TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Acclaimed Japanese actor Tatsuya Nakadai, who starred in Akira Kurosawa films such as the "Kagemusha" (The Shadow Warrior), has died, a source close to the matter said Tuesday. He was 92.
A native of Tokyo, Nakadai joined an acting school in 1952 and rose to stardom by playing the lead role in the anti-war "Ningen no joken" (The Human Condition) trilogy directed by Masaki Kobayashi, which featured a pacifist struggling in wartime Japan.
The 1980 film "Kagemusha," a story of a thief who is hired to impersonate a samurai warlord, won the prestigious Palme d'Or at the Cannes film festival the same year. Nakadai also starred in Kurosawa's 1985 work "Ran," which was based on Shakespeare's "King Lear."
He has also worked to develop the next generation, launching with his wife, Yasuko Miyazaki, the Mumeijuku school for young actors in 1975 in Tokyo.
Nakadai, who was awarded the Order of Culture from the Japanese government in 2015, died at a hospital in Tokyo of pneumonia early Saturday, according to the source.
