image source: Geek Crusade
Tan Kheng Hua has never thought about acting in her youth until she went to the United States to get her University education. While pursuing her studies, Tan enrolled herself in a theatrical art course, which gave her the first taste of acting. Although her desire to be an actress was very strong, she did not make acting a career immediately after she returned to Singapore. Instead, she took up a marketing job and acted in her spare time.
Tan started out in corporate marketing after she graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree from Indiana University. The first stage play she performed in was John Bowen’s The Waiting Room directed by her cousin Ivan Heng. It took almost a decade before Tan became a full-time actress. Tan worked on her new creations – a teen musical for the stage as well as a new 13-part Channel 8 television drama series Mr And Mrs Kok which debuted on 26 November 2009. Since 2000, Tan has been producing and creating projects for theatre and television and in April 2017, she joined the cast of the Warner Bros film Crazy Rich Asians, also starring Constance Wu.
Chin Han
image source: Deen of Geek
Ng Chin Han (born November 27, 1969), usually credited as just Chin Han, is a Singaporean actor of stage, film, and television whose career has spanned more than 20 years. Named one of Asia’s 25 greatest actors of all time by CNNGo alongside stars like Japan’s Toshiro Mifune and India’s Amitabh Bachchan and nominated for Variety’s Asian Star of the Year Award in 2013, Chin Han’s 20-year career has spanned many international theatres, television and film projects.
He appeared in The Dark Knight as Lau, and in Roland Emmerich’s 2009 film 2012 as Tenzin. Chin Han appeared in the film Restless as Dr. Lee in 2011, followed by a turn in Steven Soderbergh’s movie Contagion as epidemiologist Sun Feng. In 2012 he guest starred in the Fringe episode “Making Angels” as Neil, and later played Chinese envoy Zheng Min in the final four episodes of ABC’s Last Resort. Chin Han receive critical acclaim for his memorable role as Chancellor Jia Sidao in the Netflix series Marco Polo for The Weinstein Company and he also appeared in Ghost In The Shell and Skyscraper.
Jake Macapagal
image source: Out There magazine
Jake Macapagal was born in Manila, Philippines. He moved to Germany at the age of 27 and resided in Europe for 10 years. He is an Acting Coach and has been busy training actors since 2009. He proceeded to study at the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Sydney in 2010 for a certificate.
He starred in many local and International theatre productions for over 35 years. In 2007, he collaborated with film students and helped them defend their thesis which led him to make his first Acting Reel. Jake eventually became active in the Independent Film Industry in Manila. Jake Macapagal was nominated at The British Independent Film Awards as Most Promising Newcomer for 2013 for the BAFTA nominated film “Metro Manila”.
Joe Taslim
image source: kumparan.com
Johannes Taslim or Joe Taslim (born 23 June 1981) is an Indonesian model, actor, and former Judo athlete. He became well known in the 2012 action film The Raid: Redemption. Taslim was born in Palembang, Indonesia, to Maria Goretti and Mardjuki Taslim.
He was exposed to martial arts at an early age. His martial arts training includes Wushu, Judo, Taekwondo, and Pencak Silat. However, he found his passion in Judo and this led to his career as a professional Judo athlete. He won several gold medals in national championships, a gold medal at the 1999 South East Asia Judo championships, and a silver medal at the 2007 Asian Games. Taslim was a member of Indonesia Judo national team from 1997 to 2009 when an injury forced him to retire Actor Career Taslim is active as a model and actor, appearing in magazines, TV commercials, and several Indonesian feature films.
In 2010, Taslim won the role of Jaka, a sergeant in a special police squad, in the award-winning The Raid: Redemption, after a series of impressive fight auditions and reading. Following The Raid, Taslim took part in HBO Asia’s first action horror, Dead Mine, which had a theatrical release in selected Asian territories in September 2012, followed by exclusive television premieres across the HBO Asia network.
In July 2012, Variety reported that Taslim had joined the cast of the 2013 feature film Fast Six. Taslim will play the villainous Jah, a cold-blooded killer who uses his martial arts to fight the film’s protagonists, Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) and Brian O’Conner (Paul Walker). Taslim would be playing in The Night Comes For Us with Iko Uwais and will release this year.
Dustin Nguyen
image source: themortonreport.com
Dustin Tri Nguyen, after moving to the US from Vietnam in 1975, went on to establish himself as one of Hollywood’s premier Asian-American actors coming out of the martial arts world, having starred on such hit TV shows as 21 Jump Street, Seaquest DSV, VIP, as well as feature films like Man With The Iron Fists 2, The Rebel, Finishing The Game with director Justin Lin, Gentle and the critically acclaimed film Little Fish opposite Academy Award-winner Cate Blanchett.
This very performance earned him the 2007 Asian Excellence Award for Best Supporting Actor in a feature film. Dustin has garnered several awards in his career including the Leonardo Da Vinci Horse Award for Best Supporting Actor at the 2015 Milan International Film Festival for Gentle, numerous Golden Kite Awards, the Golden Lotus Award for Best Actor as well as the Golden Rooster Award for Favorite International Actor in The Legend Is Alive.
In recent years, Dustin has transitioned to directing and producing films under Vietnam-based Dreamscape DBS with his producer and wife, Bebe Pham. His directorial debut, Once Upon A Time In Vietnam, a fantasy martial arts drama he also wrote, was picked up by Lionsgate, which he followed with the movie Jackpot in 2015 for which he won 3 Golden Kite Awards (Vietnam’s highest cinematic award) for Best Picture, Best Actress and Best Screenplay in 2016, in addition to People’s Choice Award for Best Film of 2015. Most recently he directed the film I’ll Wait (2016), which won several awards from the Film Association of Vietnam: Best Picture, Best Actor and Best Actress. Currently, Dustin is directing the Richard Wenk written action film, The Last Mission with producers Arthur Sarkissian and Bruno Wu.
Daw Win Min Than
image source: whosdatedwho.com
Just in case you didn’t know, Daw Win Min Than is the first Myanmar actress to star in Hollywood film. She grew up in Rangoon when Burma was part of the British Raj. She was the daughter of a government official. When the Japanese occupied Burma during World War II, the family fled to India. Until she was 14 years old, she attended a convent school, where she learned English.
In 1951, the family sent her to London, where she Marie Rambert’s dance school, but she quickly realized she was no dancer and soon returned to Burma, where she married the famous politician Bo Setkya (Thakin Aung Than), who was almost 20 years her senior.
In 1954, a friend of American director Robert Parrish visited her home and took a photograph of her, which he sent to Parrish. Parrish was at the time planning the filming of H.E. Bates’ novel “The Purple Plain” and needed an Asian actress for the lead role. Seeing her picture, he realized she would be perfect and flew to Burma to convince her to accept the role, although she had no previous acting experience.
After the UK premiere in September 1954, she was convinced to come to the US in the spring of 1955 to help promote the film. While there, she received several offers of film roles, but declined them all, stating that a film career would conflict with her role as wife; and after a few weeks she returned to Burma and her husband and never acted again. The military coup in 1962 forced the couple to flee to Bangkok, Thailand, where her husband died in 1969.