Nancy Hsueh | |
|---|---|
_Press_Photo_of_Nancy_Hsueh.jpg) Hsueh in 1967 | |
| Born | February 25, 1941 Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Died | November 24, 1980 (aged 39) Portland, Maine, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1945–1978 |
| Notable work | Love is a Many Splendored Thing Targets |
Nancy Hsueh[a] (February 25, 1941 – November 24, 1980)[2][3][b] was an American actress. She was one of the first Asian American actresses to have a leading role in a U.S. television series, Love is a Many Splendored Thing (1967),[6] regarded as the first American soap opera to portray an interracial relationship between an Asian woman and a white man.[7][8] She also appeared in films such as War Hunt (1962), Cheyenne Autumn (1964), and Targets (1968).[9][4][10]
Born in Los Angeles, California, Hsueh made two films as a child actress, China's Little Devils (1945) and Intrigue (1947), on which her father served as a technical adviser.[11][12]
In the early 1960s, she appeared in the Korean War drama War Hunt (1962)[13] and the John Ford Western Cheyenne Autumn (1964).[14] According to author Jon Abbott, "her exotic appearance kept her busy in the spy shows of the period, including The Man from U.N.C.L.E., I Spy, and The Wild, Wild West."[15]
In 1967, she was cast as the female lead in the CBS soap opera Love is a Many Splendored Thing. The series was initially intended as a continuation of the 1955 film of the same name, which told the story of an interracial relationship between an American reporter and a Eurasian doctor. Hsueh portrayed Mia Elliott, the daughter of the couple in the original film.[7] However, CBS censors became uncomfortable with the series' portrayal of an interracial romance between a Eurasian woman (Hsueh) and a white American doctor (Robert Milli), and Hsueh's character was written out of the series within one year.[8][10]
Her most prominent film role was as Boris Karloff's personal assistant in Peter Bogdanovich's Targets (1968).[16] She had only a few small parts in film and television in the 1970s; her final acting role was in House Calls (1978).[17]
Hsueh was the daughter of Wei Fan Hsueh, who was born in Nanking, China, and Evelyn Postal, who was of Native American and Scottish-Irish descent.[6][11][18] She majored in education at the University of California, Los Angeles.[19]
On January 16, 1965, she married Daniel Carr, whom she had met during filming of Cheyenne Autumn.[1]
She died of atherosclerosis in Portland, Maine on November 24, 1980, aged 39.[b]
