Kathy Uyen returns to Bay Area after finding stardom in Vietnam

Inspiration and opportunity is where you find it, and perhaps no one has embodied what CAAMFest is all about better than San Jose's own Kathy Uyen, who was inspired by the largest Asian-themed film festival in the United States as a student - and now will open it with a comedy that she stars in, co-wrote and co-produced.

"How to Fight in Six-Inch Heels," a comedy that was the biggest box office hit in Vietnam in 2013, opens the 2014 edition of CAAMFest. Hometown girl makes good, opens hometown festival that helped inspire her.

"It feels like a closed circle," said Uyen, who will attend the screening at the Castro Theatre and the festival's launch party afterward at the Asian Art Museum. "The festival is a great opportunity for Asian American and Bay Area filmmakers to become more involved and be inspired to do films. I feel real honored. Who knew later on that my very first project as a writer, producer and lead actress would premiere here where I was born and raised?"

Back when she was Kathy Uyen Nguyen and CAAMFest was the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, she was a student who was inspired by the diversity of faces she saw on the screen, and knew she had to become an actress.

She went for it - bouncing around Los Angeles, making small indie films, waiting tables and trying to make her big break happen. She made two appearances on the hit sitcom "How I Met Your Mother," then thought she was on her way when was cast in the Harrison Ford-Ashley Judd film "Crossing Over."

But her part didn't survive - her story line was dumped to pare down the film's length.

When that door closed, another opened - in Vietnam. Suddenly, the land her parents fled during the Vietnam War became the place where their daughter would find success.

"I was at a crossroads in my life," Uyen said by phone from Ho Chi Minh City. "It was hard for me because I was so passionate - I had been in Hollywood and been into the scene in L.A., taking all these classes, learning as much as I could about my craft. ... But here in Vietnam I was getting lead roles that I could sink my teeth into as an actor. I didn't plan to move to Vietnam. It just happened.

Sudden celebrity

"Suddenly I'm this celebrity - I'm walking red carpets, I'm on magazine covers - it was just strange at first. I just had to fake it until I make it, right?"

That newbie experience helped inform her character in "How to Fight in Six-Inch Heels." Uyen plays Anne, a New York fashion designer who thinks her fiance (Australian-Vietnamese actor and magician Petey "Majik" Nguyen), who is temporarily in Ho Chi Minh City to help his company's mobile phone launch, is cheating on her. So she high-tails it to the former Saigon and disguises herself as a fashion model - requiring a huge makeover - to spy on him.

In Hollywood-speak, the movie would be "The Devil Wears Prada" meets "Mean Girls."

"Heels," directed by Ham Tran ("Journey From the Fall"), is the fourth movie she's made in Asia - Vietnam's "Passport to Love" first brought her attention, then "Fool for Love" was a solid hit, followed by a supporting role in the Hong Kong film "Supercapitalist." In addition, she's hosting, writing and directing a travel series for the Singapore tourism board.

"I've been getting into more the creative side," Uyen said. " 'How to Fight' gave me confidence in my writing, and not just be an actress."

For the time being, Uyen is happy to stay in Asia. But she can't help but wonder, with her success and experience, what it would be like to give Hollywood another shot.

Few Vietnamese actors

"There aren't that many Vietnamese actors in Hollywood," she says. "When I was growing up, there was only Dustin Nguyen ("21 Jump Street") and Kieu Chinh ("MASH," "The Joy Luck Club")," Uyen said. "I remember looking up to Kieu Chinh and saying, 'If she could do it, so could I.'

"The industry is more diverse now, but there still aren't that many leading roles available for Asian actors." {sbox}