from http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060725/...mo/obit_mako_1

LOS ANGELES - Mako, the Japan-born actor who used his Oscar nomination for the 1966 film "The Sand Pebbles" to push for better roles for Asian American actors, has died. He was 72.

Mako, whose birth name was Makoto Iwamatsu, died Friday of esophageal cancer at his home in Somis, California, said Tim Dang, artistic director of East West Players, the Asian American theater company Mako co-founded in 1965.

"With Mako's passing, there is a great feeling of loss in the Asian Pacific artist community," Dang said. "We have lost a pioneer who helped pave the way for all of us trying to make a career in the arts and the entertainment industry."

In an acting career that spanned more than four decades, Mako, who was born in Kobe, Japan in 1933, was a familiar face in film and television, sometimes playing roles that stereotyped Asians. His TV roles included appearances on "I Spy," "MASH," "and "Walker, Texas Ranger."

In films, he was a Japanese admiral in 2001's "Pearl Harbor," a Singaporean in 1997's "Seven Years in Tibet," and played Akiro the wizard in "Conan the Barbarian" and "Conan the Destroyer" with
Arnold Schwarzenegger.

On Broadway, his multiple roles as reciter, shogun, emperor and an American businessman in Stephen Sondheim's 1976 musical "Pacific Overtures" earned him a Tony Award nomination for best actor in a musical.

His portrayal of a Chinese coolie in "The Sand Pebbles," starring Steve McQueen, earned him a best supporting actor Oscar nomination in 1967.
That's a shame. I'm going to miss him. He played some memorable characters and had a very distinctive voice.