Vivian Wu

Vivian Wu is a sleek-featured, lushly beautiful actress whose roles embody elements of both modern and classic Asian culture. After appearing onscreen for the first time as a teenager, she almost left acting behind for a career in tourism until a key performance as an imperial concubine in the stately Best Picture Oscar winner "The Last Emperor" solidified her desire to act. While some of her follow-up roles, in the outlandish superhero thriller "The Guyver" and the campy "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III," marked a departure into fun fantasy, she made a return to earnest, introspective dramas with director Wayne Wang's sweeping mother-and-daughter mosaic "The Joy Luck Club."

Another high-profile role came opposite Ewan McGregor in sensual and visually arresting "The Pillow Book." Wu twice played Soong May-ling, First Lady of the Republic of China from 1948 to 1975, first in the intimate family drama "The Soong Sisters" and again in the decidedly more political "The Founding of a Republic." In 2011, she collaborated with director Wayne Wang on the 19th-century period piece "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan." Along with her prestigious film roles, Wu appears regularly on television, on shows ranging from the ghoulish anthology "Tales from the Crypt" to the supernatural mystery "Ghost Whisperer."