Kazuko Yoshiyuki (吉行和子, Yoshiyuki Kazuko; 9 August 1935 – 2 September 2025) was a Japanese actress, voice actress, and essayist. Having grown up with the burgeoning Japanese film and TV industry during post-war period, her career bridged traditional storytelling with modern cinematic expressions, making her a quintessential figure of her era in Japanese entertainment.

She made her debut on the screen in 1955, and has appeared in more than 60 films, and as well as hundreds of Japanese television dramas. Over her career spanning seven decades, she won a Mainichi Film Award for Best Supporting Actress Award in 1959, as well as a Japan Academy Film & TV Prize for Best Actress for a her role in 1978 film Empire of Passion.

Kazuko Yoshiyuki was born on 9 August 1935 in Tokyo, to the second child and first daughter of Eisuke Yoshiyuki (1906-1940), a Japanese writer, and Aguri Yoshiyuki (1907-2015), a Japanese hairdresser and literary family. She has three siblings: Her oldest brother, Junnosuke Yoshiyuki (1924-1994), a Japanese writer, and her youngest sister, Rie Yoshiyuki (1939-2006), a Japanese poet and writer. Her whole family were from Okayama. Unfortunately, her maternal grandfather and aunt both died from Spanish flu pandemic (1918-1920), just before she was born. Also, in July 1940 when she was 4 or 5, her father, Eisuke died suddenly due to the complications of angina pectoris at the age of 34. Like her mother, Yoshiyuki suffered from asthma since she was two years old, although she was frequently taken as a child to Okayama, where her grandparents lived here, for a change of air. During her childhood, when she was 10 years old, Yoshiyuki and her family were survived from advancing firebombs during Asia-Pacific War in World War II, although she and her family were remains live in Tokyo throughout the war.

In March 1948, at age 13, Yoshiyuki graduated from Bancho Elementary School in Chiyoda Ward, and in 1954, at age 19, she graduated from Joshigakuen Girls High school in Tokyo. Before graduating, she took the entrance exam for Mizushina Institute attached to Mingei Theatre Company. She had no intention of becoming an actress as of yet, but because she was good at drawing and sewing, and she applied hoping to become a costume designer.

In 1955, at age 20, Yoshiyuki started her film and television career as an actress with theatre troupe Gekidan Mingei. In the same year, she made her screen debut in Yukiko, starring Keiko Tsushima (1926-2012). In 1957, Yoshiyuki joined Mingei and made her debut as a leading role of Anne Frank in The Diary of Anne Frank, but after that she was only cast in modest "peasant girl" roles. In 1959, while she's still affiliated with Mingei, Yoshiyuki signed with Nikkatsu. In the same year, she won a Mainichi Film Award for Best Supporting Actress, such as her performances in Nianchan and Sainou Kishitsu.

In early 1960s, Yoshiyuki appeared in three films, such as her portrayal of factory worker in Foundry Town (1962), and Chisako Kayama in Black Straits and Yamaguchi in Father and Daughter Song (both in 1965). In 1966, she appeared in two films, such as the role of Sophie in Junji Kinoshita's A Japanese Called Otto and Yasuko Sakai in Mountains of the Heart. In 1969, at age 33 or 34, Yoshiyuki left from the company and she became as a freelancer.

In early 1970s, Yoshiyuki appeared in 11 major films, such as her portrayal of Sachiko Igarashi in Modern Chivalry Brothers (1970), Mieko Tajima in Re-Armed Gang of Yazuka and Professor Motohashi in I Can Hear My Dad's Voice (both in 1971), Yasuko in Cornered (1972), Aya Tokunaga in Lady Snowblood: Love Song of Vengeance (1974), Head Nurse Noda in Will White Girl (1976), Fusa Hirai in Days Not Returning (1978), Yue Mori in Golden Partner and Masa Takada in God's Baby (both in 1979), and Azuma Michi in Young Wife and Ayako's mother in Father and Mother! (both in 1980).

In 1974, Yoshiyuki won a Kinokuniya Theater Award Individual Prize for her appearance in The Taste of Honey at Shiki Theatre Company in Tokyo.