Toshikazu Kawaguchi (川口 俊和; born 3 April 1971) is a Japanese author, screenwriter, and director born in Osaka, Japan.…
Toshikazu Kawaguchi (川口 俊和; born 3 April 1971) is a Japanese author, screenwriter, and director born in Osaka, Japan. He has received the Grand Prize of the Suginami Theatre Festival for his stage version of Before the Coffee Gets Cold as well as having been nominated for the Bookseller's Award for the novel version. The novel has been translated into 46 languages, selling over six million copies. He has produced, directed, and wrote for theatrical group Sonic Snail. His works explore themes of love, loss, grief, and kindness.
Famous People from Osaka Prefecture
Osaka Prefecture: 6 people
Yasuhiro Imagawa (今川 泰宏, Imagawa Yasuhiro; born July 24, 1961) is a Japanese anime director and screenwriter.
Akio Ishii (Japanese: 石井朗夫, Hepburn: Ishii Akio; born October 19, 1955), known professionally as LaSalle Ishii (ラサール石井…
Akio Ishii (Japanese: 石井朗夫, Hepburn: Ishii Akio; born October 19, 1955), known professionally as LaSalle Ishii (ラサール石井, Rasāru Ishii), is a Japanese TV personality, actor, director, writer, columnist, and politician. He named himself after his high school Japanese La Salle Academy. His best-known anime role is Kankichi Ryotsu the lead character in Kochira Katsushika-ku Kameari Kōen-mae Hashutsujo which ran from 1999 to 2004 for 373 episodes. In 2025, he ran in the House of Councillors election in the proportional representation district as a member of the Social Democratic Party, winning a seat. On September 24 the same year, the managerial committee of SDP announced it approved his inauguration as its Vice-Chairman.
Tetsuji Takechi (武智 鉄二, Takechi Tetsuji; 10 December 1912 – 26 July 1988) was a Japanese theatrical and film director…
Tetsuji Takechi (武智 鉄二, Takechi Tetsuji; 10 December 1912 – 26 July 1988) was a Japanese theatrical and film director, critic, and author. First coming to prominence for his theatrical criticism, in the 1940s and 1950s he produced influential and popular experimental kabuki plays. Beginning in the mid-1950s, he continued his innovative theatrical work in noh, kyōgen and modern theater. In late 1956 and early 1957 he hosted a popular TV program, The Tetsuji Takechi Hour, which featured his reinterpretations of Japanese stage classics. In the 1960s, Takechi entered the film industry by producing controversial soft-core theatrical pornography. His 1964 film Daydream was the first big-budget, mainstream pink film released in Japan. After the release of his 1965 film Black Snow, the government arrested him on indecency charges. The trial became a public battle over censorship between Japan's intellectuals and the government. Takechi won the lawsuit, enabling the wave of softcore pink films which dominated Japan's domestic cinema during the 1960s and 1970s. In the later 1960s, Takechi produced three more pink films. Takechi did not work in film during most of the 1970s. In the 1980s, he remade Daydream twice, starring actress Kyōko Aizome in both films. The first Daydream remake (1981) is considered the first theatrical hardcore pornographic film in Japan. Though Takechi is largely unknown in Japan today, he was influential in both the cinema and the theater during his lifetime, and his innovations in kabuki were felt for decades. He also helped shape the future of the pink film in Japan through his battles against governmental censorship, earning him the titles, "The Father of Pink" and "The Father of Japanese Porn."
Kaoru Morimoto (森本薫, Morimoto Kaoru; 4 June 1912 – 6 October 1946) was a Japanese playwright, screenwriter and…
Kaoru Morimoto (森本薫, Morimoto Kaoru; 4 June 1912 – 6 October 1946) was a Japanese playwright, screenwriter and translator. He is famous for his critically acclaimed play A Woman's Life (Onna no isshō), which became one of the most often performed plays in post-war Japan.
Akira Nobuchi (野淵 昶, Nobuchi Akira, 22 June 1896 - 1 February 1968) was a Japanese stage director and film director. He…
Akira Nobuchi (野淵 昶, Nobuchi Akira, 22 June 1896 - 1 February 1968) was a Japanese stage director and film director. He launched the Elan Vital Shōgekijō little theatre in 1918 while he was at Kyoto Imperial University. He stage-managed plays by Anton Chekhov, Arthur Schnitzler, Lord Dunsany, Lady Gregory, John Millington Synge and Sean O'Casey as well as those by Japanese playwrights including Saneatsu Mushanokōji, Ujaku Akita, Masao Kume and Jun'ichirō Tanizaki. Having left the Elan Vital Shōgekijō in 1933, he entered Shinkō Kinema the following year. He made a debut with talkie Nagasaki Ryūgakusei (1935), after which he made more than 30 films until 1955.