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Rosalind Chao

Rosalind ChaoAKA Chao Jyalin

Born: 23-Sep-1957
Birthplace: Los Angeles County, CA

Gender: Female
Race or Ethnicity: Asian
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Actor

Nationality: United States
Executive summary: Keiko on Star Trek: DS9

Rosalind Chao grew up in Anaheim, near Disneyland, and started working in local theater before adolescence. She appeared in several TV commercials, and at 13 she worked opposite Lucille Ball in a 1970 episode of Here's Lucy. At 15, she played a teen princess in Anna and the King, a short-lived 1972 sitcom with Yul Brynner reprising his role from the 1956 film The King and I. After high school, Chao decided to become a reporter, and studied journalism at USC. But after a few months working at KNX, a Los Angeles newsradio station, she changed her mind, and decided she was an actress.

She was kidnapped in Jackie Chan's first American movie, The Big Brawl, and memorably strangled in a Chuck Norris movie, An Eye for an Eye. In 1981, a pilot was filmed for a possible sitcom starring Chao as a recent immigrant to America, to be titled Almost American. Chao's sitcom never materialized, but aired as a very special episode of Diff'rent Strokes. And as a consolation prize, Chao was given a recurring role on that show, as Gary Coleman's school teacher, Miss Chung.

On M*A*S*H, she was Soon-Lee, the Korean woman who married Corporal Klinger. She was still his wife on the deservedly forgotten After MASH. On Star Trek: Deep Space 9, she played botanist Keiko Ishikawa, who eventually fell for and married the Transporter Chief. Being a traditional girl, she changed her name to Keiko O'Brien, and was later assigned duties as a Star Fleet schoolmarm.

Chao has had prominent roles in Thousand Pieces of Gold with Chris Cooper, a little-seen western where her character seeks to escape slavery, and in Wayne Wang's The Joy Luck Club. She has had smaller but memorable roles in What Dreams May Come and Just Like Heaven.

Husband: Simon Templeman (voice actor)

    University: Pomona College, Claremont, CA (1978)
    University: University of Southern California (dropped out)

    Chinese Ancestry

    TELEVISION
    Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 Pastor Jin (2012)
    Six Feet Under Cindy (2005)
    The O.C. Dr. Kim (2003-06)
    Star Trek: Deep Space 9 Keiko (1993-99)
    Star Trek: The Next Generation Keiko (1991-92)
    Falcon Crest Li Ying (1986)
    After MASH Soon-Lee Klinger (1983-84)
    Diff'rent Strokes Miss Chung (1981-83)

    FILMOGRAPHY AS ACTOR
    Plus One (28-Apr-2019)
    Nanking (30-Mar-2007)
    Just Like Heaven (16-Sep-2005)
    Inhabited (19-Aug-2003) · Ms. Montane
    Freaky Friday (6-Aug-2003) · Pei-Pei
    I Am Sam (3-Dec-2001)
    The Man from Elysian Fields (13-Sep-2001)
    What Dreams May Come (28-Sep-1998) · Leona
    The End of Violence (11-May-1997)
    Love Affair (21-Oct-1994)
    North (22-Jul-1994) · Chinese Mom
    The Joy Luck Club (8-Sep-1993)
    Intruders (17-May-1992)
    Memoirs of an Invisible Man (28-Feb-1992) · Cathy DiTolla
    Thousand Pieces of Gold (26-Apr-1991)
    Last Flight Out (22-May-1990)
    Denial (Jan-1990)
    Slamdance (11-Sep-1987)
    Going Berserk (28-Oct-1983) · Kung Fu Girl
    The Terry Fox Story (22-May-1983)
    An Eye for an Eye (14-Aug-1981)
    The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan's Island (15-May-1981)
    The Big Brawl (18-Aug-1980)
    The Incredible Hulk: Married (22-Sep-1978)


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