Kill Bill star Shinichi ‘Sonny’ Chiba dead at 82 after Covid and pneumonia battle
KILL Bill actor Shinichi “Sonny” Chiba died on Thursday at the age of 82.
He was best known for playing the sword maker Hattori Hanzo in the Quentin Tarantino action flick and the lead in The Street Fighter franchise.
The pneumonia was reportedly caused by Covid, according to , and Sonny had been in the hospital since August 8.
The Japanese actor's first big international hit was 1974's The Street Fighter, which was dubbed in English and distributed to Western audiences by New Line Cinema.
Sonny went on to make two sequels to the popular flick – Return of the Street Fighter and The Street Fighter's Last Revenge.
In 2003, he played the legendary sword maker Hattori Hanzo in Kill Bill: Vol. 1, after having been mentioned in Quentin's movie True Romance a decade earlier.
A few years later, the actor entered the Fast and Furious franchise as Uncle Kamata in 2006's The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift.
Most recently, he starred in 2017’s Shashin Koshien Summer in 0.5 Seconds, which centered on the National High School Photography Championship Tournament.
In 1970, Chiba started his own training school called the Japan Action Club for for aspiring martial artists, film actors and stunt performers.