Born Isahaya, in 1956. He is the brilliant actor who most recently brought Hirayama, and the 353 days of Hirayama’s life not portrayed in Perfect Days, to life. He has won numerous awards including Best Actor at Cannes with Perfect Days. He debuted in 1979. He won the Elan d’or Prize, the Television Grand Prix, and other newcomer awards for his role in the historical TV drama Tokugawa Ieyasu (1983). After appearing in films such as Juzo Itami’s Tampopo (1985), he had his first starring role in a film in Another Way: D-Kikan Joho (1988). The hit Shall We Dance? followed in 1996, which brought him numerous Best Actor awards including Japan Movie Critics Award and Japan Academy Film Prize. The next year, Lost Paradise was another success, while Unagi / The Eel won the Palme d’Or at Cannes. Since then, he has been an integral part of films by Shinji Aoyama and Kiyoshi Kurosawa, including Eureka (2000). He has also received international acclaim for roles in the Academy Award-nominated Babel (2006) and Chronicle of My Mother (2012), he has become a leading Japanese actor in both name and reality. In 2009, he made his directorial debut with Toad’s Oil (2009), in which he also starred. In 2019, he received his third best actor prize at the Japan Academy Film Prize for The Blood of Wolves (2018).