Tomoko Munakata is a Japanese actress and voice actor born in Tokyo on January 2, 1942. She pursued higher education at Waseda University, graduating from the First Faculty of Literature with a degree in Japanese Literature. Following her university studies, she trained at the Bungakuza Acting Institute. Her professional career began in theater when she joined the theater company Gekidan Kumo in 1970. She later affiliated with Gekidan Subaru before moving to Dojinsha Productions in 1980. In 1993, she transferred to Office Kaoru, where she remained a member until 2009.

Munakata possesses a mezzo-soprano vocal range. She became particularly renowned for her extensive work in dubbing foreign films and television series, a field in which she was exceptionally active from the 1970s through the 1980s. Her dubbing credits are numerous and include providing the Japanese voice for Domino in the 1965 film Thunderball, and for Francine Parker in the 1979 horror film Zombie. She also voiced the title role in a Japanese dub of the 1948 film Joan of Arc.

In anime, Munakata has played a wide variety of roles across several decades. In line with her extensive dubbing career, she also took on roles in anime adaptations of Western literature. She is well known for her performance as Annie Errol, the mother of the protagonist, in the 1988 Nippon Animation World Masterpiece Theater series Little Lord Fauntleroy. She voiced the role of Emily Clagg in the 1990 film Hashire! Shiroi Ōkami. She also played maternal figures in other productions, such as the Mother in the 1991 film Shirahata no Shōjo Ryūko, Mowgli's mother in the 1989 series Jungle Book: Shōnen Mowgli, and the mother of the character Takuto in the 1992 OVA Zetsuai 1989.

Her filmography also includes the role of Chiyo Yoshizaki in the 1986 movie Aoi Kioku - Manmō Kaitaku to Shōnen-tachi and O-Ren Aikawa in a segment of the 1986 television series Seishun Anime Zenshu. She was the narrator for the 1991 anime series Himitsu no Hanazono. She portrayed Haru Kitajima in both the 1984 and the 2005 television adaptations of Glass Mask. Among her other notable anime roles are Neese in the 1990 Record of Lodoss War OVA, Jublues in the 1987 series Anime Sanjushi, and Trio's mother in the 1981 special Bremen 4: Angels in Hell. Her career continued into the late 2000s with a guest role as the Abbess in the 2007 series El Cazador de la Bruja.