Veteran Japanese voice actress Romi Paku (朴璐美) has shared an emotional tribute on X, formerly Twitter, mourning the death of a former manager she credits with turning her career around at its lowest point.
In a post published August 4, Paku recalled being in her 20s and ready to walk away from acting after growing disillusioned with theater. It was then, she wrote, that her manager, whom she referred to only by the nickname “Yamayoshi,” told her: “It’s an audition you’re not going to pass anyway, so you might as well enter it and go out in a blaze of glory.” According to Paku, that single sentence changed the direction of her life.
She described Yamayoshi as stubborn, hard-drinking, a professional wrestling fan who wore the same navy blazer through every season, insisting it was a leftover from his university days. The two argued constantly, she wrote, but also worked, cried and laughed through years of “firsts” together as she built her career in the voice acting industry. One fan replying to the post recalled that it was Yamayoshi who pushed Paku to audition for the 1998 mecha anime “Brain Powerd,” though Paku’s own post did not go into detail on specific projects.
Paku wrote that even after she eventually left the theater company where they had worked together, Yamayoshi continued to watch over her career from a distance. Much of the post repeats the Japanese phrase “baka yaro,” roughly “you idiot” or “damn you,” as she addressed him directly, asking him to appear at her bedside that night so they could “argue it out properly,” and promising to leave a bottle of sake waiting for him.
The post quickly circulated on Japanese social media, drawing tens of thousands of views along with replies from fans and several people who said they had personally known Yamayoshi through his work in the industry, many offering condolences to Paku.
Who is Romi Paku?
Romi Paku, born January 22, 1972, in Tokyo’s Edogawa Ward, is a veteran voice actress, actress and singer. She is best known internationally for voicing Edward Elric in “Fullmetal Alchemist” and Loran Cehack in “Turn A Gundam” (∀ガンダム). After stepping away from the theater troupe Gekidan En, she went on to co-found the talent agency SViL with her husband, fellow voice actor and actor Kazuhiro Yamaji, a separate person from the “Yamayoshi” described in her tribute.
Author’s Comment
Okay, I need a minute. Japanese people have this beautiful, infuriating habit of expressing the deepest love through insults, and this post is Exhibit A: the woman calls a dead man an idiot for six paragraphs straight and somehow it’s the most tender thing you’ll read all week. That audition line gets me too. ‘You’re not going to pass anyway, so go out in style’ isn’t encouragement, it’s reverse psychology dressed up as tough love, and it worked, because Japanese showbiz runs on managers who half-bully, half-parent their talent into greatness. I’ve never met this Yamayoshi guy, but anyone who wears the same blazer through a heatwave because it makes him feel like a Keio boy sounds like exactly the chaotic uncle figure this industry needs more of. Rest easy, sir. She’s leaving the sake out for you.
