Post by Admin on Jul 16, 2023 11:33:33 GMT -4
Nancy Kwan Ka-shen (Chinese: 關家蒨; Jyutping: Gwaan1 Gaa1sin6; born May 19, 1939) is a Chinese-American actress. In addition to her personality and looks, her career was benefited by Hollywood's casting of more Asian roles in the 1960s, especially in comedies.
Born in Hong Kong on May 19, 1939, and growing up in Kowloon Tong, Kwan is the Eurasian daughter of Kwan Wing-hong, a Cantonese architect and Marquita Scott, a European model of English and Scottish ancestry. Kwan Wing-hong was the son of lawyer Kwan King-sun and Juliann Loke Yuen-ying, daughter of Loke Yew. He attended Cambridge University and met Scott in London. The two married and moved to Hong Kong, where Wing-hong became an eminent architect. In that era, interracial marriage was not universally accepted. Nancy has an older brother, Ka-keung.
In fear of the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong during World War II, Wing Hong, in the guise of a coolie, escaped from Hong Kong to North China in Christmas 1941 with his two children, whom he hid in wicker baskets. Kwan and her brother were transported by servants, evading Japanese sentries. They remained in exile in western China for five years until the war ended, after which they returned to Hong Kong and lived in a spacious, contemporary home her father designed. Scott escaped to England and never rejoined the family. Kwan's parents divorced when she was two years old. Her mother later moved to New York and married an American.[ Remaining in Hong Kong with the children, her father married a Chinese woman, whom Kwan called "Mother". Her father and her stepmother raised her, in addition to her brother and five half-brothers and half-sisters. Five of Kwan's siblings became lawyers.
Except during World War II, Kwan had a comfortable early life. Cared for by an amah (阿嬤), a woman who looks after children, Kwan owned a pony and passed her summers in resorts in Borneo, Macao, and Japan. An affluent man, her father owned a several-acre hilltop property in Kowloon. In her youth, she was called "Ka-shen". She wrote in 1960 that as an eight-year-old, her fortune-teller "predicted travel, fame, and fortune for me".
Kwan attended the Catholic Maryknoll Convent School until she was 13 years old, after which she travelled to Kingsmoor School in Glossop, England a boarding school that her brother Ka-keung was then attending. Her brother studied to become an architect and she studied to become a dancer.
Kwan's introduction to tai chi sparked a desire to learn ballet. When Kwan was 18, she pursued her dream of becoming a ballet dancer by attending the Royal Ballet School in London. She studied performing arts subjects such as stage make-up and danced every day for four hours. Her studies at the Royal Ballet School ran concurrently with her high-school studies. Because Kwan's high school had deep connections with nearby theatre companies, Kwan was able to perform small parts in several of their productions. Upon graduating from high school, she sojourned in France, Italy, and Switzerland on a luxury trip. Afterwards, she travelled back to Hong Kong, where she started a ballet school.
