Akihiko Okamoto On Yoshimoto Kogyo's Mission To Make The World Laugh

Forbes

22-03-2025

Yoshimoto Kogyo's president and representative director, Akihiko Okamoto.
I caught up with Yoshimoto Kogyo's president, Akihiko Okamoto, to discuss how Japan's oldest comedy firm is bringing its unique humor worldwide.
Founded in 1912, Yoshimoto Kogyo's Tokyo office is inside an old primary school (shown below). Like the company, the school is also a century old and even has its own bomb shelters.
The primary school layout also has an endearing charm, as each office was once a classroom for kids. This feels fitting for a company that aims to make people roll around with raucous laughter.
So it was good to sit down with the company's president and representative director, Akihiko Okamoto, and find out more about what makes Yoshimoto Kogyo so special and how it has survived in such a competitive industry for so long.
'I grew up in Nara Prefecture, which is in the countryside, but as you may know, Nara is a historical place. That means as a prefecture, it's a very traditional and historical place. It's also a very green place. As for me, the area I grew up in was one of the commuter towns into Osaka, so it was closer to Osaka than Nara city. Where I lived was also danchi (Japanese public housing). If you compare that to the US, that would be something like Rhode Island (laughs). I also enjoyed playing baseball as a kid.'
'As for university, I graduated straight from university and went to Yoshimoto Kogyo. I delayed my exit from university because I didn't want to start working. I even prolonged my time at university to avoid working, up to 6 years in the end. Naturally, around the sixth year of my time at university, my parents started to nag me to get a job. My thought was to pretend to be serious about finding a job, and most companies had entrance exams back in those days. My strategy was to go to companies where I was unlikely to get in, and that's how I ended up at Yoshimoto Kogyo. Not only was this an accident but a real disaster (laughs).'
The headquarters for Yoshimoto Kogyo in Tokyo are in an old primary school.
'When I received the notification that I had been accepted into Yoshimoto Kogyo, my parents were ecstatically happy. Mainly because they no longer had to pay university tuition fees. Because they were so happy, I realized I had to actually earn some money and actually do some work. All this happened around 1991. So when I got here, I was not only astonished by what I saw but also, at the same time, in Japan, if you start something like a new job, you should at least give it three years. With that in mind, I decided to work hard for those three years. That way, if I did decide to leave later on, my parents wouldn't really be able to say much about it.
'Unlike today, it was hard to use the paid holidays, so I just kept on working and working, and without realizing it, it led me to where I am now.
'For the first year I was at Yoshimoto Kogyo, I was stationed in Osaka as that's where the company was based. However, for the second year, I came to Tokyo. This was interesting, as there was a cultural shift, like it was a different kind of company. It was really interesting, and I felt like I was learning a lot when I got to Tokyo. There was also a feeling that Osaka comedy was known nationwide. In that sense, it wasn't hard to work in Tokyo after coming from Osaka. I do feel that it is thanks to my predecessor and the comedians themselves who established that kind of environment in the first place before I came to Tokyo, such as what style of Osaka comedy would be prevalent on TV stations in Tokyo. Thanks to that effort, I am in the position I am in today when it comes to Osaka comedy.'
One of the aspects of Japanese comedy is that the language has multiple dialects known as 'ben'. In fact, one of these dialects, known as Kansai-ben, is often closely tied to how Japanese comedy operates, something that Okamoto elaborated on.
'Talking about language, you're right. Osaka comedy is indeed based on Kansai-ben. What happened was that all of this comedy spoken in Kansai-ben was understood nationwide as being funny. This includes Kansai-ben's character. It's not as though they do the comedy in standard Japanese; it's always been done this way, in Kansai-ben. I suppose then the whole point was that doing comedy in Kansai-ben was regarded as funny. In many ways, that's the whole point of what Yoshimoto Kogyo has done over the years. While Kansai-ben is not necessarily understood abroad, in the US, you have localised language, such as a different accent or intonation. In those instances in the US, the comedy still worked nationwide through things like TV.
'I think what makes Yoshimoto Kogyo unique is that, yes, a part of it is down to the people of Kansai using Kansai-ben, which has spread across Japan. However, we don't just have people from Kansai; there are all sorts of people from different areas of the country. They all have the will and the sense to communicate something fun, something interesting. That sense of purpose that they have is really the foundation of the company. Due to that foundation of wanting to communicate something fun or interesting to the audience, we are now attracting non-Japanese people to be a part of it.
Namba Grand Kagetsu in Osaka, where Yoshimoto Kogyo funded its first comedy theater in 1912.
'Trying to describe Japanese comedy is difficult, as there are many genres. There could be traditional stand-up or sketches. However, in the case of the two-people setup in Japan, that is called manzai (shown below). It was also established as a style of comedy during the 1920s and 1930s. This was really also created by comedians from Yoshimoto Kogyo. In some ways, much of modern Japanese comedy could be synonymous with Yoshimoto Kogyo. To explain to a non-Japanese audience, it is basically two people working together. Like any comedy, it is all about tension, and when that tension is eased.
'Outside of Japan, you tend to have the straight man and funny man setup. However, in the Japanese setup, those roles are interchangeable. This partly comes from a recent competition for comedians called the M-1 Grand Prix that started back in 2001; there are also lots of other comedy competitions like that here. Each pair in the competition would try and discuss a strategy on how to win and hone their skills to differentiate themselves from other competitors as well as improve on their comedic abilities, that kind of specific competition culture. However, what changed is that at some point, becoming a comedian was something that people in Japan actually aspired to. Not to mention that if you did well, you could earn a lot of money. This meant many people started to want to be comedians, which fed into that culture of competition. In that sense, the competitions and the increased desire to become comedians really evolved this style of comedy, with each pair of comedians representing their own unique style. All of this also increased the quality and standard of comedy here.'
One of the other challenges, apart from language, is that culture and humor are very closely related. This is not something that has been lost on Okamoto though.
'As you pointed out, wherever you go, comedy is always related to the culture it came from. That means a lot of its appeal comes from the fact you also live there. Now, we are looking beyond Japan, whether our comedians can target a local audience or if there is a specific character that works. So, comedians who are looking to go outside of Japan are thinking of that.'
In more recent years, comedy has come under fire for being insensitive and inciting scandals. However, the approach taken by Yoshimoto Kogyo is an interesting one, as Okamoto explains.
'For issues regarding potentially scandalous comments from comedians, instead of the company controlling their output, we are taking the approach of educating these comedians and also as a company studying what's acceptable and what's not in each country. The bottom line is that each talent wants to delight the audience and make them laugh; in that sense, their intent is not to offend. What's more, these days, the talent is aware of what may be acceptable and what isn't through their own information gathering.
The manzai comedian duo 'Downtown' (Left: Hitoshi Matsumoto Right: Masatoshi Hamada).
'At the same time, there are sensibilities that are hard to gain while living in Japan, particularly those related to racial differences or religious context. With that in mind, to create content that delights people and makes them laugh, we also have each of our staff give lectures and orientation classes to our talent. In short, our emphasis is more on education rather than prohibition.
'To answer whether this approach is part of Yoshimoto Kogyo's long-term success, I would say that it's probably a part of it, yes. Take idols in Japan, for instance; they will be made up a certain way and told to do this or not do that. It's quite strict. Whereas at Yoshimoto Kogyo's comedian, what we want to provide is laughter and humor, so each talent is the one that comes up and thinks about what could work and what may not. In that sense, what we as a company want to give them is an environment where they can think further and just keep pace but push forward. We want to give that kind of support structure, with part of that being a theater that they use here to showcase their thinking and skills.
'It's more about the talent coming up themselves; they aren't hired and then honed into something. The judges of their work are ultimately the audience. So when they come to us, they want to differentiate themselves from other talent on how they communicate and make people laugh. If the audience likes them, they get bigger and bigger in terms of popularity. That's how it works.'
Moving Japanese comedy towards an international audience is also something that Yoshimoto Kogyo is keenly focused on.
'On the international audience for Japanese comedy, as a company, we want to find a way to reach them in some way. So, while the talent is funny here in Japan, how do we communicate that to a non-Japanese audience. That's the challenge and what we want to work out.
'There is always the issue of language because the performer and the audience will need that commonality. So, if the audience doesn't dismiss it on account of the language barrier (as in subtitles), then that would be great.
'We talked about actual comedians in Japan, but Yoshimoto Kogyo is also working on the content side as well. We've created a comedy show format, such as Documental, known internationally as LOL: Last One Laughing; these are formats that individual talents created. Moreover, from now on, this type of content has been internationally localized in more than 20 countries. We're hoping that, in time, it will integrate cultural elements from other countries as well.
'In total, Yoshimoto Kogyo has over six thousand talents, including obviously non-comedians, but these people are thinking daily about something funny or delightful. So, if just a few more people were to become a part of their audience and their life and understood to be somebody funny, then that would be brilliant. From now on, there will be a lot more of these talents wanting to try their work abroad. If those people internationally could get to know them, that would be wonderful. That's my hope from our side to the international audience. So, after the success of Japanese anime internationally, we hope Japanese comedy will be next.'
Follow me on X, Facebook and YouTube. I also manage Mecha Damashii and am currently featured in the Giant Robots exhibition currently touring Japan.