Person Details

Birthday:

Aliases: 若林 映子 , Акико Вакабаяси

Gender: Female

Place of birth: Ota, Tokyo Prefecture, Japan

Homepage:

Movie Involvements: 12

TV Involvements: 0


Most Famous Work

Biography

Akiko Wakabayashi (born December 13, 1939 in Ōta, Tokyo) is a Japanese actress, best known in English-speaking countries for her role as Bond girl, Aki in the 1967 James Bond movie You Only Live Twice. Prior to this, she made many movies in her native Japan, especially Toho Studio's monster movies such as Dagora, the Space Monster and Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (both of which were also released under various other titles). When production of You Only Live Twice began, Wakabayashi was originally slated to play the role of Kissy Suzuki whilst her co-star Mie Hama played Suki, one of Tiger Tanaka's top agents. When learning English proved to be a major hurdle to Hama, the women switched roles, with Hama now playing the smaller part of Kissy and Wakabayashi playing the larger part of Suki. Wakabayashi, as Aki in the movie You Only Live Twice. At her suggestion, the character of Suki was renamed to Aki. This is probably partly because[citation needed] in 1966, Woody Allen took the Japanese action film International Secret Police: Key of Keys (in which both Mie Hama and Wakabayashi starred), re-edited, re-dubbed, re-plotted, and renamed it What's Up, Tiger Lily?. In the film, Wakabayashi's character was "Suki Yaki" whereas her You Only Live Twice co-star Hama played "Teri Yaki". Wakabayashi made only one more film (and a guest TV appearance) before disappearing from both the big and small screen. In an interview in G-FAN magazine (No. 76), Wakabayashi said she retired from acting due to injuries sustained while making a movie. Description above from the Wikipedia article Akiko Wakabayashi, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Most Famous Work

You Only Live Twice
Average
7

You Only Live Twice

(1967) Aki
Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster
Average
7

Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster

(1964) Mas Selina Salno
King Kong vs. Godzilla
Average
7

King Kong vs. Godzilla

(1963) Tamiye (uncredited)
When a Woman Ascends the Stairs
Average
8
Dogora
Average
7

Dogora

(1964) Gang Moll
The Beast Shall Die
Average
6

The Beast Shall Die

(1959) Hostess at the Rollita B
The Thin Line
Average
7

The Thin Line

(1966) Sayuri Sugimoto
Adventure in Kigan Castle
Average
6

Adventure in Kigan Castle

(1966) Spuria, Chamberlain's daughter

Acting

Year Character Movie/Tv
2006 Aki (archive footage)
2002 Aki (archive footage) (uncredited)
1972 N/A
1968 N/A
1967 Aki
1966 Suki Yaki
N/A
Spuria, Chamberlain's daughter
Sayuri Sugimoto
1965 Bai-Lan
1964 Mas Selina Salno
Girl Taken at Haneda
Gang Moll
Shizuko Nagata
1963 Yaya's maid
N/A
Tamiye (uncredited)
1962 N/A
N/A
N/A
Tamiye
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
1961 Midori
Anna Suh
Akiko
1960 N/A
Hostess
1959 Hostess at the Rollita B
1958 N/A
Year Character Movie/Tv

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