Minako Nagai, Akiko Yagi, Eriko Nakamura… Images of “Idol Announcers” who led the ’90s boom

Everything was so different from the old days, I was like Urashima Taro (laughs).

In an interview with “Shukan Josei PRIME” (June 8, 2010), former NTV announcer Minako Nagai described her feelings upon her return to work after 20 years the year before last.

Nagai was the first anchor of “Zipangu Asa 6” with her colleague Aya Sekiya from the spring of 1992, and the ratings were in the 10% range. The show was popular and was known as the “salaryman’s morning dollar. The following year, she formed a unit called “DORA” with fellow station members Mami Yonemori and Masako Yabumoto, and released a single CD.

At Fuji Television, three of their peers, Akiko Yagi, Satsuki Ariga, and Keiko Kono, were popular idols. They led the “female TV announcer” boom of the 1990s.

(TV magazine writer) “FRIDAY” also paid attention to these girls. The magazine also focuses on these women, including an interview with Nagai, who was popular as a “morning doll,” Akiko Yagi’s love affair with Mitsuyoshi Uchimura of “Ucchan Nanchan,” and Eriko Nakamura’s bewitching yukata (summer kimono) ……. We would like to look back on the vivid images of these women who led the TV era along with the spectacular times.

The “Morning Dolls” who wake up at 3:00 a.m. struggle to get up early

Nippon TV’s information program “Zipangu Asa 6” began in March 1992. Although the program started at 5:59 a.m., viewer ratings were in the 10% range. In particular, Minako Nagai, the announcer in charge of Thursday through Friday, was extremely popular at the time. Her small body (158 cm in height) and her bouncy smile attracted the attention of office workers on their way to work. Nagai, however, used to wake up at 3:00 a.m. on days when she was in charge of a TV program. Her daytime and nighttime lives were reversed,

I used to play tennis and ski very hard when I was a student, so I am confident in my physical strength, but I have low blood pressure, so it’s hard for me to get up in the morning. I have two alarm clocks and a timer on the TV.

I have two alarm clocks and a timer on the TV,” she said in an interview at the time, describing her hardships.

Nagai continued to work on the program until 1996, the same year she went freelance. At the age of 36, she married a man she met at the graduate school of media studies, and they had two children. She is now a part-time lecturer at Seijo University, teaches at Nippon TV Academy, and writes essays.

I hope that she will bring back some energy to the fathers of the bubble generation.