Michelle Krusiec Biography

Michelle J. Krusiec () born October 2, 1974 in Taiwan, is a Taiwanese American actress.

Early life and education

Born Yáng Y?huì, Krusiec was adopted at age 5 by a Taiwanese aunt, her father's elder sister, who had married an American.

Krusiec studied theater at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, graduating with a B.A. in 1996, and later, from the University of Oxford.

Career

Krusiec was recruited to be one of six globe-trotting travel reporters for the Discovery Channel new series called Travelers. Along with Barbara Alvarez, Robin Kipp, Pearce Bunting, Patrick Michael, Foster Soloman, and later Lisa Clark, she traveled to over 50 different locations on the show.

Krusiec played the eighteen year-old Molly O'Brien in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Time's Orphan". Krusiec was a Best Actress nominee in the Golden Horse Film Festival for her performance in a U.S. independent film Saving Face (2005), in which she plays a Chinese American lesbian juggling the demands of her girlfriend and pregnant mother. She also appeared in The Mind of the Married Man as Sachiko, the massage parlor girl who gives "happy endings." She co-starred in the NBC Saturday morning sitcom One World and also played the role of Exquisite Woo on Popular. She played Mei-Ling Hwa Darling, one of the Darling family's daughters-in-law in ABC's highly-publicized dramedy, Dirty Sexy Money. She also has a recurring role as "Nadine Park" on Season 4 of Fox's Fringe, and has also appeared on TV shows such as NBC's Community (as "Wu Mei", a love interest of Chevy Chase's character, Pierce Hawthorne), General Hospital as Attorney Grace Yang, The Secret Life of the American Teenager as Emily, Touch as Lanny Cheong, Nip/Tuck as Mei, CSI: Miami as Susan Lee, CSI: NY as Lisa Kim, American Dad as various voices, NCIS, Grey's Anatomy, Weeds, Without A Trace, Cold Case as Maya, Monk as Maria, ER as Tong-Ye, and Titus as recurring character Nancy.

Krusiec has also starred in a number of feature films including Knife Fight as Shannon, Sunset Stories as Nova, Relative Insanity as Marsha, Far North as Anja, the daughter of Michelle Yeoh's character, What Happens in Vegas as Chong, Cameron Diaz's competitive co-worker, The River Murders as Sung Li opposite Ray Liotta, Christian Slater, and Ving Rhames, Take Me Home as Suzanne, Shuffle as Kevin's Mother, and independent film projects including Tanuj Chopra's Nice Girls Crew alongside Lynn Chen and Sheetal Sheth, Shawn Chou's Tomato and Eggs opposite Keiko Agena and Sab Shimono, and Erin Li's L.A. Coffin School opposite Elizabeth Sung and Megan Lee.

Krusiec also wrote, directed, and performed a one-woman show entitled "Made in Taiwan" that premiered in Los Angeles and in New York at the New York International Fringe Festival of Theater, among other venues. She has received funding from Visual Communications to develop the play into a feature film.

She is also currently touring with the cast of David Henry Hwang's play, Chinglish, in the role of Xi Yian. The first stop of the play is at the Berkeley Repertory Theater, and then the South Coast Repertory (as the play is a joint production between the two theaters), and then to the Hong Kong Arts Festival in Hong Kong. The production of the play is directed by two-time Obie winner Leigh Silverman.

Filmography

TV series

• Sexual Considerations (1991)
• Travelers (1996)
• One World (1998)
• Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Time's Orphan Season 6, Episode 24 (1998)
• Popular (1999) (TV series)
• Titus Season 2 (2001)
• ER (2002)
• Monk (2003)
• Without a Trace Season 1 & Season 3 (2003)
• Cold Case Season 2 (2004)
• Grey's Anatomy Bring the Pain (2005)
• NCIS Under Covers (2005)
• Weeds Free Goat (2005)
• Standoff Shanghai'd (2006)
• Dirty Sexy Money Season 1 (2007)
• My Own Worst Enemy Season 1 (2008)
• CSI: NY Season 6 (2009)
• CSI: Miami Season 8 (2010)
• Community Season 2 (2011)
• Fringe Season 4 (2011)
• Touch Season 1 - episode 6 (2012) as Lanny Zheng

Movies

• Nixon (1995)
• For the Cause (2000)
• The Mind of the Married Man (2001)
• Tomato and Eggs (2002)
• Pumpkin (2002)
• Sweet Home Alabama (2002)
• Daddy Day Care (2003)
• Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd (2003)
• Duplex (2003)
• Best Actress (2004)
• Saving Face (2004)
• Cursed (2005)
• Pursuit of Happyness (2006)
• Far North (2007)
• Nanking (2007)
• What Happens in Vegas (2008)
• Henry Poole is Here (2008)
• Zoom Hunting (2010)
• The River Murders (2011)
• Nice Girls Crew (2012)

Video games

• Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven (2003) as Ayame