Koji Yakusho

Koji Yakusho was born in Isahaya City, Nagasaki Prefecture, Japan on January 1st, 1956. He was the youngest of five brothers. His name was then Koji HASHIMOTO. After graduating from Nagasaki Prefectural High School of Technology in 1974, he found employment at a municipal ward office (KUYAKUSHO) in Tokyo.

In the summer of 1976, he happened to see a stage play called THE LOWER DEPTHS by Maxim Gorky, and was very impressed by it. Being interested in stage dramas, Koji started seeing lots of plays, and in due course, he decided to become an actor.

In the spring of 1978, he challenged a test organized by an actors/actresses training studio, called Mumei Juku, led by a well known actor called Tatsuya Nakadai. Koji was selected as one of four lucky ones out of about 800 candidates.

In 1983, he won fame when he played a major role - that of ODA NOBUNAGA - in a year-long TV drama entitled TOKUGAWA IEYASU ( a famous 17th-century Shogun). From then on, he has appeared in various stage plays, movies, TV dramas, and commercials. Thus his acting field is really comprehensive.

His stage plays may interest you: he has performed major roles in productions of Machiavelli's MANDRAGOLA, Shakespeare's HAMLET (as Laertes), Lanford Wilson's BURN THIS, and Martin Sherman's BENT.

In his private life, he married an actress, Saeko Kawazu in 1982; the couple have a son born in 1985.

In 1996, he won a total of 14 awards as best actor for his work in "Shall We Dance?", "Sleeping Man" and "Shabu Gokudo". In 1997, he played the lead in Shohei Imamura's "The Eel", which won the Golden Palm at the 50th Cannes Film Festival, as well as the Best Actor award for Yakusho at the Asian Pacific Film Festival. In the same year, he was awarded the Best Actor award for "Cure" at the Tokyo International Film Festival.

He also received a special award from the Japanese Minister of Education, Science, Sports and Culture in the category of Cinema in 1998.

<Courtesy of Pymmik's Home Page on Koji Yakusho Movies>

Japan Academy Award Best Actor
Won: 1997 ("The Eel"), 1996 ("Shall We Dance?")
Nominated: 2007 ("Suite Dreams), 2004 ("University of Laughs"), 2002 ("The Choice of Hercules"), 2001 ("Warm Water Under a Red Bridge"), 2000 ("Doraheita"), 1999 ("Jubaku: Spellbound"), 1998 ("Kizuna"), 1990 ("Under Aurora")