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.