is a retired Japanese actress.

Career

Wakabayashi is best known in English-speaking countries for her role as

Bond girl A Bond girl is a character who is a love interest or female companion of James Bond in a novel, film or video game. Bond girls occasionally have names that are double entendres or puns, such as Pussy Galore, Plenty O'Toole, Xenia Onatopp, o ...

Aki in the 1967

James Bond The ''James Bond'' series focuses on a fictional British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short-story collections. Since Fleming's death in 1964, eight other authors have ...

film '' You Only Live Twice''. Before this, she had made many films in her native Japan, especially

Toho is a Japanese film, theatre production and distribution company. It has its headquarters in Chiyoda, Tokyo, and is one of the core companies of the Osaka-based Hankyu Hanshin Toho Group. Outside of Japan, it is best known as the producer an ...

Studio's monster films, such as '' Dagora, the Space Monster'' (1964) and ''

Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster is a 1964 Japanese ''kaiju'' film directed by Ishirō Honda, with special effects by Eiji Tsuburaya. Produced and distributed by Toho Co., Ltd., it is the fifth film in the ''Godzilla'' franchise, and was the second ''Godzilla'' film produced ...

'' (1964), both of which were also released under various other titles. In ''Ghidorah'', she played a mystical princess, who could predict the future and was also a prophetess. When production of ''You Only Live Twice'' began, Wakabayashi was slated to play the role of

Kissy Suzuki Kissy Suzuki is a fictional character introduced in Ian Fleming's 1964 ''James Bond'' novel, '' You Only Live Twice''. Despite Bond's womanizing, Kissy Suzuki (at least the literary version) remains the only character known to the reader who bear ...

while her co-star

Mie Hama is a former Japanese actress, television presenter, radio presenter, and author best known for playing Fumiko Sakurai in the 1962 ''Godzilla'' film, ''King Kong vs. Godzilla'', Kissy Suzuki in the 1967 ''James Bond'' film, '' You Only Live Twi ...

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 playing the smaller part of Kissy and Wakabayashi playing the larger part of Suki. At her suggestion, the character of Suki was renamed Aki. They had acted together in ''

King Kong vs. Godzilla is a 1962 Japanese ''kaiju'' film directed by Ishirō Honda, with special effects by Eiji Tsuburaya. Produced and distributed by Toho Co., Ltd, it is the third film in both the ''Godzilla'' and ''King Kong'' franchises, as well as the first T ...

'' (1962) and '' Kokusai himitsu keisatsu: Kagi no kagi'' (1965), from which footage was recut to make Woody Allen's What's Up Tiger Lily?. In 1971, she made an appearance in an episode of ''

Shirley's World ''Shirley's World'' is a television series aired first by ABC during the 1971–72 television season. The sitcom was co-produced by the British ITC Entertainment and American producer Sheldon Leonard, with English producer-director Ray Au ...

''. 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 owing to injuries sustained while making a film.

Selected filmography

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wakabayashi, Akiko 1939 births 20th-century Japanese actresses Actresses from Tokyo Living people People from Ōta, Tokyo