Who is Akiko Wakabayashi?

Akiko Wakabayashi became one of Japan's most popular actresses of their cinema's "Golden Age", ranking with actresses Kumi Mizuno and Mie Hama. One of her first films was Akiko (1961), which was named after her. Interestingly, the movie title shares both her real and character names. Her career took off when she came to Toho Studios, appearing in a host of sci-fi films, including that of the sexy gangster moll in Uchû daikaijû Dogora (1964) and the bewitching alien-possessed princess in San Daikaijû Chikyû Saidai no Kessen (1964). However, in the Western Cinema, she is probably best-known for her role as Bond girl "Aki" in the 007 epic, You Only Live Twice (1967), appearing alongside actor Sean Connery. When production of the 007 film began, Wakabayashi was originally chosen to play Bond girl "Kissy Suzuki" and her co-star, Mie Hama, is to play Bond girl "Suki". As Hama had a difficult time mastering the English language, the two actresses switched roles. In addition, Wakabayashi suggested her character name be Aki instead of Suki.

In the late 1960s to early 1970s, Japan's movie industry experienced an economic slump, which resulted in severe budget cuts. During that time, Wakabayashi made a rather abrupt end to her acting career, and has never been seen on the big screen since. Whether or not the economic slump played a factor, Wakabayashi remains one of the most memorable actresses of Japan, especially to Toho Studios' sci-fi fandom.

Overview

Nicknames
Akiko, Eiko Wakabayashi, Kiko Wakabayashi

Trivia

  • Along with Mie Hama, Wakabayashi was one of the first Asian "Bond Girls", when the two of them appeared in 1967's You Only Live Twice (1967).
  • She and her fellow Japanese co-star Mie Hama didn't speak any English, so the producers from You Only Live Twice (1967) sent them to live separately with English-speaking families in England for three months, where children would talk to them incessantly in English. Akiko picked up the language, but Mie couldn't, so the producers had them switch roles, where Akiko got the dialogue-heavy role of Aki, while Mie's voice would be dubbed by Nikki Van der Zyl.
  • She impressed director Lewis Gilbert, when she learned the English language in just three months for You Only Live Twice (1967). In his 2010 memoir "All my Flashbacks", he wrote: "Akiko was fine. She could not only say the words, she could make sense of them." She became one of the few foreign actresses in the 1960s James Bond films, whose voice wasn't dubbed.
  • She was able to speak bits of Italian and German.