Ozawa Eitarô

Ozawa Eitarô took an interest in acting in junior high school, eventually abandoning high school to join a small theater company in 1927. In 1929, he debuted with the Tokyo Leftist Theater and joined the Proletariat (Communist) party in Japan. Following the enactment of the Peace Preservation Law in 1930, radical groups came under intense scrutiny. The Leftist Theater was found in violation of the law, and Ozawa spent a year and a half behind bars.

After his release, Ozawa co-founded a new troupe and began working part-time as an actor for P.C.L. That troupe also met a dismal end, being dissolved by the military in 1940. In 1944, Ozawa co-founded yet another troupe with fellow actors Senda Koreya and Tôno Eijirô, and began appearing in the early films of director Kinoshita Keisuke. In 1946, he won a Mainichi Film Award for his role as a stubborn military officer in Kinoshita's Morning for the Osone Family (1946). His career in film blossomed from there, and he appeared in a large number of films for all the major Japanese studios.

Ozawa is best known to genre fans for playing the chief detective in The H-Man (1958), and he also had a memorable role as the Minister of Justice in Gorath (1962).