Sandra Oh Biography

Born and raised in Nepean, Ontario, Sandra Oh began taking ballet lessons at the age of four. She became heavily involved in theater at school, playing the lead role in her first school play when she was ten. At 16, Oh began acting professionally in plays and commercials and by the time she was 18, she had a regular role in the Ottawa-based television series Denim Blues. After high school, Oh auditioned for and was accepted into Canada's prestigious National Theatre School, located in Montreal. Immediately upon graduation in 1993, she won the title role in the CBC-TV movie, The Diary of Evelyn Lau, about a teenage runaway, and has never been out of work since. Career highlights include winning a Genie Award as Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role for her feature film debut in Double Happiness (1994), followed by another Genie Award four years later for the film Last Night (1998).

When she landed the role of Rita Wu in the HBO comedy series Arli$$ in 1996, Oh moved to Los Angeles. She stayed with the series for six years, winning a Cable Ace Award in 1997. She continued to appear in feature films such as Guinevere (1999), Dancing at the Blue Iguana (2000), The Princess Diaries (2001), Big Fat Liar (2002), Full Frontal (2002) and Under the Tuscan Sun (2003). In the independent film Dancing at the Blue Iguana, much of the film was improvised by the actors, and Oh, who proved to be quite adept at improvisation when first starting out as an actor, won a Best Performance award at the Milan Film Festival for her starring role as a stripper. She has also won a Theatre World Award for her role in Stop Kiss at the Joseph Papp Public Theatre in New York.

Although she married director/writer Alexander Payne (who directed her in the award-winning film Sideways) in 2003, the marriage had dissolved by 2005. Since then, she landed a starring role on ABC-TV's medical series Grey's Anatomy, and won a 2006 Golden Globe for her work on the show. She's also received five Emmy nominations for Grey's Anatomy, every season from 2005 to 2009 inclusive.

Later, she starred alongside Melissa McCarthy in the comedy Tammy (2014), lent her voice to the animated film Window Horses (2017) with Ellen Page and Shohreh Aghdashloo and starred in the Canadian film Meditation Park (2018) alongside Tzi Ma.

In 2018, Sandra starred in the series Killing Eve, which earned her a Golden Globe award in 2019. It also earned her Emmy nominations for best lead actress in 2018, 2019 and 2020.

More recently, she starred on the critically acclaimed Netflix TV series The Chair (2021) and voices the mother of the main character in the Pixar/Disney+ feature film Turning Red (2022), from Oscar-winning director Domee Shi.

Filmography:

Umma (2022)
Turning Red (2022)
The Same Storm (2021)
Raya and the Last Dragon (2021)
Over the Moon (2020)
Meditation Park (2018)
Window Horses (2017)
Tammy (2014)
Rabbit Hole (2010)
Ramona and Beezus (2010)
Defendor (2009)
Blindness (2008)
For Your Consideration (2006)
The Night Listener (2006)
Cake (2005)
Sorry, Haters (2005)
3 Needles (2005)
Break a Leg (2005)
Hard Candy (2005)
Sideways (2004)
Wilby Wonderful (2004)
Rick (2003)
Under the Tuscan Sun (2003)
Long Life, Happiness & Prosperity (2002)
Full Frontal (2002)
Barrier Device (2002)
Big Fat Liar (2002)
The Princess Diaries (2001)
Three Lives of Kate (2000)
Dancing at the Blue Iguana (2000)
Waking the Dead (2000)
Guinevere (1999)
Permanent Midnight (1998)
Le violon rouge (1998)
Last Night (1998)
Bad Day On the Block (1997)
Bean (1997)
Cowgirl (1996)
Prey (1995)
Double Happiness (1994)