Keiju Kobayashi

was a Japanese actor who appeared in 253 films in a career spanning 67 years.

Born in Gunma Prefecture, he began acting at the Nikkatsu studio after dropping out of Nihon University and made his film debut in 1942. In 1956 he moved to Toho film company. In a career that spanned 65 years, he appeared in over 250 films, most famously in the "Company President" (Shachō) comedy films made at Toho, where he worked alongside Hisaya Morishige, Daisuke Katō, Norihei Miki, and others. There he helped define the popular image of the postwar salaryman. He also won many awards for his acting, including best actor awards at the Mainichi Film Awards for ''The Naked General'' in 1958 (where he played Kiyoshi Yamashita), for ''Kuroi gashū'' in 1960, and for ''The Elegant Life of Mr Everyman'' in 1963. Kobayashi appeared in films made by such notable directors as Akira Kurosawa, Yasujirō Ozu, Mikio Naruse, and Kihachi Okamoto. He continued to give powerful performances after largely moving to television in the late 1960s.

He also portrayed the voice of the "Shirō Nishi" in the original Japanese version of the Studio Ghibli anime film Whisper of the Heart in 1995.

He died on 16 September 2010 of heart failure at the age of 86. Provided by Wikipedia