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UP AND COMING

Kelly who?

Kelly Hu, more recently seen in the TV series Martial Law, swops leading men - from heavy to hunky

The Straits Times, 19 April 2002

By Karl Ho

Kelly Hu prefers her leading men beefy, but without the fat.  The 34-year-old Asian-American actress breaks out into a naughty, sorority-girl giggle when asked who is more delicious - gongfu star Sammo Hung or World Wrestling Federation bad boy The Rock? 'If I have to tell you that The Rock is sexier than Sammo, then I think you need some glasses,' she laughs over the phone from Taiwan, where she was promoting The Scorpion King in which she stars opposite the wrestler. 'I've never kissed Sammo, so I'm going to say the Rock, because he's a great kisser. And the fact that we both come from Hawaii adds to the connection.'

Then there is the question of who has the best chops. 'That's a tough one. Sammo's quick and stylised, but The Rock is more brute strength.'

So who is Kelly Hu?

She played a Chinese police officer with shuriken-sharp gongfu moves alongside Sammo Hung in the American TV series, Martial Law. Now in The Scorpion King, she plays a mysterious sorceress who falls in love with an assassin-overlord, played by wrestling superstar The Rock. The movie, a spin-off of last year's Hollywood blockbuster The Mummy Returns opens in Singapore and the rest of the world today.

While Hu might be a familiar Asian face on American TV, and have scored cameos in various movies, her role in The Scorpion King might prove to be her biggest break yet. 'The movie is a huge step for me,' she says. 'Now I just want to try my hand at everything.'

Born in Honolulu, she is a fourth-generation American with Chinese, Hawaiian and English blood coursing through her veins. She first stepped into the glare of fame after winning the Miss Teen USA title in 1985, at the age of 18. The crown soon led to modelling stints in Japan and Italy. Apart from slowly developing a taste for acting, Hu loved martial arts. While her Mum wanted her to do pirouettes in ballet classes when she was young, she picked up gongfu moves in secret from her older brother and watched Bruce Lee movies.

After training intermittently over seven years, Hu now wears a black belt in Kanzen Budokai karate.

Her first appearance on TV was on hit family sitcom Growing Pains. She guest-starred as a single mother who dated then-teen heart-throb Kirk Cameron. She went on to make guest and regular appearances in numerous series, including Melrose Place, Pacific Blue, and Nash Bridges. Her foray into films was also marked by minor roles in Oliver Stone's The Doors (1991), Surf Ninjas (1993) and Strange Days (1995).

But with Hu's turn in a sizeable Hollywood vehicle such as The Scorpion King, she might find herself following the likes of Zhang Ziyi and Lucy Liu into superstardom. Hu certainly has no problems with being typecast as a butt-whopping Asian chick. But in The Scorpion King, she actually gets to do something slightly different. She says: 'This movie just needed a strong character, not someone with a martial-arts background. If anything, my fight scenes were more of the sword-wielding variety.'

Hu's next project will be Cradle 2 The Grave, in which she plays a villainous karate-chopping kidnapper alongside Jet Li. She says: 'I love all that physical stuff.'

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