Renowned actress Irene Tsu was born April 5, 1943, in Shanghai, China. Her father was a banker and her mother a painter. When the Communists took over China the family left for Taiwan, then Formosa. They later emigrated to New York City, where Irene attended Mamoroneck Elementary and studied ballet. She was a teenage dancer in Flower Drum Song (1961), directed by Henry Koster. He gave her her first speaking role as a teenage prostitute in his next film, Ah! Si papa savait ça (1963) starring James Stewart and Sandra Dee, which launched her acting career.
She studied acting with Ned Maderino, Lee Strasberg and Peggy Feury, among others, and for the next 20 years she played an assortment of "native girls" and "dutiful daughter" roles. In addition, she was the TV spokeswoman for Chevron Island and Standard Oil, as well as Hawaiian Punch. She became a respected leading lady and worked with some of the biggest names in the business, from Elvis Presley and John Wayne to Jeff Bridges and Richard Dreyfuss.
The 1990s saw Irene mature into such roles as doctors, lawyers and mothers. She guest-starred as Garrett Wang's mother in Star Trek: Voyager (1995), Ming-Na Wen's mom in Le célibataire (1995), the judge in Unauthorized: The Mary Kay Letourneau Story (2000), Les experts: Manhattan (2004), Division d'élite (2001) and La vie avant tout (2000), among others. She also appeared in the Peter Ho-sun Chan hit Hong Kong film Tian mi mi (1996) and Gam gai (2002).
For the past decade Irene has been a successful realtor in Beverly Hills. She enjoys helping people to realize their dreams, whether by finding them their first condo or selling their multi-million-dollar family estate or helping them invest in income properties. Irene is a single mother to nine-year-old Yasmine and has ben a yoga practitioner for 25 years. She teaches Bikram yoga for the Beverly Hills Department of Parks.
