was a Japanese actor, whose career spanned 65 years and over 230 film and television productions, He was best known for his collaborations with director Yasujirà  Ozu, whom he worked with on 14 films.
Ryà « was born in Tamamizu Village, Tamana County, a rural area of Kumamoto Prefecture in Kyushu, the most southerly and westerly of the four main islands of Japan. His father was chief priest of Raishà Âji (æ¥砧寺), a temple of the Honganji School of Pure Land Buddhism. Ryà « attended the village elementary school and a prefectural middle school before entering the Department of Indian Philosophy and Ethics at Tà Âyà  University to study Buddhism. His parents hoped he would succeed his father as priest of Raishà Âji, but Ryà « had no wish to do so and in 1925 dropped out of university and enrolled in the acting academy of the Shà Âchiku motion picture company's Kamata Studios. Shortly afterwards, his father died and Ryà « returned home to take on the role of priest. Within half a year or so, however, he passed the office to his older brother and returned to Kamata.
For about ten years, he was confined to walk-on parts and minor roles, often uncredited. During this time he appeared in fourteen films directed by Yasujirà  Ozu, beginning with the college comedy Dreams of Youth (1928). His first big part was in Ozu's College is a Nice Place (1936) and he made his mark as an actor in Ozu's The Only Son (also 1936), playing a failed middle-aged school-teacher in spite of the fact that he was only 32. This was his break-through role, and he now began to get major parts in other directors' films. He first played the lead in Torajirà  Saità Â's Aogeba tà Âtoshi (ä»°ãÂÂã°å°Âã 1937). His first leading role in an Ozu film was in the There Was a Father (ç¶ãÂÂãÂÂã 1942). This was another "elderly" part: he played the father of Shà «ji Sano, who was only seven years his junior. He was by now undoubtedly Ozu's favourite actor: he eventually appeared in 52 of Ozu's 54 films. He had a role (not always the lead) in every one of Ozu's post-war movies, from Record of a Tenement Gentleman (1947) to An Autumn Afternoon (1962). He played his most famous "elderly" role in Tokyo Story (1953).
Ryà « appeared in well over 100 films by other directors. He was in Keisuke Kinoshita's Twenty-four Eyes (1954) and played wartime Prime Minister Kantarà  Suzuki in Kihachi Okamoto's Japan's Longest Day (1967). From 1969 until his death in 1993, he played a curmudgeonly but benevolent Buddhist priest in more than forty of the immensely popular It's Tough Being a Man (Otoko wa tsurai yo) series starring Kiyoshi Atsumi as the lovable pedlar/conman Tora-san. Ryà « parodied this role in Jà «zà  Itami's comedy The Funeral (1984). Ryà «'s last film was It's Tough Being a Man: Torajirà Â's Youth (ç·ã¯ã¤ãÂÂãÂÂãÂÂãÂÂ寠次éÂÂã®éÂÂæÂÂ¥: Otoko wa tsurai yo: Torajirà  no seishun 1992).
Between 1965 and 1989 he appeared in about 90 TV productions.
Ryà « retained the rural Kumamoto accent of his childhood throughout his life. It may have held him back early in his career, but became part of his screen persona, denoting reliability and simple honesty. When the columnist Natsuhiko Yamamoto published a deliberately provocative piece called "I Can't Stand Chishà « Ryà «", in which he derided Ryà «'s accent, there was a furious reaction, and his magazine Shà «kan Shinchà  (é±åÂÂæ°潮) was inundated with letters of protest.