Keiko Kishi

Keiko Kishi (岸 惠子, Kishi Keiko, born 11 August 1932 in Yokohama, Japan) is a Japanese actress, writer, and UNFPA Goodwill Ambassador.

Keiko Kishi
Keiko Kishi (1957)
Born	(1932-08-11) 11 August 1932 (age 92) Yokohama, Japan
Occupations	Actress writer
Years active	1951–present
Spouse	Yves Ciampi ​ ​ (m. 1957; div. 1975)​
Children	1

Life and career

She made her acting debut in 1951 in Noboru Nakamura's film Home Sweet Home.

In the 1950s, David Lean proposed her for the main role in The Wind Cannot Read, which is about a Japanese language instructor in India circa 1943 who falls in love with a British officer, but that idea fell through and Yoko Tani was eventually cast in the role.

Kishi married the French director Yves Ciampi in 1957, and commuted for a while between Paris and Japan to continue her acting career. In 1963 a daughter, Delphine Ciampi, a musician and composer, was born. She divorced her husband in 1975. She has two grandchildren by her daughter.^[1]

Since 1996 she has been a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).

In 2002, she won the Japan Academy Prize for best actress for her role in the film Kah-chan.^[2]

Filmography (selected)

Film

• Home Sweet Home (1951)
• The Idiot (1951)
• Hibari no Sākasu Kanashiki Kobato (1952)
• The Thick-Walled Room (1953, rel. 1956)
• The Garden of Women (1954)
• Takekurabe (1955)
• Early Spring (1956)
• I Will Buy You (1956)
• Typhoon Over Nagasaki (1957)
• Untamed (1957)
• Snow Country (1957)
• The Snow Flurry (1959)
• Her Brother (1960)
• Ten Dark Women (1961)
• The Inheritance (1962)
• Love Under the Crucifix (1962)
• Rififi in Tokyo (1963)
• Kwaidan (1964)
• Mastermind (1969)
• The Rendezvous (1972)
• Tora-san Loves an Artist (1973)
• The Yakuza (1974)
• The Fossil (1975)
• Two in the Amsterdam Rain (1975)
• Akuma No Temari-uta (1977)
• Queen Bee (1978)
• Hunter in the Dark (1979)
• Koto (1980)
• The Makioka Sisters (1983)
• Kah-chan (2001)
• The Twilight Samurai (2002)
• Grave of the Fireflies (2005)
• Snow Prince (2009)

Television

• Vol 272, Miki
• Taikōki (1965), Oichi
• The Eldest Boy and His Three Elder Sisters (2003), Satoko Kashiwakura
• Mango no Ki no Shita de (2019), Rinko

Honours

• Kinuyo Tanaka Award (1990)^[3]
• Order of the Rising Sun, 4th Class, Gold Rays with Rosette (2004)