Background and career
Alexandra Dawn Wong (born April 19, 1982) is an American actress and comedian. Her accolades include two Primetime Emmy Awards, three Golden Globe Awards, one Actor Award, and a Grammy Award nomination. She was named one of Time's 100 most influential people in 2020 and 2023.
She is best known for her Netflix stand-up specials Baby Cobra (2016), Hard Knock Wife (2018), Don Wong (2022), and Single Lady (2024). The last of these won her a Golden Globe Award. She won another Golden Globe and two Primetime Emmy Awards for her starring role in the Netflix dark comedy series Beef (2023), becoming the first Asian background woman to win a lead acting Emmy in a Limited Series or Movie.
Wong was a cast member on the ABC show American Housewife (2016–2021) and served as a writer for two episodes of the sitcom Fresh Off the Boat in 2015. She has voiced characters on the animated series Tuca & Bertie (2019–2022) and Big Mouth (2019–2023). She has also written and starred in the romantic comedy film Always Be My Maybe (2019).
Alexandra Dawn Wong was born in the neighborhood of Pacific Heights, San Francisco, on April 19, 1982. She is the youngest of four children in her family. Her Vietnamese mother, Tam "Tammy" Wong, moved from Huế, South Vietnam (now Vietnam) in 1960 to work as a social worker in the U.S. Her Chinese-American father, Adolphus Wong (1937–2011), was born in San Francisco and worked as an anesthesiologist for Kaiser Permanente for 30 years.
In 2000, Wong graduated from San Francisco University High School in San Francisco where she was student body class president. She went to UCLA, majoring in Asian American studies. During her junior year, she studied in Hanoi, Vietnam. After college, she continued her education in Vietnam through a Fulbright program.
