It is always a happy occasion when I get to write about the awesome things Asian Australians are doing, and especially when they are kicking goals. Asian Australian actress JILLIAN NGUYEN is one of these and I am so happy to follow her journey and write about some of the awesome projects she is working on.
Just in January we wrote about NGUYEN and her being cast in romantic sci-fi film “LOVELAND” alongside HUGO WEAVING. But she has done a lot since filming “LOVELAND” and was cast in a key supporting role in SBS upcoming mini-series “HUNGRY GHOSTS” which features a long list of Vietnamese/Asian Australian actors and actresses- which we recently wrote about here too…
Here is more on NGUYEN’S career via IF:
She plays Sophie Tran, the daughter of Vietnamese immigrants, who is studying bio-medicine and gets possessed by evil spirits.
The character’s background parallels the actress’ own experience: She was born in a refugee camp in Malaysia, where her Vietnamese parents spent five years, and moved to Australia when she was 14 months old. She set her sights on acting when she was only seven after watching Titanic 20 times.
Her character treads a fine line between inherited trauma and mental illness. On her first day on set Sophie is the subject of an exorcism by a real-life Buddhist monk.
She also talks about playing the character Sophie to IF:
“It was thrilling: I’d never seen a female character doing anything like this on Australian television,” she says. “She has so much fun, including an underwater scene where she tries to kill her mother. I think the show will really challenge the way people see Asian women and in particular Vietnamese women.
“Apart from The Family Law, which was very good, all the Asian women you see on TV are sexualised or insignificant. It’s damaging because that affects how people treat Asian women in society.”
Too true Nguyen – it is a problem when Asian women on Australian TV are generally seen as nothing more than nail salon workers, laundromat owners, textile workers, illegal immigrants and sex workers, because that does nothing more but push the negative stereotype that that is all we as Asian women are worth.
There will be more on Nguyen’s career as well as an interview very soon, so please keep tabs on our site!
Images via IF
To read the original article, please click on: Jillian Nguyen feeds off ‘Hungry Ghosts’ and visits ‘Loveland’