BEIJING - In her white sneakers, Sola Aoi tiptoes through the Beijing studio as if she were wearing 20-centimetre-high heels. Every finger nail is covered with a different combination of rhinestones, glitter and plastic.
This 1.55-metre-tall actress can only do cute. Or maybe she has just played the role for so long.
The 30-year-old Japanese is a celebrity icon in China. She has her own branded collection of ladies' under-things.
She began her career 10 years ago as a porno star in her Japanese homeland, and later won film roles in South Korea and Indonesia as her fame spread through Asia.
As a media personality, her style is her brand. She has 15 million followers on Weibo, China's version of Twitter, quite an accomplishment, even in a country with a billion people.
"I don't know either why people find me so great," she told dpa, describing herself as a low-brow dolly bird. That however has been precisely the key to her success.
"She was something of a teacher for us," a 25-year-old man says, in a bid to explain her cult status among teens and young adults in China.