Ninako is a Los Angeles native whose love for the stage began with training in Vaganova ballet, and eventually broadened into other dance styles and performance art forms. 

 

She moved to New York in the fall of 2021 and shortly therafter made her Broadway debut the following winter with the original Broadway company of A Beautiful Noise as a swing and dance captain. It's been an uphill dream from then on -- appearing in Pirates! The Penzance Musical, and most recently understudying Laura Bell Bundy and Kara Lindsey in Romy and Michele. She has performed at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, PBS's A Capital Fourth, The Today Show, and twice at the Tony Awards.

 

Ninako is half Japanese and deeply rooted in her culture --- she spent much of her childhood hopping back and forth between her maternal grandmother's house in Kobe and her hometown in LA. When she's not performing, she likes cooking (and eating), listening to true crime podcasts, watching Judge Judy, and drinking a salt-rimmed margaritas in a pool. She likes to act tough, but she stops to pet people's dogs and cries at sunsets.