Tan Sri Michelle Yeoh

Tan Sri Michelle Yeoh Choo-Kheng (born 6 August 1962

[1]
) is a Malaysian actress, best known for
performing her own stunts in the Hong Kong action films that brought her to fame in the early 1990s. Born
in Ipoh, Malaysia, she was chosen by People as one of the "50 Most Beautiful People in the World" in
1997.
She is best known in the Western world for her roles in the 1997 James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies,
playing Wai Lin, and the multiple Academy Award-winning Chinese-language martial arts film Crouching
Tiger, Hidden Dragon, for which she was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in 2000. In
2008, the film critic website Rotten Tomatoes ranked her the greatest action heroine of all time.
[2]
In 2009,
she was listed by People magazine as the only Asian actress as one of the "35 All-Time Screen
Beauties".
[3]

She is credited as Michelle Khan in some of her earlier films. This alias was chosen by the D&B studio
who thought it might be more marketable to international and western audiences. Yeoh later preferred
using her real name.
[4]


Yeoh was born to a Malaysian Chinese family in Ipoh, Malaysia. Her parents are Janet Yeoh and Yeoh
Kian Geik, a lawyer and MCA politician.
[5]
She is a Hokkien.
[6]
She was keen on dance from an early age,
beginning ballet at the age of four. At the age of 15, she moved with her parents to England, where she
was enrolled in a boarding school. Yeoh later studied at the Royal Academy of Dance in London,
majoring in ballet. However, a spinal injury prevented her from becoming a professional ballet dancer,
and she transferred her attention to choreography and other arts. She later received a B.A. degree in
Creative Arts with a minor in Drama.
In 1983, at the age of 20, Yeoh won the Miss Malaysia beauty pageant.
[4]
She represented Malaysia at
the Queen of the Pacific 1983 beauty pageant which was held in Australia and won the crown. She was
also Malaysia's representative at the 1983 Miss World pageant in London. From there, she appeared in a
television commercial with Jackie Chan which caught the attention of a fledgling Hong Kong film
production company, D&B Films. Yeoh started her film career acting in action and martial arts films such
as Yes, Madam in 1985, after which she did most of her own stunts.
[7]
The D&B Group in Hong Kong was
run by Dickson Poon. Yeoh married Poon in 1987 and retired from acting. After the couple divorced in
1992, Yeoh returned to acting.
[4]