Creamy Mami, the Magic Angel

Creamy Mami, the Magic Angel (魔法の天使クリィミーマミ) is a magical girl anime series by Studio Pierrot from 1983. It went on to have five OVA adaptions and featured in other Studio Pierrot special presentations. A three volume manga was released during the original TV run, with the story written by Kazunori Itō and art by Yuuko Kitagawa. This was the first of five magical girl anime to be produced by Studio Pierrot, and the first of these to feature the designs of Akemi Takada. In 2005, the web-poll for TV Asahi's top-100 anime of all time saw Creamy Mami, the Magic Angel poll 82nd.

Story
Yū Morisawa is an ordinary 10-year-old girl, until she sees a spaceship floating in the sky. Carried into the ship, she helps Pino Pino find the Feather Star. In thanks for her assistance he grants her a magical wand, which allows her to transform into a 16-year old girl, for one year. She is also given two cats from Feather Star, Posi and Nega, who are to watch over her while she has magical powers. While wandering around the city as a teenager, she accidentally ends up on TV and asked to sing, which the magic enables her to do remarkably well. Using the alias of Creamy Mami, she becomes an overnight success, and is soon sought to begin a professional career as an idol under Parthenon Productions. Along the way, she also meets past residents of Feather Star and supernatural beings. In addition, she must fight against Snake Joe, a shady character of the rival LP Productions, who is always trying to steal away her and Megumi-chan, another one of Parthenon Productions' top stars.

Characters

 * Yū Morisawa (森沢優) / Creamy Mami (クリィミーマミ)
 * Seiyū: Takako Ōta
 * A normal 10-year old girl, Yū harbours a secret crush for her childhood friend Toshio Ōtomo. Given the ability to transform into a 16-year old girl, she is made to fill in for the absent Megumi Ayase to sing on TV.  Giving her name as Creamy Mami, she becomes an overnight hit.


 * Nega (ネガ)
 * Seiyū: Kaneta Kimotsuki
 * One of the two cats from the Feather Star asked to watch over Yū Morisawa while she has magical powers. His name is short for negative. Nega was the one who taught Yū the words which allow her to transform in Creamy Mami, he secretly know other magical words, but avoid telling then since Yū might end up using her powers for self gain like cheating in a surprise school test. Yū tricked him into saying the magical words to generate a pen which can answer any questions in one of the episodes. He, despite his brash attitude, really like Yū a lot that he was even able to mistook a girl called Cassidy with her.


 * Posi (ポジ)
 * Seiyū: Yuko Mita
 * One of the two cats from the Feather Star asked to watch over Yū Morisawa while she has magical powers. Her name is short for positive. She is very supportive of Yuu and it sometimes annoy Nega. When Yū failed to transform for the first time, she suggested to use the magic wand while saying the magic words which leaded to a suscessful transformation. Her voice actress also say the titles of every episodes.


 * Megumi Ayase (綾瀬めぐみ)
 * Seiyū: Saeko Shimazu
 * A popular idol and the star act of Parthenon Productions, she feels threatened by the newcomer, Creamy Mami, and declares herself to be Mami's rival.


 * Hayato Kidokoro (木所 隼人)
 * Seiyū: Sukekiyo Kameyama
 * Megumi Ayase's bumbling manager, he is moved to managing Creamy Mami when she joins Parthenon Productions.


 * Midori Kisaragi (如月みどり)
 * Seiyū: Masahiro Anzai
 * Toshio Ōtomo's best friend, Midori is in love with Yū Morisawa and seeks to tell her this. Because of his bashfulness, he needs Toshio's help to do this.


 * Natsume Morisawa (森沢なつめ)
 * Seiyū: Mika Doi
 * Wife of Tetsuo, mother of Yū, Natsume works in Creamy with her husband. She used to be the leader of a motorcycle gang. Her and her husband own Creamy Crepe making crepes.


 * Tetsuo Morisawa (森沢哲夫)
 * Seiyū: Akira Murakami
 * Husband of Natsume, father of Yū, Tetsuo works in Creamy with his wife. He used to be a member of Natsume's motorcycle gang. Tetsuo almost discovered Yû when she transformed for the first time, however she managed to trick him.


 * Toshio Ōtomo (大伴俊夫)
 * Seiyū: Yū Mizushima
 * Friend of Yū Morisawa and Midori Kisaragi, he falls in love with Creamy Mami after her first TV appearance.


 * Pino Pino (ピノピノ)
 * Seiyū: Seiko Nakano
 * An alien being, Pino Pino grants Yū Morisawa magical powers for one year in thanks for helping him find the Feather Star.


 * Shingo Tachibana (立花慎悟)
 * Seiyū: Kazuhiko Inoue
 * President of Parthenon Productions, he quickly recognises Creamy Mami as future sensation, and tries to make her into a star.


 * Mamoru Hidaka (日高 守)
 * A boy which recently got transfered to Yû's school who came from a small town in Hokaido. He seemed to be pretty rude at first, but later became friends with Yû due his huge love for cats. He says he can listen what the wind says and was one of the few people who realized Nega and Posi aren't normal cats. Mamoru at first doesn't knew many things about big cities and was annoyed due the fact Creamy Ga-Oka had such small threes. He was pretty outdated with news that he even doesn't knew who Creamy Mami was, plus when asked he thought it was a name of a crepe. Despite being a major character, Mamoru never had any real contact with Mami.

Impact and influence
Creamy Mami (1983) is known as a pioneer of the new marketing strategy, now known as “media mix”. They used an anime to promote a new, least-known idol singer. The real idol singer, Takako Ohta, acted as an idol singer (Creamy Mami) also in the story. The opening theme Delicate ni Suki Shite was her first song in the real world too. Even though Ohta was a new singer and not a trained seiyū, she voiced Yū/Creamy Mami. The result was a great success. The anime Creamy Mami has become famous and Ohta gained a high popularity that still exists today. In 1999, Fuji TV's show Kaishingeki TV Utaemon had a poll to decide the most popular old TV theme song for 25-year-old audience, and Delicate ni Suki Shite was ranked first. This anime has been repeatedly broadcast over the Internet too. As of writing (2006-08-08), people in Japan can legally watch the show on-demand for free on GyaO.

The same “media mix” approach was seen in Idol Densetsu Eriko (1989) and Idol Tenshi Youkoso Yōko (1990). The anime version of Full Moon o Sagashite (2002) basically shares the same format too. Another example is Lemon Angel (1987). Using an anime to promote a singer, per se, was not really new, as there was Pink Lady Monogatari (1978), but Pink Lady was already extremely popular at that time, so it was not that they gained popularity through the anime.

Creamy Mami set the format that would be used for future Studio Pierrot magical girl titles, and was especially influential in Fancy Lala. Creamy Mami also stars in Adesugata Mahou no Sannin Musume, along with Magical Emi and Persia, as well as Majokko Club Yoningumi A-Kukan Kara no Alien X, with Magical Emi, Persia and Pastel Yumi. The popularity of the series not only saw two feature-length sequels, but Creamy Mami also featured in five music video-based productions, starting with the 1985 OVA Lovely Serenade. The second of the feature-length sequels, Magical Angel Creamy Mami Long Goodbye, began with the short animation Mahō no Tenshi Creamy Mami VS Mahō no Princess Minky Momo Gekijou no Daikessen, and where Creamy Mami battles against Ashi Productions' Minky Momo.

Creamy Mami's companions Posi and Nega were also parodied in Gainax's 1991 OAV Otaku no Video, in which Misty May (the magical girl character created by the series' protagonist) has two lion-cub companions named Posi-King and Nega-King. (The character design for both is based on King the lion cub, a companion of the title character in Gainax's 1990 TV series Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water.)

Internationalization
Magical Angel Creamy Mami was dubbed into Italian by Studio PV, who released it as L'incantevole Creamy from 1985-02-03. It was also broadcast in France by La 5 (later on TMC, AB1 and Manga) as Creamy, merveilleuse Creamy from April 29, 1988. , and more recently released in French DVD editions (French dub or Japanese language and French subtitles) by Declic Image. It was also distributed in Spain as "El Broche Encatado" in 1992.

In these countries the musical theme was the same: in Italy it was sung by Cristina D'Avena, in France by Valérie Barouille and in Spain by Soledad

The text and music were by Alessandra Valeri Manera - Giordano Bruno Martelli

The musical base was partially re-orchestrated in France and Spain, and the text was translated and adapted by Charles Level for the French version.

It was dubbed into Cantonese by a Hong Kong TV company - TVB, who released it as "我係小忌廉" (I am Creamy Mami) from 1985-1-7 showing it from Monday to Friday at 6pm, each time showed half a hour.