Yoshiko Kuga (久我 美子, Kuga Yoshiko, 21 January 1931 – 9 June 2024), was a Japanese actress.
Life and career
Kuga was born in Tokyo, Japan. Her father, Michiaki Koga (久我通顕), was a marquis and a member of the House of Peers.[1]
In 1946, while still attending Gakushuin Junior High School, she became an actress for Tohostudios.[2] In June 1946, Toho had sponsored a search for "new faces", choosing Kuga as one of 48 new actresses and actors from 4,000 applicants.[3] In 1947, she made her debut as one of the lead actresses in the omnibus movieFour Love Stories (四つの恋の物語, Yottsu no Koi no Monogatari). She was one of the actors active in the 1948 union strike at Toho studios.[3] In the 1950s, she started working independently and starred in many productions of the Shochiku studios under the direction of Keisuke Kinoshita. Other important directors include Kenji Mizoguchi (The Woman in the Rumor), Yasujirō Ozu (Equinox Flower), and Tadashi Imai (An Inlet of Muddy Water). In 1954, she co-founded the film production company Ninjin Club (Bungei purodakushon ninjin kurabu) with actresses Keiko Kishi and Ineko Arima to enable better working conditions for actors within the studio system.[4] Since the 1970s, she appeared mainly on television and on stage.[5]
^ abHirano, Kyoko (1992). Mr. Smith Goes to Tokyo: Japanese Cinema Under the American Occupation, 1945–1952. Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press. ISBN1-56098-157-1.
^González-López, Irene; Smith, Michael, eds. (2018). Tanaka Kinuyo: Nation, Stardom and Female Subjectivity. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN978-1-4744-0969-8.
