Asatte Dance

Here's another ecchi OVA from Knack: 1991's Asatte Dance (Dance till Tomorrow), adapted from a seven volume manga by Yamamoto Naoki. It's NSFW, but it's quite funny in its R-rated way.

Our protagonist, Terayama Suekichi, is nineteen years old, an unmotivated college freshman. The morning after the funeral of his great-grandfather Daikichi, he wakes up hungover, with a splitting headache and a near-naked girl in his bed. 

Although he's in college, his real interest is an amateur theater group, particularly its pretty, somewhat older director, Shimomura Masami. But his unrequited crush is interrupted when the unknown girl, Hibino Aya, and the Terayama family lawyer,Tachimi Tadamori, drop by his apartment. 

Tachimi repeats what he had told Suekichi at the funeral: great-grandfather Daikichi has left him an off-the-books stamp collection valued at more than 400 million yen, provided that Suekichi finishes university, gets married, and finds a job. Aya, it turns out, was also at the funeral, overheard the conversation, and has glommed onto Suekichi. Perhaps she's after the inheritance; perhaps not.

Complications aplenty ensue. The stamp collection may have been intended for Suekichi, or it may have been intended for his younger cousin Sue, who looked very much like a boy when she was young. The theater company is perpetually in debt and relies on "dues" from its members to fund performances. Suekichi is in charge of collecting these dues, but he's not very good at it. The theater company's upstairs neighbors are yakuza loan sharks. 

They, of course, are very good at collecting debts. They get increasingly involved in the company's affairs. Aya brings a penniless Southeast Asian refugee to freeload at Suekichi's apartment, not particularly caring that he is broke.

She also inserts herself into the theater company's problems, She turns out to be quite a good actress and not the least inhibited about using her assets on Suekichi's behalf. 

The OVAs only show the beginning of the story. Fortunately, the manga is available in English, so you can see how it turns out. Or just read the Wikipedia summary.

The characters are a bunch of goofballs. One of the actors wears a frog's head and never takes it off, even in bed. Aya teaches Freddy that the standard Japanese greeting is "chinpo" (penis or dick). The yakuza boss is a fierce, menacing gangster, except when his toupee slips off; then he turns into a simpering okama, straight out of Okama Hakusho. In either mode, he is besotted with theater. Great-grandpa Daikichi conveys his bequest in a lavish video, in which he re-enacts his encounter with a con-woman who offered him late-life companionship, including sexual healing. He also keeps coming back as a ghost, not so much to haunt Suekichi as to taunt him.

Aya is a bit of an enigma throughout. Is she a gold-digger, out for Suekichi's inheritance? Is she a young wife recently set free by divorce, out for a good time? A bit of both? Even the manga never quite answers the question, and it takes a very long time for Suekichi and Aya's story to play out. More than that would be spoilers.

The voice cast includes:

• Kikuchi Masami (Terayama Suekichi) starred as the male leads in the Tenchi Muyo, Aa! Megami-sama!, and Comic Party franchises. He played Makoto in Doukyuusei 2 and Taira no Kiyomori the younger in Genji, Part 1, and he appeared in Fukuyama Gekijou, all Orphan releases.
• Oizumi Akira (Terayama Daikichi) appeared in Cat's Eye and Korogashi Ryouta. He played Ichiji in Mellow and Mama-rin in Okama Hakusho, both Orphan releases.
• Orikasa Ai (Hibino Aya) made her debut in Shoukoushi Cedie. She played the title role in Romeo no Aoi Sora, Fee in Planetes, Seguchi Touma (the record company president) in Gravitation, Quatre in Gundam Wing, and Ryouko in the Tenchi Muyo franchise. She also played Enrico in Dioxin no Natsu, Carrie in Ziggy Sore Yuke! R&R Band, Sara in Eien no Filena, Toryune in Al Caral no Isan, Katchan's mother in Tako ni Natta Okaasan, the narrator in Boku no Boukuugou, Made, Ayuuru's sister, in B.B. Fish, and young Mars in Fire Emblem, all Orphan releases. 
• Ootsuka Houchu (Ikezu Daisuke, the lead actor) played Satou in the Ajin properties, Bookman in D.grayman: Hollow, Rob in Shinigami no Kuro Maid, Ziggy in Edens Zero, Tsurumi in Golden Kamuy, and the announcer in Yawara!
• Sasaki Yuko (Shimomura Masami, head of the troupe) played Akiko/Keiko in Wolf Guy, Sayoko in Aoko Honoo, Yuki in Sei Michaela Gakuen Hyouryuuki, and Exper Schiff in Exper Zenon, all Orphan releases. She also played Gilbert in Kaze to Ki no Uta SANTCUS and Hitomi Nomura in Piano.
• Ogata Kenichi (Tadinori Tachimi, the Terayama family lawyer) played the put-upon father in Maroko, Suzuki in Kigyou Senshi Yamazaki: Long Distance call, the crooked casino boss in Okane ga Nai!, the Hong Kong chef in Yuukan Club, Chichi's father in Chiisana Koi no Monogatari, the business chief in Okama Hakusho, and the Narrator/Lord of Kaga in Oedo wa Nemurenai!, all Orphan releases. He also played Smee in Peter Pan no Bouken and Gran Torino in Boku no Hero Academia. However, he's best known to me as the voice of Ranma 1/2's Sataome Gemna, whose alter ego - the grumpy panda - is my avatar on most anime forums. 
• Umezu Hideyuki (Freddy) played Akadama-sensei in Uchouten Kazoku and Uranos Corsica in Gangsta. He had featured roles in Star Dust, Apfelland Monogatari, Blue Sonnet, Hashire Melos, Hi-Speed Jecy, Hidamari no Ki, Nana Toshi Monogatari, Neko Neko Fantasia, Singles, the What's Michael? OVAs, Yamato 2520, Genji, Part 1, Mellow, and Ziggy Sore Yuke! R&R Band, all Orphan releases.
• Fukuda Nobuaki (Yakuza Boss) played Yasufumi in the Haikyuu!! franchise. He appeared in Kage, Wolf Guy, and Hashire Melos, all Orphan releases.
• Yamaguchi Ken (Yakuza sidekick) appeared in Dokushin Apartment Dokudami-sou, Yamato 2520, Hoshi Neko Full House, Shiratori Reiko de Gozaimasu!, and Condition Green, all Orphan releases.
• Sakurai Toshiharu (Frog Man) played Hanson in Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water and Innocentius VII in Arslan Senki TV. He appeared in Akai Hayate, Exper Zenon, and Mellow, all Orphan releases.

Episode 1 was directed by Kogure Teruo. He also co-directed several Naniwa Yuukyouden OVAs. Episode 2 was directed by Ochiai Masamune. He also co-directed the Naniwa Yuukyouden OVAs, as well as Don Dracula and Crows. The background music consists of bluesy harmonica and guitar riffs, which suits the material perfectly. The score is credited to Nakamura Tatsuya, of whom nothing is known.

Some translation notes:

• Asatte means the day after tomorrow, so the title Dance Till Tomorrow isn't quite right; but that's what Viz titled the English version of the manga.
  
• The theater company is called Sankakumokuba, or triangular wooden horse. This is a BDSM punishment device, so the troupe's name is translated as Bondage Horse.
• The yakuza run the Akumu Salary Loan Company. Akumu means nightmare.
• The woman in Great-Grandpa's video is named Kimiko Matsushita, a parody of a real porn star, Kimiko Matsuzaka.
• When Aya dresses as a female yakuza of the "Shooting Star Family" to confront the loan sharks, she uses formal, almost ceremonial speech patterns. There's a similar scene in Stop!! Hibari-kun!, when Hibari's yakuza-obsessed teacher comes to meet the family.
• "...49 days since my great-grandfather died." In Buddhism, a memorial service is held on the 49th day after a person's death. 
• "Women join massage parlors..." She actually says "soapland," a unique form of prostitution that exploits a loophole in Japanese law.
  

I should mention (warn? tout?) that the show has a lot of nudity and sex. Suekichi and Aya get it on frequently and enthusiastically, despite his suspicions about her motives. When the troupe members have to raise cash to escape the yakuza, the men end up as "hosts" at a sketchy host club that is actually a male brothel of sorts. It's not hentai, or even close, by current standards, but you have been warned, or at least notified.

Asatte Dance was released on VHS tape, but only the first volume was released on laserdisc as well. The raws were encoded several years ago. Moho Kareshi made an initial translation, but the project languished until Perevodildo did a thorough translation check, with the Japanese manga raws as a reference. Perevodildo timed as he checked, and I did a cleanup pass. I edited and typeset. ics- and Nemesis QCed. The first volume was ripped on the Domesday Duplicator, the second on a lossless capture VHS setup. Both were encoded by Orphan's anonymous media expert.

Asatte Dance is good, dirty fun. It's not particularly coherent, but the ride is the point, not the story. You can get the show from the usual torrent site or from IRC bot Orphan|Arutha in channels #nibl or #news on irc.rizon.net.