Anna Sawai

Anna Sawai is an actress and singer, born in Wellington, New Zealand, on June 11, 1992. She moved to Japan at the age of 10 with her family, which is where her acting career began.

When Sawai was 11 years old, she landed her first acting role in the 2004 Nippon TV adaptation of Annie. She later made her film debut in the 2009 martial arts film Ninja Assassin. In 2013, her music career took off in Japan when she became one of the lead vocalists in the J-Pop music group Faky. In 2018, she left the girl group to continue her acting career and landed supporting roles in the Japanese film Colors and the British film Giri/Haji.

Her international rise to fame came with her roles in F9, the ninth film in the Fast & Furious franchise, and her role in Pachinko on Apple TV+. She later received more recognition for her role in the MonsterVerse series Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, which aired in 2023.

She received greater recognition for her portrayal of Mariko in the FX drama, Shōgun, which earned her an Emmy, Golden Globe and Screen Actor’s Guild Award for best actress in a drama.