Sumire Matsubara

, better known mononymously as , is a Japanese actress, singer and fashion model. Early life and education Sumire was born in Japan to entertainers Junichi Ishida and Chiaki Matsubara (1958–2022). Sumire's half-brother is actor Issei Ishida. By the time Sumire was seven years old, her parents had divorced, and she moved from Japan to Hawaii with her mother. Sumire recalled that her mother "would often take me to see musicals, Disney movies, and we would go karaoke together and perform for each other". She enrolled in her school's choir and eventually starred in a Punahou School production of the musical West Side Story. Sumire was accepted to Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she pursued a Bachelor of Fine Arts in musical theater and acting. She later complimented the school's conservatory program but noted that she "did feel some racial discrimination from the people of the town. After being in the school, it was amazing, but something in me was telling me that this place was not the place for me." Following the death of her grandmother in 2010 and the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami in 2011, Sumire returned to Hawaii to live with her mother. She later moved back to Tokyo.