Toshio Suzuki
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| Toshio Suzuki |
Toshio Suzuki (鈴木敏夫 Suzuki Toshio?) is a long-time colleague of Hayao Miyazaki and a former CEO of Studio Ghibli. As a producer and an executive managing director at the studio, Suzuki has been a driving force behind the studio's success. According to Miyazaki, "If it were not for Mr. Suzuki, there wouldn't have been Studio Ghibli."
Born on 19 August 1948 in Aichi prefecture, Suzuki graduated from Keio University with a bachelor of arts degree in 1972. Suzuki joined Tokuma Publications and eventually became editor of the company's animation magazine Animage. He and Miyazaki met when Miyazaki began to serialise the Nausicaa manga in the magazine in 1982. Suzuki then became one of the committee members to make Nausicaa into a motion picture, and he has since been involved in all the Ghibli movies. He later became the chief editor at Animage, and in 1989 he officially moved to Studio Ghibli. He has produced all the Ghibli movies since that move. Suzuki also co-produced Ghost in the Shell 2 - Innocence, a film partially funded by Studio Ghibli.
In 2008, Suzuki stepped down as CEO of the studio, and was succeeded by former Disney Japan executive Koji Hoshino. Suzuki continued at the studio, producing films and sitting on the studio's board of directors as an executive managing director. In 2014 Suzuki stepped down from his producer duties at the studio, assuming a new position as "general manager." Yoshiaki Nishimura has assumed day-to-day producing duties at the studio.