Kheng And Able

Tan Kheng Hua has been featured in more international productions than ever at age 58. Yet, she once battled the fear of being forgotten. The actor opens up about reinventing herself and the four words that keep her grounded.

- Serene Goh.

Tan Kheng Hua is T a presence—and present. The actor/producer, petite and unpretentious, fully invests in conversations before her, be they about falsies or young creatives. She leads with “Call me Kheng!” and asks after everyone. The questions aren’t the autoresponders of a seasoned celebrity, but those of a conscientious student of her environment and its humans, inviting reciprocal warmth.

Back in 2008, she poured that energy into stage production It’s My Life!, spending a year working with then-teenagers (today’s millennials) to capture their coming of age amid nascent social media channels.

“I still want to do something like It’s My Life! again,” she says. At her Joo Chiat home, where she lives with her 23-year-old daughter Shi-An and their cat Toastie, she marvels at the up-and-coming centennials. “I personally love looking at their creativity on TikTok; on Instagram. I love what they’re doing in the films I see on (online video content platforms) YouTube, Not Safe for TV and Viddsee. We have so many wonderful songwriters, all Singaporean, who are so, so good.”

She’s working on a possible stage production here next year. And, over a pandemic that stalled live performances, she kept a packed schedule, commuting between Singapore, Los Angeles and Vancouver as a regular on The CW’s action-adventure television series Kung Fu (2021), now available on HBO Max.