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Yeoh is Time’s 2022 Icon of the Year

Time named Michelle Yeoh its 2022 Icon of the Year on Tuesday, highlighting her storied 40year acting career that includes this year’s “Everything Everywhere All at Once.”

Yeoh is a favourite for an Oscar nomination for her performance in the surreal actiondrama. She had been named to Time’s 100 Most Influential People of 2022 list earlier this year.

During her career, Yeoh told Time that she had to “battle” a Hollywood that offered her parts that were stereotypes of Asians or harmful tropes of Asian women.

“It shouldn’t be about my race, but it has been a battle,” Yeoh said. “At least let me try.”

Years before landing her first Hollywood role, Yeoh, 60, was already a movie icon in Asia, starring in popular Hong Kong action films throughout the late 1980s and 1990s, becoming famous for doing her own stunts.

In the late ’90s, Yeoh was ready to call it quits after getting married, planning to have children and after several injuries on set. Yeoh told Time that she reversed course after a conversation with director Quentin Tarantino, who visited her while promoting “Pulp Fiction.”

Yeoh then crossed over to American cinema with the 1997 James Bond film “Tomorrow Never Dies.”

She continued to win over American audiences with her supporting roles in “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor,” “Kung Fu Panda 2,” several Marvel films and “Crazy Rich Asians.”

CULTURE

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2022-12-08T08:00:00.0000000Z

2022-12-08T08:00:00.0000000Z

https://thestarepaper.pressreader.com/article/282437058157950

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