Yūya Yagira

is a Japanese actor. In 2004, he became the youngest winner of the Best Actor award in the history of the Cannes Film Festival for his portrayal of 12-year-old Akira in the highly acclaimed Nobody Knows. Career Yagira was 12 years old and not a professional actor, when filming began for Nobody Knows in 2002. He then immediately went on to television projects and other films. He co-starred with Eriko Sato in Akane Yamada's All to the Sea which was released in 2010 and co-starred with Kie Kitano in Taro Hyugaji's Under the Nagasaki Sky, released in 2013. In 2021, Yagira played young Takeshi Kitano in the biopic Asakusa Kid. Personal life Yagira was hospitalized on August 29, 2008 for a drug overdose, with early reports calling it a suicide attempt. Yagira later denied that he had been trying to kill himself, noting that he was the one who called an ambulance after he began feeling ill from taking the pills.  According to his blog: