Irie Takako

• Born: 1911/2/7
• Died: 1995/1/12
• Japanese: 入江たか子 (Irie Takako)

Irie Takako was an actress and early Japanese film star. She was best known for her role as the tragic heroine in the 1933 film Taki no shiraito, directed by Mizoguchi Kenji, and started her own production company, Irie-puro, in 1932.

Born in Tokyo the daughter of Viscount Higashibôjô, her real name was Higashibôjô Hideko. She made her film debut at age 16 in the 1927 film Kechinbo Chôja produced by the studio Nikkatsu, taking on the stagename Irie Takako from the beginning. She appeared in three films by Mizoguchi Kenji the following year, Tokai kôkyôgaku ("Metropolitan Symphony"), Asahi no kagayaku ("The Morning Sun Shines"), and Tôkyô kôshinkyoku ("Tokyo March").

In 1930, at the age of 19, she served as the model for a folding screen painting by Nihonga painter Nakamura Daizaburô which was featured at the 1930 Teiten ("Imperial Exhibition"), and is now in the collection of the Honolulu Academy of Arts. The painting depicts her in a scarlet furisode with a pastel green obi with gold leaf designs, white tabi and green zôri, lounging on a Western-style chaise. The painting became one of several works by Daizaburô to inspire dolls, and a number of the toys, complete with their own miniature chaise furniture, were produced in the early 1930s. She had met the painter when he served as an artistic director at the film studio.

Two years later, alongside director Mizoguchi Kenji, she produced the film Manmô kenkoku no reimei ("Dawn of the Founding of Manchukuo and Mongolia") under the auspices of her own production company, Irie-puro.

She played many supporting roles in the postwar period, and starred in a number of films as well, including the 1958 film Kaidan Saga Yashiki, as a demon cat actress. She died at age 83 in 1995.

References

• Brown, Kendall et al (eds.). Taishô Chic: Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia, and Deco. Honolulu Academy of Arts, 2001. pp70-77.