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Actor

1972-10-10 · Yokohama, Japan · Male

12 series in the catalog

James Yaegashi (Japanese: 八重樫ジェイムズ) is a Japanese-American actor based in New York.

Early life

James Yaegashi was born in Yokohama and raised in Yamagata to an American mother and a Japanese father. Upon graduating high school, he moved to America and majored in acting and directing at University of Missouri–Kansas City. He moved to New York City with his wife in 1998.

Career

He has acted in various stage productions, including as Mr. Yunioshi in a stage production of Breakfast at Tiffany's; a role that had historically been played in yellowface. Of the character Yaegashi said "He's a real character, for starters. The film...made so many changes to the story...Yunioshi is a Nisei, a Japanese American from California. In the movie, Mickey Rooney played him as if he was fresh off the boat." He ultimately felt it was necessary to play the character to portray ethnic characters in a positive light. Yaegashi first entered the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) with a minor role in Daredevil, but had a more notable role when he was cast as Robert Minoru in the Hulu original series Runaways based on the Marvel Comics series. In 2004, he voiced the Chinese Triad leader, Wu Zi Mu, in the action-adventure game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. He later voiced an undercover police officer called Charlie in Grand Theft Auto IV (2008) and the expansion pack The Lost and Damned (2009). He also voiced Dr. Yi Suchong in the first-person shooter game BioShock (2007) and one of its sequels, BioShock Infinite: Burial at Sea (2014).

Personal life

James Yaegashi is married with two children. He is also bilingual.