Yasuaki Kurata

Yasuaki Kurata, born in Ibaraki, Osaka in 1946, belongs to a very small club: Japanese actors who genuinely made it inside the Hong Kong film industry rather than just visiting it. He trained in judo, karate and aikido, and that grounding shows in why Hong Kong producers kept casting him. What impresses me most is not that he appeared in those films, but that he was nominated twice for the Hong Kong Film Awards. In an era when a Japanese performer could easily have been slotted permanently into the villain-who-loses role, being recognized by the local industry's own awards means he was judged on craft, not novelty. He also worked steadily at home in Japan, so this was never a one-market career. I don't need embellished legends here. A Nihon University graduate who took his body and his discipline across the sea and earned respect on someone else's turf is already a rare enough story.

Name (English)

Yasuaki Kurata

Name (Japanese)

倉田保昭

Reading

くらた やすあき

Born

March 20, 1946 (age 80)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Pisces / Dog

Origin

Ibaraki, Osaka Prefecture, Japan

Height

173 cm

Occupation

judoka / actor / aikidoka / karateka

University

Nihon University

• Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/kurata_samurai_spirit_club/
• Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasuaki%20Kurata
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%80%89%E7%94%B0%E4%BF%9D%E6%98%AD
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q999296

Tags

• Osaka Prefecture
• judoka
• actor
• aikidoka

Last updated

2026-08-07

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.