She made her acting debut in 1951. In the 1950s, David Lean had proposed her for the main role in The Wind Cannot Read, which is about a Japanese language instructor in India circa-1943 who falls in love with a British officer, but the project fell through.
Kishi married the French director Yves Ciampi in 1957, and commuted for a while between Paris and Japan to continue her acting career. In 1963 a daughter, Delphine Ciampi, a musician and composer, was born. She divorced her husband in 1975.
Since 1996 she has been a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).