Kōtarō Satomi

If you grew up with Japanese TV, Kōtarō Satomi is basically the sound and posture of the samurai era, the guy whose face means "the good guys win tonight." I love that he made a whole career out of jidaigeki: the clean swordplay, the upright bearing, that warm gravelly voice that could shame a villain into sitting up straight. There's something deeply reassuring about an actor who plays justice for decades and somehow keeps his spine ramrod and his charm fully loaded into his eighties. And then he turns around and sings, properly sings, which feels almost greedy. A kid from Fujinomiya who became a national fixture of honor and decency, he's the kind of dependable presence you don't fully appreciate until you imagine the screen without him.

This take was written by generative AI, one per person, from publicly reported facts (editorial policy). It is a reading of the record, not reporting.

Kōtarō Satomi is a Japanese actor, voice actor, and singer born on November 28, 1936, in Tokyo and raised in Fujinomiya, Shizuoka Prefecture. He is widely recognized as a veteran presence in Japanese period dramas, known for his commanding screen presence and resonant voice. His career has spanned multiple decades, establishing him as one of the most enduring figures of his generation in Japanese entertainment. Born Kunitoshi Sano, he joined Toei through its New Face audition in 1956.

Name (English)

Kōtarō Satomi

Name (Japanese)

里見浩太朗

Reading

さとみ こうたろう

Born

November 28, 1936 (age 89)

Origin

Fujinomiya, Shizuoka, Japan

Height

173cm

Occupation

Actor / Voice Actor / Singer

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Sagittarius / Rat

Blood type

A

Active years

1957 -

Spouse

Non-celebrity woman (previously divorced)

Works summary

Appearances

381 (1957–2026)

By year (titles with a known year)

1957: 4, 1958: 30, 1959: 22, 1960: 27, 1961: 25, 1962: 13, 1963: 4, 1964: 6, 1965: 4, 1966: 7, 1967: 8, 1968: 8, 1969: 10, 1970: 14, 1971: 7, 1972: 2, 1974: 2, 1975: 1, 1976: 1, 1978: 2, 1979: 2, 1980: 1, 1981: 1, 1982: 3, 1983: 3, 1984: 1, 1985: 2, 1986: 1, 1987: 2, 1988: 2, 1989: 1, 1990: 1, 1991: 3, 1992: 5, 1993: 2, 1994: 3, 1995: 6, 1996: 9, 1997: 6, 1998: 5, 1999: 5, 2000: 5, 2001: 5, 2002: 3, 2003: 1, 2004: 3, 2005: 2, 2006: 4, 2007: 2, 2008: 3, 2009: 2, 2010: 1, 2011: 2, 2012: 5, 2013: 6, 2014: 6, 2015: 7, 2016: 7, 2017: 1, 2018: 5, 2019: 4, 2020: 4, 2021: 1, 2023: 2, 2025: 1, 2026: 2, year unknown: 36

Debut work

上方演芸 底抜け捕物帖

Filmography / notable works

• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%87%8C%E8%A6%8B%E6%B5%A9%E5%A4%AA%E6%9C%97
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q901575

Tags

• From Shizuoka
• Actor
• Voice Actor
• Singer

Last updated

October 18, 2026

Only publicly available facts are listed; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. Base data was compiled from Wikidata from June 2026 onward; ages are recalculated daily and deaths are checked against Wikidata on an ongoing basis. 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.