SHUNNED FOR 40 YEARS

Hollywood rejected him for decades but now Ke Huy Quan is an Oscar winner 

- NASIFA SULAIMAN

IT’S the kind of comeback story Hollywood can’t get enough of: a refugee kid from Vietnam moves to the US, stars in two of the biggest blockbuster movies of the 1980s then vanishes for nearly 40 years only to reappear as an Oscar winner. 

Ke Huy Quan didn’t disappear by choice. It was Tinseltown that shunned him for close to four decades before welcoming him back with open arms and showering him with adulation – and award after award. 

He’s been the toast of the 2023 awards season, scooping almost every major gong, including the prize of prizes, an Academy Award. 

The 51-year-old was named best supporting actor for Everything Everywhere All at Once, the quirky sci-fi comedy that’s become the unexpected hit of the year. Ke plays several versions of Waymond Wang, husband of Evelyn (Michelle Yeoh), and finds himself embroiled in an interdimensional rupture that unravels reality. 

Waymond is in turn an exhausted laundromat owner, a multibillionaire and a confident ass-kicker and Ke has received universal praise for his portrayal of the characters. 

Film stunt coordinator Timothy Eulich says it was clear Ke, who performed his own stunts, was doing extra practising on the side. “Every day he’d be better than the day before,” he says. 

Ke’s Oscar acceptance speech captivated audiences almost as much as his performance in the movie. He was living proof of the American dream, he said. “My journey started on a boat. I spent a year in a refugee camp and somehow, I ended here on Hollywood’s biggest stage. I can’t believe this is happening to me.”