2009 Aug 10 An Unlikely Villain: Japanese actor Masanobu Otsuka
For his graduation project at Meiji University, an architecture student named Masanobu Otsuka designed a building that was an exaggerated version of the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars. His teachers laughed at him, saying he should be an actor instead of an architect.
Sure enough, Masanobu soon landed the role of the Japanese translator in The One Man Olympics, followed by a part in Lovers On the Road. The vivacious Masanobu is a natural comedian. You’d never guess from his cheerful, cheeky charm – nor from his hilarious impersonations of Al Pacino and Jackie Chan – that he was most recently cast as an evil Japanese soldier in City of Life and Death (aka Nanking! Nanking!), the recent film about the Nanjing Massacre.
the Beijinger: Why study architecture if you wanted to act?
Masanobu Otsuka: I like architecture, and I didn’t think acting was a skill you could learn at school.
tbj: Why did you come to China to pursue a career in acting?
MO: Hong Kong film! I made a resolution to act or write plays there, but people told me I should learn Mandarin in Beijing first. It’s still my dream to go to Hong Kong.
tbj: Was it stressful to play a Japanese soldier in a Chinese film?
MO: Not really. Did I kill anyone in China? No! I am just an actor. I think Japanese people can separate those two issues. I am a patriot and I adore our Mikado [emperor]. When Nanking! Nanking! was looking for Japanese actors, many people, including my schoolmates, refused the role because the subject was quite sensitive. My friends asked me not to take the part, but when I heard the director was Lu Chuan, and the cast included Liu Ye and Fan Wei, I took the role.
tbj: What’s your next film?
MO: It’s called Tiananmen, directed by Ye Daying. It tells the story of the 26 days leading up to the founding ceremony of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. I play a Japanese artist who helps to design the ceremony. The film should come out at the end of August or early September.
tbj: What sort of role would you like to play next?
MO: I think I’m lucky – most directors like me, and while I have played quite a few roles related to the Japanese army, I don’t usually get the really evil Japanese roles. But after Nanking! Nanking!, I don’t think I will accept any more roles of military personnel. It’s been enough. I want to play a gangster, someone in the mafia, like the roles in The Godfather.
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