Changing one's career at the age of 46 is no easy task, let alone choosing to become a kabuki performer from scratch.

But for award-winning actor Teruyuki Kagawa, who made his kabuki stage debut May 29 in Tokyo, it is a meaningful journey to rediscover his roots and make up for the decades he never got to spend with his father, kabuki actor Ichikawa Ennosuke III.

Kagawa was born in 1965, the oldest son of Ennosuke and actress Yuko Hama, who divorced when Kagawa was very young.