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Hana-Kimi Manga Gets New Live-Action Series, 1st Stage Play

Hisaya Nakajo's classic shōjo manga Hana-Kimi (Hana Zakari no Kimi-tachi e) will receive both a new live-action television series and its first stage production to commemorate its 30th anniversary this winter.

The television series stars:

• Hana Kawamura as Mizuki Ashiya
• The Rampage member Makoto Hasegawa as Izumi Sano
• The Rampage member Itsuki Fujiwara as Shūichi Nakatsu
• Ryūgūjō member Keigo Itō as Shinji Noe
• Ryūgūjō member Yūki Tomita as Kyōgo Sekime
• Lienel member Miro Takaoka as Taiki Kayashima
• Lienel member Riku Morita as Senri Nakao
• Genosuke as Megumi Tennōji
• Tagright member Daigo Kobayashi as Minami Nanba
• Tagright member Tomoki Nishiyama as Masao Himejima
• Gekidan Exile member Yūki Sakurai as Itsuki Kujō
• Hiroto Takahashi as Makoto Kagurazaka

Keisuke Shibata and NTV's Shiori Ueno are directing the series, and Fumie Koga, Yuka Arai, and Kazumi Ōki are writing the scripts with composition by Yōko Tamura. Kōji Endō (Nyaight of the Living Cat, live-action Blade of the Immortal, Terraformars) is scoring the music. Shintarō Sugano is writing and directing the stage play.

The half-hour eight-episode series will premiere on the NTV channel on December 5 at 2:30 p.m. (12:30 a.m. EST). The TVer and Hulu services will stream the series in Japan, and Hulu will also stream a "director's cut" of the series.

The stage play will open with most of the series' cast one week after the series ends on February 13-15 in Osaka. It will then travel to Aichi on February 18-19 and Tokyo on March 13-22.

Viz Media describes the Hana-Kimi story:

Japanese-American track-and-field star Mizuki has gotten herself to transfer to a high school in Japan...but not just any school! To be close to her idol, high jumper Izumi Sano, she's going to an all-guys' high school...and disguising herself as a boy! But as fate would have it, they're more than classmates...they're roommates! Now, Mizuki must keep her secret in the classroom, the locker room, and her own bedroom. And her classmates--and the school nurse--must cope with a new transfer student who may make them question their own orientation...

Hana Zakari no Kimi-tachi e (Hana-Kimi) was Nakajo's defining work, running in Hakusensha's Hana to Yume magazine from 1996 to 2004. 

Nakajo ran a short continuation of the Hana-Kimi manga in 2011, and published a special chapter in 2014. Her latest update to the series was Himitsu - Hana Zakari no Kimi-tachi e After School, which debuted in 2021. Viz Media published the Hana-Kimi manga in North America, and also published her Sugar Princess manga. 

The manga inspired a 2007 live-action television series starring Maki Horikita, Shun Oguri, Toma Ikuta, followed by a second live-action series starring AKB48 idol group member Atsuko Maeda, Aoi Nakamura, and Shōhei Miura in 2011. The manga also inspired a live-action television version in South Korea and a 2006 live-action television version in Taiwan.

The anime adaptation had its episode 1 world premiere at the Anime NYC event on August 23, 2025. It premiered on the Tokyo MX channel on January 4, 2026 at 9:30 p.m. (7:30 a.m. EST), and it also ran on BS11, MBS, CBC TV, RKB Mainichi Broadcasting, and other channels. Crunchyroll streamed the anime with English subtitles and same-day dub in North America, Central America, South America, Europe, Africa, Oceania, the Middle East, the CIS, and India.

Source: Comic Natalie