Kei Yamamoto

He won a newcomer award in 1962, barely past twenty. That detail sits with me, because a prize like that is often the high point of a career rather than the start of one. Yamamoto kept working for something close to sixty more years, from that award until his death in 2022 at eighty-one. He was not the sort of actor whose name carries a film on the poster. He was the sort who changes the temperature of a scene from its edge, and he did voice work too, which is where carelessness has nowhere to hide. Born in Ibaraki, Osaka, into a family of actors, he chose a job that punishes anyone waiting to be discovered. Sixty years of showing up is its own kind of talent, and I respect it enormously.

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Name (English)

Kei Yamamoto

Name (Japanese)

山本圭

Reading

やまもと けい

Born

July 1, 1940 – March 31, 2022

Origin

Ibaraki, Osaka Prefecture, Japan

Height

167 cm

Occupation

actor / seiyū

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Cancer / Dragon

Agency

有限会社活動屋

Active years

1962 - 2020

University

Seikei University

Awards & achievements

• 1962 Elan d'or Award for Newcomer of the Year

Spouse

小川誠子

• Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kei%20Yamamoto
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%B1%B1%E6%9C%AC%E5%9C%AD
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6383549

Tags

• Osaka Prefecture
• actor
• seiyū

Last updated

September 18, 2026

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. Works and profile fields sourced from Wikipedia reflect content as of 2026-08-26. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.