| Yui Aragaki Biography |
Yui Aragaki (新垣結衣) was born on June 11, 1988 in Naha, Okinawa, Japan. She is a Ryukyuan model, actress, seiyū and occasional radio show host. She is a well-loved Japanese idol.
She is popularly known as Gakky (ガッキー Gakkī), a nickname given by Ayako Enomoto in 2001.
Because of her fashion sense and logical personality, she gained a large fanbase in and out of Japan. Her beauty is well-regarded in her home country, being considered as one of the local celebrities who possess beautiful faces.
Along with U-20 idol Maki Horikita, she is regarded as one of the most prominent actresses in Japan who are below twenty years of age.
Aragaki was very shy as a child. Until now she is shy around strangers, which is uncommon for most celebrities who appear on-screen as outgoing personalities. She and then-popular U-15 idol Ishida Miku belonged to the same agency. They even lived in the same dormitory while debuting in Tokyo.
After seeing an audition notice for the junior fashion magazine nicola, Aragaki applied for and won the Grand Prix award for the audition. After that, she became a model for the said magazine or popularly called as a nicomo.
In 2004 she put her modeling in nicola on hold to expand her current modeling career into gravure, appearing on variety shows, and acting.
Came 2005, she officially graduated from the magazine. The same year, she was in the TBS drama Dragon Zakura. This began her entrance into the acting world and she has gone on to appear in other shows since. Even though she has graduated from nicola, she still appears in the magazine occasionally.
Currently, Aragaki holds the record for most covers of nicola at 15 covers.
She constantly appears in TV commercials every now and then, her Pocky commercials being the most popular ones.
Just recently, Aragaki made her singing debut. The ballad called Memories , the theme song for her first lead role movie, Koisuru Madori, marked the beginning of her career as a singer. She will also release a song called "Heavenly Days" for the movie "Koizora". It is confirmed that Aragaki will be releasing an album on December 5th, 2007 and will perform a debut performance in Budoukan. If this event pushes through, she would be the third song artist to debut in the said location. Aragaki's situation where an album is to be released before a single is very rare to female idols like her.
Besides modeling, acting and singing, Aragaki occasionally hosts a segment in the radio show, SCHOOL OF LOCKS!. GIRLS LOCKS!, the segment where certain young female idols switch slots in hosting, is also hosted by the likes of Maki Horikita, Nana Eikura and Erika Toda.
She debuted as a singer after releasing her debut album "Sora" on December 5, 2007. The album features two songs, "Memories" and "heavenly days", which she sang as theme songs for movies she starred in. She had her first live concert taken place at Nippon Budoukan on December 22, 2007. She will not participate in singing at the 58th Annual Kōhaku Uta Gassen, but she will attend as a guest judge along with actress Aoi Miyazaki and 9 people who took an active part in 2007.
On February 12, 2008, she was awarded the New Actor Award of the 50th Blue Ribbon award. She has already been awarded with 5 different new actor awards for starring in three movies in 2007 (Koisuru Madori, Waru Boro, and Koizora).
(Source: Wikipedia, www.wikipedia.com)
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