So This Is My Why

Tan Kheng Hua is a well-known and respected award-winning actress/producer in Singapore and Malaysia. Kheng has been seen in The Philanthropist (NBC), The Patriarch (UFA), and Serangoon Road (HBO Asia Original Series). Her recent role, as “Empress Dowager” in Netflix’s Original Series, Marco Polo, has garnered attention of many viewers. She is now seen in the movie adaptation of Singapore-born Kevin Kwan’s best selling novel, Crazy Rich Asians, where she plays “Kerry Chu”, the mother of protagonist Rachel Chu played by Constance Wu.

Besides film and television, Kheng is also highly respected in Singapore theatre scene where she’s a prolific actress and independent creative producer in Singapore. She creates and produces stage and television content of all genres including cabaret, drama, comedy, dramatic comedies, musicals, etc. One of the television dramas she created and produced was titled Do Not Disturb, which was the first local English-language TV series to receive the maximum 5-star rating from Singapore’s main newspaper, The Straits Times. She has also created and produced festivals such as The SIN-PEN Colony at the Georgetown Festival in Penang and The 20-Something Festival in Singapore.’

She was named to be one of 20 Singaporean contemporary artists representing Singapore in Singapore: Inside Out in NYC, London, and Beijing. Kheng has also been nominated for and won many awards including The Art Nation Award (Best Actress), DBS Life! Theatre Award (Best Actress), Asian Television Award (Best Comedic Performance by an Actress), Asian Television Award (Dramatic Performance by an Actress), Star Awards (Nominated Best Supporting Actress), Asian Television Award (Best Current Affairs & Magazine Presenter), JCCI Singapore Foundation Culture Awards for Contributions to Singapore, and the Critics Choice Award (Best Actor) at the Cairo International Festival of Experimental Theatre.

Since Crazy Rich Asians, Kheng Hua has gone on to score roles in UK Channel4’s four-part miniseries Chimerica, feature film The Garden of the Evening Mist based on the novel of same name, written by Tan Twan Eng. She has also appeared in Netflix show Medical Police, crime series Magnum P.I. and medical drama Grey’s Anatomy. It was recently announced that she has landed a role in the pilot of the reboot of 1970s martial arts drama serial Kung Fu from American TV network The CW.