Ken Watanabe
Ken Watanabe · 在ロサンゼルス日本国総領事館 Consulate-General of Japan in Los Angeles, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons
Person

Ken Watanabe

b. 1959

Japanese actor (1959-)

Born
21 Oct 1959 · Uonuma

Life timeline

Their life from birth to death. On the timeline, world events of the time are shown faintly.

Showing 77 years
  1. 21 Oct 1959BornBorn in Uonuma
  2. 1987AwardElan d'or Award for Newcomer of the Year
  3. 2007AwardBlue Ribbon Awards for Best Actor

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Meanwhile in the world

Major world events during their lifetime (1959 – today).

  1. 1959Antarctic Treaty System
  2. 19621962 FIFA World Cup
  3. 1962Cuban Missile Crisis
  4. 19661966 FIFA World Cup
  5. 1966 – 1976Cultural Revolution
  6. 1968Prague Spring
  7. 1969Apollo 11 Moon landing
  8. 19721972 Summer Olympics
  9. 19741974 FIFA World Cup
  10. 19781978 FIFA World Cup
  11. 1978 – 1979Iranian Revolution
  12. 1979 – 1989Soviet–Afghan War
  13. 1980 – 1988Iran–Iraq War
  14. 19841984 Summer Olympics
  15. 1985Schengen Agreement
  16. 19891989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre
  17. 1989Fall of the Berlin Wall
  18. 19901990 FIFA World Cup
  19. 1991Dissolution of the Soviet Union
  20. 19941994 FIFA World Cup
  21. 1994 – 1996First Chechen War
  22. 19981998 FIFA World Cup
  23. 2001 – 2021War in Afghanistan
  24. 2003 – 2011Iraq War
  25. 20042004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami
  26. 20062006 FIFA World Cup
  27. 20082008 Summer Olympics
  28. 2008Russo-Georgian War
  29. 20102010 Haiti earthquake
  30. 2010 – 2012Arab Spring
  31. 20112011 Norway attacks
  32. 2011Libyan civil war
  33. 2011 – 2024Syrian civil war
  34. 20122012 Summer Olympics
  35. 20142014 FIFA World Cup
  36. 2014Russo-Ukrainian war
  37. 2015Paris Agreement
  38. 20182018 FIFA World Cup
  39. 2020COVID-19 pandemic
  40. 20212020 Summer Olympics

Biography

Ken Watanabe (渡辺 謙, Watanabe Ken; born October 21, 1959) is a Japanese actor. He is best 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, Watanabe has won the Japan Academy Film Prize for Best Actor twice, in 2007 for Memories of Tomorrow and in 2010 for The Unbroken. He is also known for his roles in Christopher Nolan's films Batman Begins and Inception, as well as Memoirs of a Geisha, and Pokémon Detective Pikachu.

In 2014, he starred in the reboot Godzilla as Dr. Ishiro Serizawa, a role he reprised in the sequel, Godzilla: King of the Monsters. He lent his voice to the fourth and fifth installments of the Transformers franchise respectively, Transformers: Age of Extinction and Transformers: The Last Knight, as Decepticon-turned-Autobot Drift. In 2022, he starred in the HBO Max crime drama series Tokyo Vice.

He made his Broadway debut in April 2015 in Lincoln Center Theater's revival production of The King and I in the title role. In 2015, Watanabe received his first Tony Award nomination for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Musical at the 69th Tony Awards for his role as The King. He is the first Japanese actor to be nominated in this category. Watanabe reprised his role at the London Palladium in June 2018, earning a Laurence Olivier Award nomination.

Text from the Wikipedia article Ken Watanabe, CC BY-SA 4.0

About this information

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