Masako Nozawa

Born Masako Tsukada in Tokyo in the mid-1930s, Masako "Mako" Nozawa is a renowned seiyu (voice actor) best known for her work on the immensely popular anime manga "Dragonball." She began her career in the mid-1960s on a number of Japanese series, including the insect adventure "Honeybee Hutch," and the guardian amphibian cartoon "The Gutsy Frog." In 1978 she gained her first major role as Tetsurô Hoshino on the manga-inspired space-faring adventure "Galaxy Express 999." Her performance on the 88 episodes of this show led to work on several TV movie spin-offs, as well as a slew of other work throughout the early 1980s. In 1986 she landed the part of Son Gokû on the iconic Anime "Dragonball," which ran for five seasons and spawned a number of films as well as the spin-off series "Dragon Ball Z." This action-packed spin-off proved even more popular than the original series and ran for a whopping eight seasons. "Dragonball GT" and "Dragonball Z Kai" followed, as did roles in a number of other shows, including a part on the treasure hunting comedy adventure "One Piece."