One Piece is having a month. Amid regular weekly releases of the final arc of Eiichiro Oda’s original hit manga, there’s also been updates on WIT Studio’s anime remake The One Piece, alongside the release of the second season of Netflix’s live adaptation, and an announcement of a LEGO One Piece special. That’s on top of all the merchandizing, from limited run or edition collaborations with companies from Popeye’s to Crocs.
Amid this One Piece-ification of culture is an experience for U.S. fans unlike any other: Fan Fest Night’s Grand Pirate Show. Last year’s experience included Straw Hat Crew meet-and-greets, an on-site artist creating original wanted posters, and themed food and beverages. This year those character interactions and photo-ops, along with the themed dining experiences, return with a slightly new spin and location, alongside a stage show produced in collaboration with Universal Studios Japan.
“In our first year of Fan Fest Nights, we were able to introduce One Piece as one of our core anime experiences,” says Stephen Siercks, senior director, entertainment production and executive producer of Universal Fan Fest Nights. “We just saw such overwhelming popularity and success from it, that we knew that there was more that we could activate around, more stories that we can tell and we can do it in a grander way. That’s what immediately led us to being able to put One Piece into a stage production.”
USJ, who partnered last year with USH on its 2025 anime experiences including Jujutsu Kaisen, has been producing One Piece stage shows, sometimes running as long as 90-minutes, since 2007. What fans can expect out of USH is slightly different, but nevertheless as engaging. The Grand Pirate Show drops fans into the world of the Straw Hat Crew — Luffy, Zoro, Nami, Usopp, Sanji and Chopper — along with appearances by the Marines as the group searches for Pop Greens, or seeds with both instant growth and attack capabilities.
The Straw Hats aren’t alone in their search, with appearances by Buggy and another potential surprise as audiences watch their favorite band of pirates fight off threats on their latest adventure. For those unfamiliar with USH’s WaterWorld venue, the Grand Pirate Show will lean into its best offerings — stunts and fight choreography, special effects, watercraft, pyrotechnics, and audience engagement — for an epic show running on select nights between April 23 and May 16.
The experience will run alongside Scooby-Doo Meets the Universal Monsters: Mystery on the Backlot, taking fans of the classic movie monsters onto the films’ actual sets, where they can solve a new case with the animated teen detectives. Other Fan Fest events include a journey into the Forbidden Forest as part of a Wizarding World creature adventure, a screening of Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon the Miracle: Moon Palace Chapter Deluxe at the DreamWorks Theater and the return of the popular Dungeons and Dragons experience.
Below, Siercks teases this year’s One Piece experience as part of Fan Fest Nights 2026.
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One Piece has a really expansive universe, with a lot of characters, locations and arcs you can tap. Where does this show sit within Oda’s universe?
Last year we were able to introduce our guests and fans to One Piece, whether you were a super fan or [casually] knew of the brand or were new to anime. You had a chance to meet and greet with a character and one of the Straw Hat crew. We’re again introducing guests to some of the storyline of the iconic One Piece manga, and we’re doing it in almost an origin story fashion. We’re introducing you to the characters, some of the narrative and the relationships between the characters and threading the needle to create a brand new story. It helps connect everything together for Fan Fest Nights in a way that drives some of the character and world building One Piece is known for as a live event adaptation in Hollywood.
The show’s USJ is well known for being pretty extensive and narratively involved. But they’re also a regular theme park offering, versus an after-hours event exclusive. How is this show inspired by or similar to the USJ experience and how is it different?
We’ve taken a lot of inspiration from our Universal Studios Japan entertainment partners, who have been producing stage versions of One Piece for the last 20 years. Myself, the main producer and lead of the show were able to go to Universal Studios Japan in the last year and experience their show in real time. We met with a lot of the team who put that show together, and we’ve actually enlisted a lot of their support in developing our experience as well. The reason for that is that they know this brand so well, and have been doing such great work bringing this One Piece world to life over the years. And being able to go and see what they do and adapt it to fit Fan Fest Nights here at Universal Studios Hollywood has been a really meaningful experience.
Their show certainly allows a deep dive into the current and latest version of the manga, and it’s new every year. We’re able to take the essence of that experience that they do so well and bring it into an event format that works for Fan Fest Nights, allowing our guests to be immersed within the experience, be introduced to these characters, and then continue their journey across the rest of the event night. We’re doing it in a way that is truly authentic and representative of the brand, while also representative of what we’re building with Fan Fest Nights. It’s that fan-first immersive, interactive experience that will not only be within the show, but pour out into the streets around the show venue as well. It allows us to introduce guests to the Straw Hat Crew in a grand, exciting way that you can only do at the WaterWorld venue here at Universal Studios Hollywood.
One Piece at Universal Studios Hollywood.
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Can you talk about what audiences can expect to see? How long is this and where will the story go narratively and performance-wise?
The show will last about 20 minutes, which is perfect timing for us to be able to introduce the characters, introduce the storyline, and find the resolution that packages it all together. We spent a long time talking through with our partners and our own team about where we want to place this storyline and narrative, so that those who are fans of the manga and fans of the anime genre can pick up with it, but if you’re brand new to anime, you also are able to get a sense of who these characters are and what they’re doing. We found our place on Midori Island. It’s our starting location for this storyline, and it allows us to reference both some of the later and some of the more current anime characterizations, while still being an opportunity to platform the fan favorite characters along the way as well.
This show is also going to be action packed from start to finish, from the way in which we’re introducing the characters, through how the conflict manifests itself as part of the story and how it ultimately resolves. One thing that’s going to be very special about this version of the show, and what we do inside of that venue, is that we’re going to bring a lot of that action out towards the audience, so there’s going to be a lot more that happens in and around you. It’s a way to get further immersed and further connected with the characters in the storyline, while still being able to provide all the stunts, the pyrotechnics and the action that that venue is known for.
You brought the Straw Hat Crew to life last year through character meet and greets which featured great costumes. How is that continuing on or changing this year due to the stunt nature of the show?
Bringing the characters to life is so important when you’re thinking about an iconic story brand like One Piece. Our costume team really spends a lot of time developing these characters and what they wear and the makeup, making sure that we’re paying attention to every single detail. And last year, when we got a chance to create the meet and greet experiences, that level of detail and authenticity was so important because it was a one-on-one interaction. You got a chance to talk with Luffy and have these photos with the other Straw Hat Crew. We’ve brought that same level of detail into the stage show, and been able to leverage the same costume design team to now create an experience that feels similarly connected to the characters, but also works for a live stage show experience on a grander scale. The Universal Studios Japan team doing this for so long has allowed us to really create the best of the best when it comes to a character experience, both inside of the show and outside of the show that our guests are going to love being able to engage with.
One thing about One Piece that feels so key to the brand is the music. What can fans expect out of the audio experience with this live show?
One of the great things about this show’s audio elements, especially how we’re activating it, is that the creative director who is supporting the development of the show is also a creative director of audio video. So you can expect that music is going to play a very important role in terms of being able to drive the energy and the storyline forward, but also make it something that is very familiar for fans. You’re going to connect to the different characters, the different environments, the different stories that are being told throughout the show experience.
Last year you really leaned into those character interactions and the themed dining experience. How are those things re-appearing as part of this year’s event?
Not only are we producing the Grand Pirate Show, which is our experience in WaterWorld, but just outside we’re bringing back the Grand Pirate Gathering, which for last year, was a meet and greet area. Our guests will again get a chance to meet with their favorite Straw Crew outside of the show experience and also experience connected food and beverage offerings, all in the same location. One Piece is taking over a section of Fan Fest Nights, allowing us to really go that extra mile in terms of bringing the brand to life as part of the event experience.
Our culinary team does such an amazing job bringing these different brands and moments to life through their food presentation, but with One Piece, look for this year food that’s connected directly to the characters and to some of the experiences we’re creating, expanding beyond what we were able to provide last year. This food really is going to take center stage in terms of helping to connect the experience, both in terms of how you interact with it, but also some of the presentation of it across the event.
