Kinya Kitaoji is a Japanese actor who was born on February 23, 1943, in Kyoto, Japan. He is the son of a famous actor, Utaemon Ichikawa, and made his debut while still a child, starring alongside his father in the 1956 film “Oyakodaka.” He studied at Gyosei Junior & Senior High School, later going on to graduate from Waseda University. He has continued to act in Japanese movies and dramas ever since. With over six decades of acting experience under his belt, some of his more recent drama appearances include “Massan” (2015) and “Castle of Sand” (2019).

Kinya Kitaoji

Fuji TV

Tsukimi Kurashita (Kyoko Yoshine) lost her mother to illness while she was still a young girl. Her enduring memory of her mother is jellyfish – after an emotional visit to an aquarium with her mother. Ever since, she has been completely obsessed with these aquatic creatures.

She lives in a Tokyo apartment with a group of young women on the fringes of society, most of whom have little or no romantic experience, shun outsiders, and are unemployed.

Tsukimi Kurashita dreams of escaping this dreary apartment and her housemates. She wants to retreat into her own world and become an illustrator.

But her life is sent on a brand new course on the fateful day when she quarrels with an uppity pet store clerk about a jellyfish, which she believes may be on the verge of death.

A remarkable looking stranger intervenes: a stunning beauty queen (who later turns out to be a cross-dressing man): Kuranosuke Koibuchi (Koji Seto). The stranger buys the jellyfish for Tsukimi Kurashita, who repays the favor by letting this exotic beauty stay with her at the apartment – much to the disdain of her housemates.

But the chaos has only just begun, as both Koibuchi Kuronosuke and his brother Koibuchi Shu (Asuka Kudo) slowly begin to fall for Tsukimi Kurashita…

This drama was based on a hit manga series of the same name, and also spawned an animated series and a 2014 live-action film.

“Princess Jellyfish” is a 2018 Japanese drama series that was directed by Ishikawa Junichi.

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