For twenty-four years Yasuo Yamada was the voice of Arsène Lupin III, and he played the master thief not as a smooth operator but as a delighted schoolboy. It is a nasal, improvising, undignified performance, and it is why the character is likeable at all.
Fi1m perspective
Two men, one pot of spaghetti, two forks. In The Castle of Cagliostro (1979) Lupin and Jigen fight over dinner and it is the funniest scene in the film, and most of the joke is in the voices: Kiyoshi Kobayashi's Jigen a low growl under a hat brim, Yasuo Yamada's Lupin a nasal, delighted whine, the sound of a schoolboy who has found the staffroom key. We laughed out loud at it, and we laughed because Yamada never lets Lupin sound as though he knows he is famous. He sounds like a man who has just got away with something and cannot quite believe his luck.
He had been doing it for eight years by then. Yamada was cast as Lupin in 1971 for the first television series and kept the part across series, specials and films until his death in 1995, and the character's catchphrases, the "Ararara" above all, and his loose, half-improvised delivery came from the actor as much as from any script. Before Lupin he had been the Japanese voice of Clint Eastwood, from Rawhide in 1959 onwards, and of Jean-Paul Belmondo. A man who has dubbed Eastwood knows exactly how little a line needs. He chose to give Lupin the opposite, and the choice is the performance.
Cagliostro is the only Lupin film we have reviewed, and it is a particular case. Hayao Miyazaki's first feature is fast, funny and warm, and Yamada's boyishness fits a film that does not think about anything for long. Whether the same voice served the first theatrical outing, The Mystery of Mamo (1978), or a later one such as Legend of the Gold of Babylon (1985), we cannot say at the same length. Yamada himself preferred the first television series to the second, which he thought was pitched too much at children, an odd position for a man whose Lupin sounds about twelve. It suggests he heard something in the part that the shows did not always want.
The long run had its friction. He was replaced for The Fuma Conspiracy (1987), did not care for it, and had little to do with the character's creator, Monkey Punch, afterwards. He carried Lupin's mannerisms into public appearances and put the character on his business cards. In 1989 he said of the thief: "I'm sorry to say this, but I want him to grow old with me, and when I die, I want to take him with me to my grave." We have not often heard an actor ask for his character's funeral.
Start with Cagliostro, and listen for the forks.
Biography
Yasuo Yamada was a Japanese actor, voice actor and narrator. Born in Tokyo on 10 September 1932, he left the faculty of literature at Waseda University and began his career with the Mingei Theatre Company before working freelance and with Theater Echo. He appeared in numerous stage, radio and television productions.
Yamada is best known for voicing Arsène Lupin III in the Lupin the Third anime series and films from 1971 until his death. His credits include The Castle of Cagliostro (1979), Lupin the Third: The Mystery of Mamo (1978) and many television specials. He was also the regular Japanese dubbing voice for Clint Eastwood and Jean-Paul Belmondo.
Yamada died of a brain haemorrhage on 19 March 1995, aged 62. Kan'ichi Kurita succeeded him as the voice of Lupin III.
