Top Qs
Timeline
Chat
Perspective

Kazuya Tatekabe

Japanese actor and voice actor From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kazuya Tatekabe
Remove ads

Kazuya Tatekabe (たてかべ和也、立壁和也, Tatekabe Kazuya; July 20, 1934[1] – June 18, 2015) was a Japanese actor, voice actor, and manager. He was born in Kimobetsu, Hokkaidō. He was represented by Kenyu Horiuchi's Kenyu Office until the time of his death.[2]

Quick facts Born, Died ...

He is most known for the roles of Takeshi Gōda known as "Gian" (Doraemon), Walsa (Time Bokan), and Tonzura (Yatterman).

Remove ads

Biography

Summarize
Perspective

Early life

Tatekabe was born in Kimobetsu, Hokkaidō on July 20th, 1934.[3] His ancestors were pyrethrum farmers.[4] His late father had used to work for the Iburi Longitudinal Railway, but when he got too weak to continue working, the family moved to Shimokitazawa, Setagaya Ward, Tokyo, in 1942, when Tatekabe was in second grade. If they hadn't done so, he might have stayed in Hokkaido.[5] He once said, "I might have worked for an agricultural cooperative, gotten married, had grandchildren, watched Doraemon by the stove, and listened to the voice of Gian, who was probably played by someone else, and wondered, 'Who is that nasty voice?'"[5] Tatekabe was born an only child, and as a young boy, he was very similar to the character of Nobita,[5] as he spoke with a slight Hokkaido accent and was a frequent victim of bullying throughout his childhood years.

During the war, while Tatekabe was in fourth grade elementary school, he was evacuated to Asama Onsen in the northeast of Matsumoto City, Nagano Prefecture, but was then evacuated again over to Senba in Shiojiri City, Nagano Prefecture. Around the time, Tatekabe continued to wet his bed every night, a habit that continued on for six months close to the war's end. Once he returned to his parents' home from the evacuation site, he finally stopped wetting his bed.

Every day when he returned home from Daizawa National School (now known as Daizawa Elementary School) in Setagaya Ward, Tokyo, he was absorbed in playing baseball. After entering the Tokyo Agricultural Education College Junior High School, he continued to show his passion for baseball.

Career

During high school, Tatekabe was asked to take part in the drama club's production of "Alt Heidelberg" as Dr. Jüttner, to which he was met with praised from audiences which got him to think he had talent to become an actor and that theater was interesting to him. However, Tatekabe didn't end up joining the drama club because he never liked being tied down to anything. After that, Tatekabe started to go and see plays all over Tokyo nearly every week. He was impressed by every play he saw, and thought, "This is the only way I can live my life," and his desire of becoming an actor in the business grew stronger every day. However, Tatekabe was not particularly interested in acting. After he finally graduated from high school, Tatekabe entered the Department of Theater Arts at the Nihon University College of Art.[6] One of his university classmates was Kiyoshi Kobayashi.[7]

After Tatekabe had graduated from high school, he wanted to join a professional theater company as soon as possible and become a trainee, but when he saw his parents' faces, he couldn't bring himself to tell them. As an only child, he had previously thought that he would become a businessman someday and take care of his parents. He also didn't like studying very much, and had the impression that he would be able to just have fun in the theater department, so he went to the university. Even after entering university, he didn't study, but participated in many theater productions, including "The Bottom". Around this time, Tatekabe began to become interested in producing, and for a while he focused on studying as a production staff member.

After Tatekabe graduated from the university, he went around applying to various broadcasting companies with hopes of becoming a television producer, but he ended up failing at all of the job interviews he had to do in order to proceed. While he worked as a stagehand at Nippon Television, he teamed up with university classmate Yasuo Tanaka to form the theater company Engeki-za and performed "Poison and Old Lady" in Sapporo, Hokkaido. His university student friend Kobayashi asked Tatekabe to join his Izumiza theater company and Tatekabe agreed to it. The Izumiza theater company performed plays about the People's Republic of China, but most of the plays were ideological and were considered uninteresting. When Tatekabe was asked if he wanted to do it, he accepted before going on-stage.

After TV broadcasting began, Tatekabe officially began his career as a voice actor. His first voice acting roles were in dubbing foreign films. He had no memory of the first dub he partook in, other than being told that it would be "profitable". Tatekabe's television drama debut was in Dial 110. Tatekabe was a member of the theatre company Mitou,[8] Tokyo Actors' Cooperative[9] and Ezaki Productions[10] throughout his career.

There was a slight misunderstanding between Tatekabe and his manager at the agency, and at first he thought it was a mismatch, but soon realized that there were other people around him who had similar doubts. Having decided to do it himself, in 1979, Tatekabe officially founded Office Chuo, and served as both its president and as a voice actor. He tried to sell everyone by acting as a manager, but in the end, he was the only popular one, so he had no desire to be both actor and manager at the same time. He had no choice doing it because of Time Bokan and Doraemon, though in reality he wanted to sell everyone. During his time at Office Chuo, he met Kenyu Horiuchi. The people who had been with him despite the opposition of the agency members said, "Let's keep going like this," because they had been working hard for five years. However, as pressure came on the agency, they realized tht things would be hard if they went on as is, so they decided to merge in 1984 and absorbed into Production Baobab.[11] After Horiuchi ended up leaving Baobab to establish Kenyu Office, Tatekabe also decided to leave with him in order to work for the same agency, serving as director.

Awards

In 2004, for the 25th anniversary of the Doraemon movies, Tatekabe along his regular co-stars Nobuyo Ōyama, Noriko Ohara, Michiko Nomura, and Kaneta Kimotsuki received the Rikiya Tayama Award at the 14th Japan Movie Critics Awards.[12] In November 2006, Tatekabe received the Special Award at the 11th Animation Kobe along his regular Doraemon co-stars[13] and in March 2007, Tatekabe received the 3rd Lifetime Achievement Award at the Tokyo International Anime Fair 2007 alongside his regular co-stars on Doraemon.[14]

Final years and death

In 2009, Tatekabe was diagnosed with gastric cancer and had to have his entire stomach removed.[15] During his medical treatment, he was determined to complete his role as Tonzura in the Yatterman series. Before the cancer diagnosis, he never got a serious illness and therefore, had never been hospitalized.

Tatekabe died on June 18, 2015, in Tokyo from acute respiratory failure at 1:49pm. He was 80 years old.[16][17] He was single all his life, and was said to have been attended by his relatives and staff at his agency during his final moments. After undergoing gastrectomy in 2009, he didn't suffer from a recurrence of cancer, but his health declined until his final years, and he died of senility. His final voice acting role was of Max Tennyson in the Japanese dubbed version of Ben 10. A memorial caption was shown at the beginning of the Doraemon anime series episode that broadcast on June 19, 2015.[18]

Upon the announcement of Tatekabe's death, his close family, fans, TV Asahi[19] and former partner Horiuchi mourned his death, as well as his Doraemon anime successor Subaru Kimura,[20] current Doraemon voice actress Wasabi Mizuta,[21] Akira Kamiya,[22] Shigeru Chiba, and Kazuhiko Inoue on social media,[23] with the Fujiko F. Fujio Museum also sharing a memorial comment in condolence.[24]

Tatekabe's wake was held at Aoyama Funeral Hall on June 23, and was attended by around 900 people, including Subaru Kimura, Wasabi Mizuta, Noriko Ohara (who passed in 2024), Michiko Nomura, Kaneta Kimotsuki (who passed in 2016), Keiko Yokozawa, Masako Nozawa, Mika Kanai, Koichi Yamadera, and Keiko Toda.[25] Many voice actors and related parties sent flowers during the event.

At the wake, Horiuchi, as the funeral committee chairman, gave a speech for Tatekabe, and Kimotsuki sent an eulogy. Kimotsuki, a longtime friend of Tatekabe for years, prayed for the Hanshin Tigers' victory for Tatekabe, who was a Hanshin Tigers fan, saying, "Hanshin is in the running to win. I hope they win," and ended by crying out in Doraemon character Suneo's voice, "Gian, why did you go before me, even though you're Gian?".[26]

Tatekabe's funeral was held on June 24, at the same Aoyama Funeral Hall, and was attended by around 600 people. Following the wake, Kimotsuki read a eulogy, expressing his gratitude by saying, "The 26 years of Doraemon have been really fun. It's all thanks to you, Kabe-san," and concluded by shouting out "Gian!" as Suneo.[27] Horiuchi, who served as the funeral committee chairman, also spoke out, stating on his official website, "I will never forget your teachings and will see you off without shedding a tear until the very end." At first, he tried to hold back his tears, but at the end, he cried out "Kabe-san, Kabe-san" to Tatekabe's portrait, his voice shaking, and tearfully expressed his gratitude, saying, "He was the best teacher in Japan."[28]

Inside his coffin, Tatekabe was dressed up in a Gian T-shirt, with a microphone resembling Gian's recital mic and many stuffed plushies of the character by his side.[29] At the funeral procession, 80 balloons in the shape of white birds were released at the office's request. Afterwards, Tatekabe's body was cremated at Kirigaya Funeral Hall in Shinagawa Ward.

The funeral was organized by Kenyu Office, who Tatekabe was last affiliated with before he passed away.[30]

Even after his death, Kenyu Office has kept Tatekabe's profile, treating him as a "permanently affiliated" employee of the company.

Remove ads

Personality/Characteristics

Summarize
Perspective

As a voice actor, Tatekabe's most recognized voice acting roles are Gorilla-Imo from The Gutsy Frog, Dotechin from Giatrus, Tonzura from Yatterman,[31] Gurokkī from Time Bokan,[32] and Takeshi "Gian" Gōda from Doraemon.[33]

His voice type was baritone[34] and he was known for playing tough, gorilla-like characters.[35] Tatekabe himself stated that he enjoyed playing generally arrogant characters.[36]

During his time with Haikyo, in addition to providing voice-over work, Tatekabe also did work as an actor and in radio voice over, but all of them were minor roles without a credited name. His acting jobs for those often required him to stay tied for days despite scenes for him coming few and far between, but voice acting work he did never got cancelled, so Tatekabe felt that if he did minor roles, then voice acting was better off for his career.[37]

In the Japanese dub of Ben 10, Tatekabe voiced the role of Max Tennyson. When he originally auditioned, the Japanese dub's production staff were very reluctant to hire Tatekabe for the role. However, when Tatekabe sent his audition over to the United States, the company asked him to be the voice of Max, and therefore he was chosen for the dubbing role.[38]

His hobbies were watching baseball and reading, with his motto being "Cheerful, courageous, popular, and sometimes carefree".[39]

Interpersonal Relationships

While he was over at Production Baobab, Tatekabe didn't want the merger to fail, he was told, "I can't quit Doraemon, but you don't have to do any other work." He also worked as a manager[40] and a senior managing director. With his position in the former, he was responsible for scouting and discovering voice acting talent such as Aki Uechi (formerly known as Akiko Kajima),[41] Yuko Mizutani,[42] Ai Orikasa,[43] and Wasabi Mizuta,[44] the voice actress of Doraemon since the 2005 series.

He arranged for Uechi to star in Idol Densetsu Eriko from her debut, and also had arranged her to audition for the role of Shinnosuke in Crayon Shin-chan and also had highly recommended Mizutani despite the fact that they were in different agencies at the time.[45]

When a sound director had criticized actress Yūko Gotō, claiming she had an "evil voice", Tatekabe advised her, "The flaw of having a bad voice can be used as a weapon in anime. Poison can also become medicine."[46]

Role of Gian in "Doraemon"

In the Doraemon anime series, Tatekabe famously voiced the character of Takeshi Gōda, known by his nickname "Gian", for 26 years from 1979 to 2005. When he was originally offered the role, Tatekabe had no idea what either Doraemon or the character was. At the time he wondered, "What is 'Doraemon'?" He had already been familiar with Obake no Q-Tarō, but he did not know about Fujiko Fujio much then.

When interviewed upon his departure from the franchise, Tatekabe said that playing the role of Gian, a selfish character with strong emotions, required a lot of energy, so in order to prepare for recording, he smoked 20 cigarettes a day and drank alcohol six days a week. In late 2004, with his final recording scheduled to occur in about three months, Tatekabe reflected on his time saying, "I wonder how I'll feel on the last recording day, looking back on 26 years. I might even cry." He also expressed hope that the next voice actor to voice Gian would be "someone with a kind heart".[47]

Tatekabe wanted to have a drink with the person who would take over the role of voicing Gian in the 2005 series, but was greatly disappointed when he found out that the selected successor for the role of Gian, Subaru Kimura, was only a junior high school student at the time of his casting, only being 14 years old. He hoped to live for another five years and then be able drink with him. Kimura's high school happened to be close to the house Tatekabe lived at, so Tatekabe would often go to see Kimura whenever there was a school festival or an event going on during the five and a half year wait. Tatekabe's wish came true eventually, as Kimura officially turned 20 years old in 2010, so after a bit of planning in motion, they were finally able to go out for drinking together, which became a trending topic online in Japan in 2014 when Kimura shared two photos from the time on his Twitter.[48][49][50]

According to Tsutomu Shibayama, director and chief director of the Doraemon anime and Doraemon series, "The voice actors have a deep understanding of the characters, so I don't have to say anything." Shibayama gave an example through Tatekabe with the character of Gian, as he was extremely conscious of using foul language. Whenever lines like "You idiot!" or "Damn it" were written in the scripts, he ended up receiving complaints from Tatekabe, who complained about how "Gian wouldn't say such things."[51] Tatekabe also wrote the lyrics for Gian's staple character song in the 1979 anime, "Ore wa Jaian-sama".[52][53]

Remove ads

Successors

Due to Tatekabe stepping down with his advanced aging, other voice actors have taken over some of his roles.

Notable voice work

Theatrical animation

Video games

Dub work

Live-action

Animation

Television

Remove ads

References

External links

Loading related searches...

Wikiwand - on

Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.

Remove ads
Remove ads