Haruo Nakajima, who wore the Godzilla suit for the first 12 Godzilla films has died at age 88. The actor, known in Japan as “Mr. Godzilla” is reported to have died on Aug. 7.
Nakajima played Godzilla and a reporter in Ichiro Honda’s 1954 classic, as well as appearing the same year as a bandit in Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, which are known as two of the best films in Japanese cinematic history.
Nakajima stated that the Godzilla suit in the 1954 film was made partly of concrete and weighed around 220 pounds and given that there was no history of the character, Nakajima was given little to no direction on how to portray the iconic character. He chose to visit a zoo in Tokyo and studied the movements of animals to use when he stomped across a miniature set of the Japanese capital, the rest is history.
“My biggest influence came from bears, the way bears move is very interesting,”
Nakajima became a focal point of monster conventions from the 90’s to the time of his passing. Nakajima will be missed but not forgotten.
