Nancy Kwan

Nancy Kwan Ka-shen (; born May 19, 1939) is a Chinese-American actress whose career included more than fifty English language film and television roles. Kwan's career coincided with Hollywood's casting of more Asian roles in the 1960s, and she became an Eastern sex symbol in the 1960s.

Biography

Early life

Kwan was born in Hong Kong on May 19, 1939, and grew up in Kowloon Tong district. Kwan's father was Kwan Wing-hong, a Cantonese architect and her mother was Marquita Scott, a White British model of English and Scottish ancestry. Kwan did not have any songs in the musical; the vocals for Linda Low were performed by B. J. Baker. Comparing Suzie Wong and Flower Drum Song, she found the latter much harder because the girl she played was "more go-getter". Her prior ballet education provided a strong foundation for her role in Flower Drum Song, where she had much space to dance. #tag:ref|The film's three-building primary set cost $310,000, spanning 51,000 square feet. Modeled after Grant Avenue in Chinatown, San Francisco, it was up to that point the biggest, most expensive Hollywood sound stage ever designed.

As a Hollywood icon, Kwan lived in a house atop Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles. She drove a white British sports car and danced to Latin music. She enjoyed listening to Johnny Mathis records and reading Chinese history books. Her bob cut in the film drew widespread media attention for the "severe geometry of her new hairstyle". Sassoon's signature bob became known as "the Kwan cut", "the Kwan bob", or just "the Kwan"; photographs of Kwan's new hairstyle appeared in both the American and British editions of Vogue. Ann Lloyd and Graham Fuller wrote in their book The Illustrated Who's Who of the Cinema: "Her Eurasian beauty and impish sense of humor could not sustain her stardom". Her later films were more varied, In December 1963, Pock was constructing a luxury hotel in the Tyrolean Alps. During Christmas of that year, Nancy Kwan visited that location and was able to participate in several pre-1964 Winter Olympics events despite being busy with work. Her contract with film production company Seven Arts led her to travel around the world to film movies. She found the separation from her son, Bernie, who was not yet a year old, difficult. She said, "He's coming into a time when he's beginning to assert his personality." Fair-skinned and blue-eyed, Bernie more strongly resembled his father. #tag:ref|The Tamahine's energetic nature either charms or bedevils her family members. With a libertine's disregard for clothes, Tamahine, an instructor at Hallow school, is welcomed as a guest to the headmaster's quarters. While at the school, she disrobes with no sense of impropriety; similarly when she returns home, she gleefully casts away all her clothing while cavorting into the ocean. Adorned in only a bra and panties, she tosses flowers to her students from her boudoir. Her "high-jinks" cause all the male students and the headmaster to become infatuated with her. The more conservative teachers are angered by those same hijinks. As part of Kwan's role in the film, she fought Sharon Tate's character by throwing a flying kick. Her martial arts move was based not on karate training, but on her background in dance. Author Darrell Y. Hamamoto noted that this "ironically" tweaked Kwan's "dragon-lady role" number by notably replacing Kung Fu with Western dance moves. She married Hollywood screenwriter David Giler in July 1970 in a civil ceremony in Carson City, Nevada. The marriage was Kwan's second and Giler's first. They divorced in 1971.

That year , Kwan returned to Hong Kong with her son because her father was sick. She initially intended to remain for one year to assist him, but ultimately remained for about seven years. She did not stop working, starring as Dr. Sue in the film Wonder Women (1973). While in Hong Kong, Kwan founded a production company, where she played characters in the television series Fantasy Island, Knots Landing and Trapper John, M.D.. Like her first husband Peter Pock, as well as her former fiancé Maximilian Schell, Meisel was Austrian. "I have my Austrian karma," she said in a 2021 interview. "I think it's lifetime."

In a 1993 interview with the St. Petersburg Times, Kwan remarked that her son Bernie was frequently called a "blond, blue-eyed Chinese" because he could speak the language fluently. In 1979, the two returned to the United States because Kwan wanted him to finish his schooling there. Bernie was an actor, a martial artist, and a stunt performer. Bates said their stunt was the "highest 'double drop' ever attempted".

Kwan has sporadically recorded audiobooks. In 2011, she recorded an audiobook for the 1989 memoir When Heaven and Earth Changed Places by Le Ly Hayslip with Jay Wurts. The San Francisco Chronicles Patricia Holt praised Kwan's intonation in her delivery, writing that "Kwan's faint Asian accent and careful pronunciation of Vietnamese words make Hayslip's weaving of her past and present lives a riveting experience".

In 1993, Kwan played Gussie Yang, a "tough-talking, soft-hearted Hong Kong restaurateur", in the fictional Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story. a character based on Seattle restaurateur and political leader Ruby Chow Variety reviewer Julio Martinez praised Kwan for her ability to "flo easily between haughty sophistication and girlish insecurity".

In 1994, an article in the South China Morning Post said that she preserved her "dancer's figure" through the Chinese martial art tai chi and frequent dance sessions.

In 1996, when he was 33, Kwan's son, Bernie, died after contracting AIDS from a girlfriend Kwan had advised him to avoid.

Roger Ebert and his wife Chaz Hammel-Smith gave the thumbs up to Nancy Kwan at the Hawaii International Film Festival on October 20, 2010.Nancy Kwan has appeared on television commercials into the 1990s and appeared in commercials for the cosmetic "Oriental Pearl Cream".

Kwan has been involved in philanthropy for AIDS awareness. In 1997, she published A Celebration of Life – Memories of My Son, a book about her son who died after being infected with HIV. She contributed the profits from both the book and a movie she made about him to support the study of AIDS and the promotion of AIDS awareness. Kwan told The Kansas City Star in 2007 that she had not considered retiring, saying that it leads to trouble. Retirees, she professed, frequently find themselves with nothing to do because they have not readied themselves for it. Kwan said, "I hope I'm working until the day I die. If work is a pleasure, why not?"

Kwan appeared in Arthur Dong's 2007 documentary Hollywood Chinese, where she joined other Chinese luminaries in discussing past accomplishments and future prospects for people of Chinese descent in the movie industry.

Kwan and her husband Norbert Meisel write and direct films about Asian-Americans. Kwan believes that Asians are not depicted in enough films and TV shows. She and her husband have resolved to create their own scripts and films about Asian characters. In Sunshine, Rachel is supported by Kwan, the manager of a jazz club, who knows a secret about her. #tag:ref|Clapp, a professor of urbanism who has travelled frequently to teach in Hong Kong, is from California. The novel's title is a tribute to Wong's Chinese Pidgin English. Main character Marco Podesta is, like Clapp, an urbanism professor. His visit to Hong Kong coincides with the transfer of sovereignty over Hong Kong in 1997. He meets and becomes infatuated with a Chinese girl, Lily. Podesta, while strolling through Sheung Wan, discovers a painting featured in a gallery window. The painting's subject, a Chinese girl, wears a ponytail and cheongsam. To Podesta, she is Suzie Wong. He becomes infatuated with her and meets the painting's artist, Robert Lomax, who is either Suzie Wongs male lead or an insane man. Author Clapp was inspired to write the novel when he was traveling on the Star Ferry in 2000 and saw a young lady's flowing ponytail from behind. He said, "Now, I know there are thousands of women in Hong Kong with ponytails, but somehow the film started rolling in my head and I started to write notes."

Filmography Poster of To Whom It May Concern: Ka Shen's Journey, a 2009 docudrama about the actress.

Film

Television

Awards 1961 Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Drama (Nominated) for The World of Suzie Wong 1961 Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer – Female, shared with Ina Balin and Hayley Mills Golden Ring Award Historymaker for Excellence in the Performing Arts – Chinese American Museum of Los Angeles, California Visionary Award – East West Players, April 28, 2003 Lifetime Achievement Award – Chinatown, Los Angeles, June 2009 Maverick Award – Hawaii International Film Festival, October 2010 Lifetime Achievement Award – San Diego Asian Film Festival, October 2011 Lifetime Achievement Award – Museum of Chinese in America, November 2015 AHF Inductee & Lifetime Achievement Award - Asian Hall of Fame, 2021