Producer Nishizaki as a “speculator.” If so, he was a pioneer who struck a great vein of “animation” that could be enjoyed by both children and adults. Once Yamato turned into gold, Nishizaki’s life changed drastically, and it seems he became an arrogant monster.
However, without Nishizaki, Yamato as we know it would not have been born, and Japanese animation would have been very different. The history of Japanese anime may have begun from a fleeting dream seen by one speculator.