The Chinese Directors,Actors and Actresses in Hollywood

1. Bruce Lee

Bruce Lee remains the greatest icon of martial arts cinema and a key figure of modern popular media. Had it not been for Bruce Lee and his movies in the early 1970s, it's arguable whether or not the martial arts film genre would have ever penetrated and influenced mainstream North American and ...

2. Jackie Chan

Actor | Ngo si seoi

Hong Kong's cheeky, lovable and best-known film star, Jackie Chan endured many years of long, hard work and multiple injuries to establish international success after his start in Hong Kong's manic martial arts cinema industry.

Jackie was born Kong-sang Chan on April 7, 1954, on Hong Kong's famous ...

3. Michael Zhang

Actor | The Avengers

Michael Zhang is a Chinese American actor from Los Angeles, California. Michael and his younger brother Matthew Zhang first gained notice for his stand-up comedy, having performed material he wrote at the young age of 12 at the world famous Hollywood Improv, leading to a number of dramatic roles in ...

15 years old, Chinese American actor, comedian and martial artist. The Avengers(2012) Supporting Role, Director:Joss Whedon Space Warriors (2013) Lead role, Director: Sean McNamara Displacement(2014) Supporting role, Director:Kenneth Mader The Bandit Hound(2014) Lead role, Director:Michelle Danner Dumb American Family Tv(2014) recurring role, Produce:Jonathan Stern

4. William Kong

Producer | Wo hu cang long

William Kong is known for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), House of Flying Daggers (2004) and Curse of the Golden Flower (2006).

5. Chow Yun-Fat

Actor | Wo hu cang long

Chow Yun Fat is a charismatic, athletically built and energetic Asian-born film star who first came to the attention of western audiences via his roles in the high-octane/blazing guns action films of maverick HK director John Woo.

Chow was born in 1955 on the quiet island of Lamma, part of the ...

6. Matthew Zhang

Actor | Bad Words

Matthew Zhang is an American teen actor of Asian descent. He is best known for his role of Oliver in the live-action television series Henry Danger on Nickelodeon, and the role of Dong in Back in the Game on ABC, alongside James Caan and Maggie Lawson. He also lends his voice to the Nickelodeon ...

12 years old , Chinese American actor and comedian. Bad Words (2013) Supporting Role, Director: Jason Bateman Back in The Game (2013) ABC/Fox TV show: Recurring Role, 12/13 EpisodesDirector: G.Ficarra;J.Requa Bad Seeds(2015) Nickelodeon TV show: recurring Role,producer:C H Greenblatt Henry Danger(2014) Nickelodeon TV show:recurring Role, Producer:Dan Schneider Dumb American Family Tv pilot(2014) Series Regular role, producer:Jonathan Stern

7. Ang Lee

Director | Xi yan

Born in 1954 in Pingtung, Taiwan, Ang Lee has become one of today's greatest contemporary filmmakers. Ang graduated from the National Taiwan College of Arts in 1975 and then came to the U.S. to receive a B.F.A. Degree in Theatre/Theater Direction at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, ...

8. Ziyi Zhang

Actress | Yi dai zong shi

Ziyi Zhang is a Chinese actress and model. She is best known for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), Rush Hour 2 (2001), Hero (2002), House of Flying Daggers (2004), and Memoirs of a Geisha (2005).

She made her feature film debut in The Road Home (1999).

For her work in Memoirs of a Geisha she was...

9. Justin Lin

Producer | Better Luck Tomorrow

Justin Lin is a Taiwanese-American film director whose films have grossed $2 billion worldwide. He is best known for his work on Better Luck Tomorrow, The Fast and the Furious 3-6 and Star Trek Beyond. He is also known for his work on television shows like Community and the second season of True ...

10. Jet Li

Actor | Huo Yuan Jia

Jet Li born Li Lian Jie in Beijing, China. He started training at the Beijing wushu academy (wushu is China's national sport, largely a performance version of various martial art styles) at age eight. He won five gold medals in the Chinese championships, his first when he was only 11. In his teens,...

11. John Woo

Director | Ying hung boon sik

Born in southern China, John Woo grew up in Hong Kong, where he began his film career as an assistant director in 1969, working for Shaw Brothers Studios. He directed his first feature in 1973 and has been a prolific director ever since, working in a wide variety of genres before A Better Tomorrow ...

12. Yimou Zhang

Director | Ying xiong

Yimou Zhang was born on November 14, 1951 in Xi'an, Shaanxi, China. He is a director and writer, known for Hero (2002), House of Flying Daggers (2004) and Curse of the Golden Flower (2006). He has been married to Ting Chen since December 2011. They have three children. He was previously married to ...

13. Gong Li

Actress | Man cheng jin dai huang jin jia

Born in Shenyang, grew up in Jinan, the daughter of an economics professor. Loved music from childhood, and dreamed of a singing career. After failing to gain entrance to China's top music school in 1985, applied for and was admitted to the Central Drama Academy in Beijing, from which she graduated...

14. Bingbing Fan

Actress | X-Men: Days of Future Past

Bingbing Fan was born 16 September 1981. She is a Chinese actress, television producer and pop singer.

Fan rose to fame in Asia in 1998-1999 with the mega-hit TV series My Fair Princess. In 2003, she starred in Cell Phone, which became the highest-grossing Chinese film of the year, winning a Hundred...

15. Bingbing Li

Actress | Transformers: Age of Extinction

Li Bingbing (born 27 February 1973) is a Chinese actress and singer. She rose to fame with her role in Seventeen Years (1999) and since then received critical acclaim for her roles in A World Without Thieves (2004), Waiting Alone (2005), The Knot (2006), The Forbidden Kingdom (2008), The Message (...

16. Lucy Liu

Actress | Kill Bill: Vol. 1

Born to immigrants in New York City, Lucy Liu has always tried to balance an interest in her cultural heritage with a desire to move beyond a strictly Asian-American experience. Her mother, Cecilia, a biochemist, is from Beijing & her father, Tom Liu, a civil engineer, is from Shanghai. Once ...

17. Janet Yang

Producer | The People vs. Larry Flynt

Janet Yang was born on July 13, 1956 in New York City, New York, USA. She is a producer and executive, known for The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996), High Crimes (2002) and Empire of the Sun (1987).

18. Andrew Lau

Cinematographer | Mou gaan dou

Andrew Lau Wai-Keung was born in Hong Kong in 1960, and has been fond of photography as a child. He joined Shaw Brothers (HK) Ltd. after secondary school graduation. The first film he participated in as a semi-skilled worker in cinematography was Legendary Weapons of China directed by Chia-Liang Liu...

19. Jay Chou

Soundtrack | The Green Hornet

Jay Chou is a Taiwanese musician, singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, actor and director. He was born in Taipei to schoolteachers, Yeh Hui-Mei, who taught fine arts, and Chou Yao-Chung, a biomedical researcher. In 2000, Chou released his first album, titled Jay (2000), under the record ...

20. Wayne Wang

Director | Smoke

Wayne Wang is a key figure in the development of independent filmmaking, alternating major Hollywood studio films such as »The Joy Luck Club« with smaller, independent work like »Smoke«. Continuing to work in the two different worlds, Wang directed an independent digital film, »The Center of the ...

21. Joan Chen

Actress | Judge Dredd

Born into a family of doctors and educated in China at the Shanghai Film Academy and the Shanghai Institute of Foreign Languages, Joan Chen was discovered by veteran Chinese director Jin Xie while observing a filming with a school group. Her performance in Xiao hua (1979) (A.K.A. "The Little Flower...

22. Michelle Yeoh

Actress | Everything Everywhere All at Once

Michelle Yeoh was born in Ipoh, Malaysia. She's the daughter of Janet Yeoh & Kian Teik Yeoh. She's of Hokkien descent, speaking English and Malay before Chinese. A ballet dancer since 4, she moved to London to study at the Royal Academy as a teen. After a brief dance career, she won the Miss ...

23. Sammo Kam-Bo Hung

Stunts | Ip Man

Born in Hong Kong, Sammo Hung's acting career began while he was training in acrobatics, martial arts and dance as a child at the China Drama Academy, and he received acclaim for his performance with a troupe called "The Seven Little Fortunes." He made his feature film debut as an actor at the age ...

24. Woo-Ping Yuen

Stunts | Wo hu cang long

Woo-Ping Yuen was born on January 1, 1945 in Guangzhou, China. He is a director and actor, known for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), Fearless (2006) and Kung Fu Hustle (2004).

25. Harry Shum Jr.

Actor | Crazy Rich Asians

Harry Shum Jr. (born April 28, 1982) is a Costa Rican-born Chinese American actor, dancer, and choreographer. He is best known for his roles as Mike Chang on the Fox television series Glee (2009-15) and as Magnus Bane on the Freeform television series Shadowhunters (2016-19). He was nominated for ...

26. Johnnie To

Director | Hak se wooi

With over thirty directing and producing credits to his name, Johnnie To enjoyed international breakthroughs with Election (2005), Election 2 (2006) (aka "Triad Election") and Exiled (2006); those films enjoyed multiple international film festival appearances and were separately sold to more than ...

27. Hark Tsui

Producer | Di Renjie zhi Tongtian diguo

Tsui Hark recently became the fourth Chinese film director to join the board of judges for the 57th Cannes Film Festival in the feature films category this year.

An internationally acclaimed visionary director, Tsui started making experimental movies with 8mm film when he was only 13. After ...

28. Ringo Lam

Director | Lung foo fung wan

Ringo Lam was born on December 8, 1955 in Hong Kong. He was a director and writer, known for City on Fire (1987), Full Alert (1997) and Wild City (2015). He died on December 29, 2018 in Hong Kong, China.

29. Kar-Wai Wong

Director | Yi dai zong shi

Wong Kar-wai (born 17 July 1956) is a Hong Kong Second Wave filmmaker, internationally renowned as an auteur for his visually unique, highly stylised, emotionally resonant work, including Ah fei zing zyun (1990), Dung che sai duk (1994), Chung Hing sam lam (1994), Do lok tin si (1995), Chun gwong ...

30. Terence Chang

Producer | Paycheck

Terence Chang is known for Paycheck (2003), Face/Off (1997) and Hard Boiled (1992).

31. Vivian Wu

Actress | The Last Emperor

Vivian Wu (Chinese name : Wu JunMei) is a Chinese American actress and producer. Born in Shanghai, China, to Zhu ManFang, a famous Chinese actress and Wu ChengYe, a college professor, she was discovered by female director HuangShuQin during her visit to her mother's film set when she was 15 years ...

32. Ming-Na Wen

Actress | Mulan

Ming-Na ("enlightenment") was born on the island of Macau, forty miles from Hong Kong. Her mother, Lin Chan Wen, divorced her father when Ming-Na was only a toddler. She has an older brother named Jonathan. After the divorce, they moved to Hong Kong where her mother became a nurse. There her mother...

33. Lisa Lu

Actress | The Last Emperor

Lisa Lu is a Chinese-American actress. She started her career as a teenager, performing in Kunqu theatrical productions, a traditional style of Chinese opera. The Chinese Civil War (1927-1949) ended with a Communist victory. While the new regime financially subsidized China's theaters for most of ...

34. Wendi Murdoch

Actress | Ocean's Eight

In 2011 Chinese-born businesswoman, Wendi Murdoch, made her debut as a producer with Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (2011). Based on the 2005 best-selling novel of the same name, this historical drama was set in nineteenth century China and won the Golden Angel Award at the Chinese American Film ...

35. Tsai Chin

Actress | Memoirs of a Geisha

Tsai Chin, pinyin Zhou Caiqin is an actor, director, teacher and author, best known in America for her film role as Auntie Lindo in The Joy Luck Club. The third daughter of Zhou Xinfang, China's great actor in the last century, she was trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art London (first ...

36. Victor Wong

Actor | Big Trouble in Little China

Eccentric-looking Chinese-American actor with a slightly drooping face (the result of a bout of Bell's palsy) who studied political science, art & journalism before becoming a news reporter for a San Francisco public TV station in the late 1960s.

Apart from a brief stint in the mid-1970s on the TV ...

37. John Lone

Actor | The Last Emperor

Born Leung Kwok Ng in Hong Kong October 13, 1952, John Lone was spartanly raised by a single mother until the age of 7 when he was sent off to be schooled with the Peking Opera. He never again saw his mother. The Peking Opera could be a brutal and grueling life for a child but he was a diligent and...

38. Bruno Wu

Producer | The Protégé

Bruno Wu is known for The Protégé (2021), The Immigrant (2013) and Grace of Monaco (2014).

39. Nan Yu

Actress | The Expendables 2

Nan Yu was born on September 5, 1978 in Dalian, Liaoning, China. She is an actress, known for The Expendables 2 (2012), Tuya's Marriage (2006) and Speed Racer (2008).

40. Stephen Tao

Producer | Monarch Cove

Stephen Tao is known for Monarch Cove (2006), Room Service (2007) and A Perfect Day (2011).

41. Christopher C. Chen

Producer | Ugly Delicious

Christopher C. Chen is known for Ugly Delicious (2018) and Looper (2012).

42. Dan Lin

Producer | The Lego Movie

Dan is the CEO and Head Wrangler of Rideback, the film and television company known for producing tentpole live-action and animated content for global audiences. Rideback is housed inside Rideback Ranch. This innovative, creative campus formed by Lin in LA's Historic Filipinotown district is also ...

43. James Wan

Writer | Saw

James Wan (born 26 February 1977) is an Australian film producer, screenwriter and film director of Malaysian Chinese descent. He is widely known for directing the horror film Saw (2004) and creating Billy the puppet. Wan has also directed Dead Silence (2007), Death Sentence (2007), Insidious (2010)...

44. Leehom Wang

Actor | Blackhat

Leehom Wang was born on May 17, 1976 in Rochester, New York, USA. He is an actor and composer, known for Blackhat (2015), Lust, Caution (2007) and Love in Disguise (2010). He was previously married to JingLei Li.

45. Tang Wei

Actress | Se, jie

Tang Wei was born on October 7, 1979 in Wenzhou, Zhejiang, China. She is an actress, known for Lust, Caution (2007), Decision to Leave (2022) and Blackhat (2015). She has been married to Kim Tae-yong since July 12, 2014. They have one child.

46. Tony Leung Chiu-wai

Actor | Fa yeung nin wah

Tony Leung Chiu Wai was born in Hong Kong on 27 June 1962. He and his younger sister were raised by their mother after his father left them. In 1982, after passing the training courses of TVB, Tony became a TV actor and became famous for his comedy style in such TV shows as Tales of a Eunuch (1983)...

47. Fann Wong

Actress | Shanghai Knights

Fann Wong is a Singapore-born actress-singer-model of Chinese origin. Born on 27 January 1971, she derived her artiste name, Fann Wong, from a combination of her father's surname (Fann) and her mother's surname (Wong). With GCE 'A' Levels and a diploma in fashion merchandising from the La Salle ...

48. Livi Zheng

Producer | Insight

Livi Zheng is known for Insight (2021), Bali: Beats of Paradise (2018) and TAEYANG: Seed (2023).

49. Ken Zheng

Writer | Insight

Ken Zheng is known for Insight (2021), Brush with Danger (2015) and Pixel (2024).

50. Albert Tsai

Actor | Abominable

Albert Tsai is an American actor. He started his professional career at the age of 9. Albert won rave reviews and multiple awards recognition for his breakout role as Bert on the ABC comedy series Trophy Wife, including a "Best Supporting Actor" nomination from 2014 Critics' Choice Television ...