Cocorico

Cocorico (ココリコ, Kokoriko), is a Japanese comedy duo (kombi) consisting of Endō Shōzō (遠藤 章造) and Tanaka Naoki (田中 直樹). They are best known for making up the cast of the popular and long-running variety show, Downtown no Gaki no Tsukai ya Arahende!!.

Members

 * Born July 13, 1971 in Toyonaka, Osaka. Plays the tsukkomi.
 * Born April 26, 1971 in Toyonaka, Osaka. Plays the boke but is the leader, and writes all of their material.
 * Dynamite Shikoku - Endō's alter-ego

Style
Cocorico has a concept of two opposite people. While Endo has a ordinary, but, at the same time, cool man persona, talkative, who can sing well but has terrible acting skills, Tanaka is a clumsy, overdramatic and fearful man, but at the same time is cute and kind and is the acting genius of the duo.

Opposite to most of Japanese comedy duos, Cocorico hasn't an exaggerated style of comedy.

Their main speciality is conte, a style of performance focusing on telling interesting tales, many of which, one must assume, are made up for the sake of humour.

In Gaki no Tsukai, Cocorico are treated like junior comedians, although they are actually veterans.

History
Both were born and raised in 1971 in Toyonaka, Osaka. They were classmates during elementary and middle school. They were part of their school's baseball club. Endo was a pitcher and Tanaka a catcher.

After their graduation, Endō was a salesman of office equipment in Takamatsu, Kagawa, but he quit. Aspiring to become a comedian, he moved to Tokyo and invited Tanaka, who was a design student in Osaka, to make a comedy duo.

Different from the most of Japanese comedians, who studied at comedy schools before debuting, Endō and Tanaka had not had any mentoring, so they were looking for a way to debut. Watching an announcement on TV, they participated in the audition for Yoshimoto Kōgyō Batamon Club, which they passed at the first attempt, and started the duo naming themselves originally as "Cocorico Bombers". But later, they were advised by Kōji Kato (Gokuraku Tonbo) to shorten their name to their current one.

At 1994 Cocorico had their first movie appearance as the main characters of ''Yankee Gurentai Nanbo no Monjai! 2. From the same year, Cocorico started to appear on popular variety shows as Waratte Itomo!! and Vocabula Tengoku''. Cocorico also worked many times since their early days with the veteran comedy duo Utchan Nanchan.

At 1995, Cocorico appeared for the first time at Gaki no Tsukai as contestants on a comedy competition. And at 1997, February, 9, Endō and Tanaka became part of the regular cast until nowadays. Between these events, Cocorico worked as openers of the manzai shows of Downtown at Gaki no Tsukai. They also made some appearances at the show.

From 1996, the duo started to work at a radio program called Cocorico no Kairaku Shawā Okoku, which was aired at CBC Radio until 1999 and was revived at 2021, September, 2 as a special program to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the CBC Radio.

At 1998 they started to break. The TV appearances started to increase considerably since them, Cocorico also appeared in entertainment magazine covers and made commercials for famous brands like Glico, Hitachi and Coco Store. And they also started to present their own show: Cocorico Ogon Densetsu, broadcast by TV Asahi. It was very succeful, specially considering that it was the first Cocorico show, that had a high TV rating percentage and was aired until 2016, having some changes at the name.

Cocorico started to do solo activities from around 2000 and from 2005 it has begun to increase. They also started to appear in dramas and get major roles at movies.

At 2000's Cocorico's shows like Cocorico Miracle Type and Cocorico Million Kazoku was starting to increase, most of those was broadcast by Fuji TV.

The duo won their first prize at 2001, that was the Entertainment Award from the 39th Golden Arrow. At the same year, Cocorico appeared for the first and only time on a drama called Ashita ga Arusa, along many other popular rookie comedians at that time. Ashita Ga Arusa made Tanaka win his first prize at acting, 29th The Television Drama Academy Awards. He won the New Actor Award. At 2002, Tanaka, for his acting in Minna no Ie, won the 25th Japan Academy Awards as Newcomer of the Year and the Popularity prize, the only category in Japan Academy Awards chosen by popular voting.

On 2000's Endō's popular gag "Ho-ho-hoi" became a real trend. He won the 1st place on a High Tension Series from Gaki no Tsukai with this gag. Endō was also caughting many attention for be a good looking comedian, and frequently he has ranked in high positions at the Yoshimoto Kōgyō's most handsome entertainers rankings.

At 2019 Cocorico was invited to be the hosts of the Tokyo Olympics countdown events.

At November 26, 2021, the duo opened their YouTube channel, called "Cocorico Channel", that's focused in conte. The debut video, "Panda No Shazai Kaiken" (パンダの謝罪会見, panda's apology press conference), surpassed 10.000 views in less than 48 hours.

Trivia
Although Endo and Tanaka were childhood friends, at their early days as a comedy duo their relationship wasn't good. Hosei Tsukitei related that at those times at Gaki no Tsukai backstage had difficulties to talk with Cocorico members when the three were together. Endo and Tanaka didn't liked when Housei talked only to one of them. Their friendship was recovered with the time passing.

Endo married japanese tarento, Chiaki Fujimoto, in July 2002. 6 years later, they divorced in December 2007. They have a daughter, Iroha, born in May 2003. In 2015, he later remarried a woman who was an ex-manager of Tsutomu Sekine. Their first son was born in the summer of 2016.

Tanaka married japanese model Shie Kohinata in 2003 and had two sons, born in 2004 and 2008. According to Kohinata in Waratte Iitomo! they hadn't a dating period before marrying. They later divorced in May 2017 and Tanaka got the custody of the children.

Both of Cocorico members were awarded at the Best Father Yellow Ribbon Awards. Tanaka in 2013 and Endo at 2018.

In 2021, Endo adopted two dogs and named them as "Coco" and "Rico", which is inspired on duo's name.

Present

 * Downtown no Gaki no Tsukai ya Arahende!! (ダウンタウンのガキの使いやあらへんで!!) (Nippon TV, since 1989)

Past

 * DABO Gin (1995/4/3 - 1996/3/25, TV Asahi)
 * Yoshimoto Tōkyō Shin Hatsubai (TBS)
 * UN FACTORY Kabosuke (1995/4 - 1995/9, Fuji TV)
 * Suppadaka Bokujō (1996 - 1998 TV Saitama)
 * Morita Kazuyoshi Awā Waratte Iitomo! (1997/4 - 2006/9, Fuji TV)
 * Nakai Masahiro no Bokura Wa Minna Ikite Iru (1997/10/29 - 1998/9/16, Fuji TV)
 * Shonen Satoru → Chojin Satoru (1997/10 - 1998/3, Fuji TV)
 * Habatake! Penguin (1998/4/15 - 1998/8/26, TBS)
 * Cocorico Oogon Densetsu → Cocorico A-kyu Densetsu → Ikinari! Kogane Densetsu (1998/10/6 - 2016/12/18, TV Asahi)
 * Sata☆Suma (1998/10/31 - 2002/3/23, Fuji TV) - irregular appearance
 * Cocorico Kaijokasai (1998/11 - 1999/10, MBS)
 * Ginga Pikaichi Terebi (1998, MBS)
 * Fujiriko (1999/10/1 - 2002/3/13, Yomiuri TV)
 * Akashiya Mansion Monogatari (1999/10/13 - 2001/9/26, Fuji TV)
 * Cocorico Miracle Type (2001/4/11 - 2007/9/5, Fuji TV)
 * Shijo Saikyo no Mega Hit Karaoke Best 100 Kanpeki ni Utatte 1000-man'en (2000 - 2004, TV Asahi)
 * Taikutsu Kizoku (2003/10 - 2004/3, Fuji TV)
 * Waraido (2005/3/21 - 2007/7/7, MBS)
 * Puroyagu All Star Super Battle (2005 - 2006, Tokai TV)
 * Buchi Nuki (2005/4/4 - 2006/3/24, TV Tokyo)
 * Cocorico Milion Kazoku (2006/4/4 - 2008/12/9, TV Tokyo)
 * Cocorico Gout Temps Miracle Nouveau Type (2006/9/13 - 2007/3/28, Fuji TV)
 * Oto Rico (2007/10/4 - 2008/3/27, Nippon TV)
 * MMM (2008/4 - 2009/3, Yomiuri TV)
 * Shinshun Tsurube Daishin'nen Kai (2009-2011, Fuji TV)
 * Japan International Birdman Rally (2010, Yomiuri TV) - 33rd male moderator
 * Nara≒Deki ~○○Nara××Dekiru Wa Zu~ → Tensai Kids Zeinshuugou Kiminara Dekiru (2017/10/16 - 2018/2/5, TV Asahi)
 * Unmei no Hito Oshi ~Koko de Inkan O Oshimasu Ka?~ (2018/4/12 - 2018/9/27, TV Asahi)
 * Kami Hitoe (2019/4 - 2020/9/21, TV Asahi)

Drama

 * Hamada Masatoshi no Jikken Dorama Heisei Mystery Jiken-bo (1999/03/18, TV Asahi)
 * Ashita ga Arusa (2001/4/21 - 6/30, Nippon TV)
 * Kikiippatsu Dorama Special: Flying Boys (2002/10/0, Fuji TV

Past

 * Cocorico no Kairaku Shawā Okoku (1996/10 - 1999/3, revived in 2021/9/2, CBC Radio)
 * Cocorico no @llnightnippon.com (1999/4 - 2001/3, Nippon Broadcasting System)
 * Cocorico no All Night Nippon Premium (2017/10 - 2017/12, 2018/10 - 2019/3, Nippon Broadcasting System)

Movies

 * Yankee Gurentai Nanbo no Monjai! 2 (1994) - starring, under the name of "Cocorico Bombers"
 * Kishiwada Shōnen Gurentai Yakyū-dan〈Kishiwada Shōnen Yakyū-dan〉(2000) - starring
 * Kishiwada Shōnen Gurentai Chō Tokubetsu-hen I had a dream (2000) - starring
 * Ashita Ga Arusa THE MOVIE (2002)

Dubbing

 * Son of the Mask (2005)

Advertising

 * Pretz (Ezaki Glico)
 * Cocostore
 * POP CHIP (House Shokuhin)
 * Georgia (Coca Cola Japan)
 * Promise (SMBC Consumer Finance)

Music

 * Kanashimi No Yokae (2001/5/23, East West Japan) - under the name of "Endo Shozo to Tanaka-san"

Book

 * Cocorico Miracle Type (2003/3/27, Kadokawa Shoten, ISBN 9784048535847 )

Awards

 * 39th Golden Arrow Award: Performing Arts Award