When Ke Huy Quan accepted the Best Actor in a Supporting Role Oscar at the Oscars tonight (March 12), there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.
Who’s this guy?
Jonathan Ke Quan, sometimes known as Ke Huy Quan (born August 20, 1971), is an American actor and stunt coordinator. The Goonies’ Data and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom’s Short Round were two of Quan’s early roles (1985).
Quan also starred in the 1991 sitcom Head of the Class and the movie Encino Man (1992).
After almost two decades since his last acting gig, Quan made a comeback in 2021. He won numerous awards, including an Academy Award and a Golden Globe for his portrayal of Waymond Wang in the critically acclaimed science fiction comedy-drama Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022), a kind and loving husband navigating the multiverse.
Well-deserved
Before landing the part of Waymond Wang, Quan frequently made hints that he thought his career was on the verge of failure.
With the multiverse film Everything Everywhere All At Once, the actor, well known for his role as Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, made a comeback to acting.
Quan had already won the Golden Globe and the Screen Actors’ Guild Awards for Best Supporting Actor, making him the first Asian man to win the latter award, but the imaginative mother-daughter drama from the Daniels (directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert) gave him a new platform and helped him win this awards season.
At the Academy Oscars, a visibly overjoyed and moved Quan delivered a stirring speech on pursuing one’s dreams and how challenging it had been for him to maintain his own.
The actor remarked, “My journey began on a boat, I spent a year in a refugee camp, and somehow I got up here on Hollywood’s largest platform.
I cannot believe it’s happening to me. This is the American Dream. They claim stories like this only occur in movies.
The actor gave a heartfelt shout-out to his brother, his Everything Everywhere All At Once crew, and his mother, who was at home supporting him (“Mom, I just won an Oscar!”). Also, he thanked his wife Echo for supporting him during his struggles to secure new possibilities.
Dreams are something you have to believe in. I almost gave up on mine. “I owe everything to the love of my life, my wife Echo, who month after month, year after year for 20 years reminded me that one day, my time will come,” Quan added.
“To all of you out there, thank you so much for welcome me back. I love you. Please keep your dreams alive.”
Recently, Quan mentioned that before to the Daniels, he had not had much luck.
All I did was wait for the phone to ring in my early 20s, which are meant to be the best years of your life.
Quan recently told The Telegraph, “They last saw me up on screen I was a tiny boy and now I’m a middle-aged man.
I think I’ve cried more in the last two months than I have in the past 20 years. I had no idea how the crowd would react.