Discovered by roving talent scouts from the Horipro agency in 1995, Haruka Ayase (b.1985) has since appeared in almost 20 TV series and a dozen movies. She won the 2005 Best Newcomer at the Golden Arrow Awards for her role in the TV series Socrates in Love, in which she played a girl dying of leukaemia. She also appeared as Hamaji in the samurai epic Satomi Hakkenden (2005) and the leading role in the romantic series Glow of Fireflies (2007). She also appeared as the title character in the time-travel romance Cyborg She (2008, a.k.a. My Girlfriend is a Cyborg) and Natsuko in Koki Mitani’s The Magic Hour (2008). She provided the voice of Violet in the Japanese language dub of The Incredibles and Victoria in Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends. Her next movie is the eagerly awaited Oppai Bare (Volleyboobs, 2009).

The son and namesake of a famous kabuki performer, and the scion of an acting dynasty that dates back to the samurai era, Shido Nakamura (b.1972) was thirty years old before he left the traditional stage for modern media. He thus became an unusually old Best Newcomer at the Japanese Academy Awards, winning the prize after a powerful role as Dragon, the shaven-headed Chinese challenger in Fumihiko Sori’s table tennis movie Ping Pong (2002). Subsequent roles have included an appearance in the movie spin-off of My Boyfriend is a Sniper (2004), and appearances alongside Jet Li in Fearless (2006), as Lieutenant Ito in Clint Eastwood’s Letters from Iwo Jima (2006), and as Gan Xing in John Woo’s epic Red Cliff (2008). He has also lent his voice to several anime, including Death Note (as Ryuk) and in the 11th Pokémon movie as Zero.

Former model Yosuke Kubozuka (b.1979) soon became a heartthrob in teen drama series, appearing the live-action versions of Kindaichi Case Files, GTO, both based on popular manga series. His cultivated bad-boy persona reached its peak with his role in Lipstick, in which he played a manipulative teenage crime kingpin. He first gained praise as a serious actor in the acclaimed GO! (2001), for which his portrayal of an ethnic Korean in Japan won him a Kinejun Award and a Japanese Academy Award, both for Best Actor. Although both Kubozuka and Fumihiko Sori appeared on the credits of the TV series Ikebukuro West Gate Park, they first properly worked together on Ping Pong (2002), in which Kubozuka performed a star turn as a single-minded table tennis champion. He also appeared in Samurai Resurrection (2003) in the pivotal role of Shiro Amakusa, the self-styled teenage messiah who led a revolt of Japanese Christians in the 17th century.

Also known as Emochan (b.1948) this comedian became a familiar face to a generation of Japanese through his appearances in the mid-1970s on Hirake! Ponkikki, a children’s show in the Sesame Street vein. He gained a sudden change in career late in life, winning the Japanese Academy Award for Best Actor for the title role in Shohei Imamura’s Dr Akagi (1998), the tale of a wartime physician who stands up to the Japanese military during an epidemic. His later movie roles have included appearances in Sumo Do, Sumo Don’t (1992), Yin-Yang Master (2001) and Japan Sinks (2006). He also appeared in Takeshi Kitano’s Zatoichi (2003) as the owner of a tavern.

A familiar face from Japanese gangster movies, Riki Takeuchi (b.1964) originally left school to work in a bank. He made his movie debut in the film His Motorcycle: Her Island (1984) and was soon a regular in Takashi Miike’s Dead or Alive series, as well as in the movie franchises Tokyo Mafia and Mafia Family Yanagawa. He has appeared in many TV drama series both as a regular and in numerous bad-guy cameos