Kiều Chinh is a Vietnamese-American actress, humanitarian, lecturer, and philanthropist. She is known as one of the most legendary actors from Vietnam. In her career spanning over sixty years, Kiều Chinh received many accolades including an Emmy Award in 1996. Her internationally notable film roles were in Operation C.I.A. and The Joy Luck Club. Kiều Chinh is also a president, co-founder, and co-chair of the Vietnam Children's Fund.
Career
Kieu Chinh began her acting career in her South Vietnam, starting with a starring role in Hồi Chuông Thiên Mụ . Kieu Chinh soon became one of South Vietnam's best-known personalities. In the 1960s, in addition to Vietnamese films, she also appeared in several American productions including A Yank in Viet-Nam and Operation C.I.A., the latter opposite Burt Reynolds. Kieu Chinh also produced a war epicNgười Tình Không Chân Dung , which later would be remastered and shown in the U.S. at the 2003 Vietnamese International Film Festival. In 1975, while Kieu Chinh was on the set in Singapore, communist North Vietnamese overran Saigon. Kieu Chinh left for the U.S. where she resumed her acting career in a 1977 episode of M*A*S*H "In Love and War", written by Alan Alda and loosely based on her life story. Kieu Chinh subsequently acted in feature films as well as TV-movies including The Children of An Lac, Hamburger Hill, Riot, Catfish in Black Bean Sauce, Face, Journey From The Fall, 21. From 1989 to 1991, she had a recurring role as Triệu Âu on the ABC Vietnam War drama series China Beach. In 2015, she co-produced Ride The Thunder, a Fred Koster film based on the book of the same title, written by Richard Botkin. In her best known role, she starred as Suyuan, one of the women in Wayne Wang’s The Joy Luck Club in 1993. In 2005, Kieu Chinh starred in Journey from the Fall, an epic feature 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.
Personal life
For over a decade, Kieu Chinh has been a lecturer of the Greater Talent Network in New York. She has been invited to give keynote addresses at Pfizer, Kellogg, Cornell University and University of San Diego. Kieu Chinh is also active in philanthropic work. Together with journalist Terry Anderson, she co-founded the Vietnam Children’s Fund, which has built schools in Vietnam attended by more than 25,000 students annually. Kieu Chinh and Anderson continue to serve as the Fund’s co-chair.
At the 2003 Vietnamese International Film Festival, Kieu Chinh received the Lifetime Achievement Award. Also in 2003, at the Women's Film Festival in Turin Kieu 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, Kieu Chinh: A Journey Home by Patrick Perez / KTTV, won the Emmy in 1996. 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.
