Ken Watanabe
This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (September 2008) Ken Watanabe Ken Watanabe in 2007 Born (1959-10-21) October 21, 1959 (age 55) Koide, Niigata, Japan Occupation Actor Years active 1979–present Spouse(s) Yumiko Watanabe (div. 2005) Kaho Minami (2005–present) Website www.kdash.jp/profile/kdash/watanabe_ken/index.php Ken Watanabe (渡辺 謙, Watanabe Ken?, born October 21, 1959) is a Japanese actor. To English-speaking audiences, he is known for playing tragic hero characters, such as General Tadamichi Kuribayashi in Letters from Iwo Jima and Lord Katsumoto Moritsugu in The Last Samurai, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Among other awards, he has won the Japan Academy Prize for Best Actor twice, in 2007 for Memories of Tomorrow and in 2010 for Shizumanu Taiyō. He is also known for his roles in director Christopher Nolan's Hollywood films Batman Begins and Inception. In 2014, he starred in the reboot of Godzilla, and lent his voice to the fourth installment of the Transformers franchise, Transformers: Age of Extinction as Decepticon turned Autobot Drift. He is set to make his Broadway debut this spring in Lincoln Center Theatre's revival production of The King and I in the title role (opposite Kelli O'Hara as Anna Leonowens).