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Kieu Chinh

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Kiều Chinh
Born
Nguyễn Thị Chinh

(1937-07-03) 3 July 1937 (age 87)
Hanoi, North Vietnam
Occupations
  • Actress
  • humanitarian
  • lecturer
  • philanthropist
Years active1957–present
Websitekieu-chinh.com

Kiều Chinh (born Nguyễn Thị Chinh; September 3, 1937) is a Vietnamese-American actress, humanitarian, lecturer, and philanthropist. In her career spanning over sixty years from 1957 to present days, Kiều Chinh received many accolades including an Emmy Award in 1996.

Her film roles included Operation C.I.A. (1965) and The Joy Luck Club (1993).[1] She is also a president, co-founder, and co-chair of the Vietnam Children's Fund.

She was awarded a lifetime achievements award at the Aisian Film Festival in Los Angeles in May 2021.[1]

Career

Kiều Chinh began her acting career in South Vietnam, starting with a starring role in Hồi Chuông Thiên Mụ (The Bells of Thiên Mụ Temple) (1957).

In the 1960s, in addition to Vietnamese films, she also appeared in several American productions including A Yank in Viet-Nam (1964) and Operation C.I.A. (1965), the latter opposite Burt Reynolds. Kiều Chinh also produced a war epic Người Tình Không Chân Dung (Warrior, Who Are You) (1971), which later would be remastered and shown in the U.S. at the 2003 Vietnamese International Film Festival.

In April 1975, while Kiều Chinh was on a film set in Singapore, she became aware that North Vietnam was about to overrun Saigon. She returned to her South Vietnam, and then to Singapore using her diplomatic passport. When the government of South Vietnam fell, she was deported from Singapore because her diplomatic passport was no longer valid. She was refused entry to France, Britain and the US. Eventually she was admitted to Canada. She was required to get a job immediately and ended up working on a chicken farm. She tried to contact previous acquaintances in the acting world including Glenn Ford and Burt Reynolds, but both were "unavailable" to help. Eventually she contacted Tippi Hedren who arranged an air ticket and a US visa for her and invited her to her home. William Holden also was supportive once he had found out about Chinh's plight.[2] Kiều Chinh resumed her acting career in the US, her first part being in a 1977 episode of M*A*S*H "In Love and War", written by Alan Alda and loosely based on her life story.

Kiều Chinh subsequently acted in feature films as well as TV-movies including The Children of An Lac (TV), Hamburger Hill (1987), Riot (1997), Catfish in Black Bean Sauce (1999), Face (2002), Journey From The Fall (2005), 21 (2008).

From 1989 to 1991, she had a recurring role as Triệu Âu on the ABC Vietnam War drama series China Beach.

In her best known role, she starred as Suyuan, one of the women in Wayne Wang’s The Joy Luck Club (film) in 1993. In 2005, Kiều Chinh starred in Journey from the Fall, a film tracing a Vietnamese family through the aftermath of the fall of Saigon, the re-education camps, the boat people experience, and the initial difficulties of settling in the U.S.

She was awarded a lifetime achievements award at the Asian Film Festival in Los Angeles in May 2021.[1]

Filmography

Honors and awards

At the 2003 Vietnamese International Film Festival, Kiều Chinh received the Lifetime Achievement Award. Also in 2003, at the Women's Film Festival in Turin Kiều Chinh was awarded the Special Acting Award. In 2006, the San Diego Asian Film Festival honored Kieu Chinh with the Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2015, the San Francisco Film Fest, Festival of Globe honors Kieu Chinh with a Lifetime Achievement Award for her contributions to the film industry and more.

A documentary based on her life, Kiều Chinh: A Journey Home by Patrick Perez / KTTV, won the Emmy in 1996.[1]

In 2009, Chinh was honored as the 2009 Woman of the Year for her work in film and community service by State Senator Lou Correa.

References

  1. ^ a b c d "Kiều Chinh được AWFF trao Giải Thành Tựu Trọn Đời (2021) * Viet Nam Nhat Bao * Vietnam Daily News". www.vietnamdaily.com. Retrieved 2021-05-25.
  2. ^ Hastings, Max (2018). Vietnam. p. 630.
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