is a Japanese voice actress and a former singer. Hasegawa started her career as a member of the

idol Idol or Idols may refer to: Religion and philosophy * Cult image, a neutral term for a man-made object that is worshipped or venerated for the deity, spirit or demon that it embodies or represents * Murti, a point of focus for devotion or medit ...

girl group A girl group is a music act featuring several female singers who generally harmonize together. The term "girl group" is also used in a narrower sense in the United States to denote the wave of American female pop music singing groups, many of who ...

NGT48 NGT48 (read "N.G.T. Forty-eight") is a Japanese girl group produced by Yasushi Akimoto. NGT48 is named after Niigata City of Niigata Prefecture, where the group is based. The group performs at the NGT48 Theater which is located in the fourth fl ...

in 2015, debuting as a regular member of the group's Team NIII. In 2018, she was transferred to Team G, which later merged with Team NIII to become a unified first generation in 2019. On May 18, 2019, she left the group to pursue voice acting.

Early life

From her fourth year in elementary school to her third year in middle school, Hasegawa played baseball on a co-ed team, in which she served as second baseman. After leaving the school's baseball club, she subsequently joined into the track and field group, where she received offers from over 10 different schools as a result of her achievements.

Career

Music career

Hasegawa auditioned for

AKB48 AKB48 (pronounced ''A.K.B. Forty-Eight'') is a Japanese idol girl group named after the Akihabara (''Akiba'' for short) area in Tokyo, where the group's theater is located. AKB48's producer, Yasushi Akimoto, wanted to form a girl group with it ...

's then-upcoming Niigata-based sister group,

, having been fascinated with idols after she watched ''

AKB0048 ''AKB0048'' (stylized as ''AKB∞48'') is a 2012 Japanese science fiction musical comedy anime television series based on the Japanese idol, idol group AKB48. The anime is produced by Satelight, with Shōji Kawamori as chief director. The firs ...

''. After passing the audition for the group's first generation on July 25, 2015, at the opening show of NGT48's theater on January 10, 2016, she debuted as a regular member of the newly established Team NIII. As part of

, she subsequently made her major label debut on April 12, 2017, with the single "

Seishun Dokei is the first single by Japanese idol girl group NGT48. It was released on April 12, 2017. It reached number-one on the weekly Oricon Singles Chart with 160,271 copies sold. It was also number-one on the Billboard Japan Hot 100 The ''Bi ...

." In 2018, Hasegawa appeared in the live-action film adaptation of the novel ''Midnight Bus''. She was later transferred to the group's newly established Team G. She also participated in the South Korean reality competition series, ''

Produce 48 ''Produce 48'' () was the third season of the South Korean reality competition series ''Produce 101''. It was a large-scale project in which the public "produces" a girl group by voting for members out of a pool of 96 contestants from South Kor ...

'', representing NGT48 with Team NIII's Noe Yamada. Hasegawa was eliminated during the first round and finished at 71st place. In 2019, after Team G co-captain Maho Yamaguchi was forced by the NGT48 management to apologize for publicly alleging that she was assaulted in December 2018, Hasegawa removed "NGT48" off her social media profiles to show support. The NGT48 management responded by merging Team NIII and Team G together into a "first generation" group, with their final performances as their original teams on April 21, 2019. During Team G's performance on April 21, Hasegawa, along with Riko Sugahara, announced her decision to graduate from NGT48 in solidarity with Yamaguchi. Hasegawa held a final performance with Yamaguchi and Sugahara on May 18, 2019.

Voice acting career and other post-graduation activities

During Hasegawa's graduation speech, she announced she was pursuing voice acting. On June 10, 2019, Hasegawa announced that she signed with Crocodile Ltd. with the help of

Yasushi Akimoto is a Japanese record producer, lyricist, and television writer, best known for creating and producing some of Japan's top idol groups, Onyanko Club and the AKB48 franchise. Total sales of the singles he has written exceed 100 million copies, maki ...

. She took voice acting lessons from the sound company BloomZ. She was first assigned as the PR reporter for the second season of ''

Dropkick on My Devil! is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yukiwo. The series began serialization in Flex Comix's ''Comic Meteor'' web magazine in April 2012. Twenty volumes have been released as of December 2022. An anime television series ada ...

'' and later made her voice acting debut as Konomi Seki on ''Sapporo Otome Gohan''. Since its inception in 2019, Hasegawa also participated in the cross-media project ''Idol Bu Show'', playing the part of the character Kokoro Kakegawa in the correlated radio drama shows and events, among other things, and taking part in the productions of two CD albums as part of the in-story unit X-UC: ''Current Xanadu'', released on January 8, 2020, and ''Papier Mache Idol'', released on October 7, 2020. This was later followed up in with yet another participation, announced in June 2020, in another cross-media project: ''Denonbu'', produced by

Bandai Namco also known as the Bandai Namco Group and generally Bandai Namco, is a Japanese multinational holding company, production enterprise and entertainment conglomerate headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, formed from the merger of Bandai and Namco on S ...

. In it, Hasegawa plays the role of the character Shian Inubousaki. As a

Vtuber A , or , is an online entertainer who uses a virtual avatar generated using computer graphics. Real-time motion capture software or technology are often—but not always—used to capture movement. The digital trend originated in Japan in the mid- ...

, ever since 2019 Hasegawa has been providing voice and

movements Movement may refer to: Common uses * Movement (clockwork), the internal mechanism of a timepiece * Motion, commonly referred to as movement Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * "Movement" (short story), a short story by Nancy Fu ...

for the official

mascot A mascot is any human, animal, or object thought to bring luck, or anything used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, professional sports team, society, military unit, or brand name. Mascots are also used as fi ...

of the

Daiei , based in Kobe, is one of the largest supermarket chains in Japan. In 1957, Isao Nakauchi founded the chain in Osaka near Sembayashi Station on the Keihan train line. Daiei is now under a restructuring process supported by Marubeni Corporation ...

supermarket group, Mokkun, in the children educational videos published regularly on the mascot's YouTube channel. A native of

Tainai 270px, Tulip fields in Tainai is a city located in Niigata Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 28,495 in 10,821 households, and a population density of 110 persons per km2 (288/sq mi). The total area of the city was . Ge ...

, Hasegawa had been serving since September 2019 also as a tourism PR ambassador for the city to engage in promotional campaigns and events for it, with her appointment being renewed over the subsequent years.

Discography

Songs within NGT48

Songs within Idol Bu Show

Songs within Denonbu

Songs within Tokyo 7th Sisters

Filmography

Live-action

Radio

Television

Theater

Film

Voice acting

Television anime

Anime movies

Video games

Movie dubbing

Drama series dubbing

Cross-media productions

Photobooks

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hasegawa, Rena 21st-century Japanese actresses 2001 births Japanese film actresses Japanese voice actresses Voice actresses from Niigata Prefecture Living people NGT48 members Produce 48 contestants VTubers