Biography
Korean-American actor Sung Kang became widely known as Han Lue, a member of the "Fast & Furious" crew in four films in the popular action series, which led to work in other action features like "Live Free or Die Hard" (2007) and roles in television series like "Power" (Starz, 2014- ). Born Kang Sung-Ho in Gainesville, Georgia on April 8, 1972, he was the son of South Korean immigrant parents who relocated throughout his childhood due to their obligations to the United States military. They eventually settled in California, where he attended the University of California, Riverside with the intention of earning a degree in law. To his parents' dismay, Kang decided to become an actor, and headed to Los Angeles, where he landed minor roles on series like "Martial Law" (CBS, 1998-2000) and in features like "Pearl Harbor" (2000). His breakthrough role came in 2002 as a co-star and co-producer of "Better Luck Tomorrow" (2002), an independently financed crime picture with a predominately Asian cast that also marked the directorial debut of Justin Lin, who would later cast Kang as a key supporting figure in the "Fast and Furious" franchise. Kang made his first appearance in the third title in the series, "The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift" (2006) playing the jittery, speed-loving Han Lue, who dies in the film's conclusion. When the franchise reunited its original cast - including Vin Diesel and Paul Walker - for "Fast & Furious" (2009), the series' timeline was reset to disregard the events in "Tokyo Drift," thus reviving Han to become a key member of the on-screen team's vehicular mayhem until "Fast & Furious 6" (2013), where he is seen returning to Japan and facing the demise that capped "Tokyo Drift." The international success of the "Fast and Furious" films also gave Kang's career profile a boost, and he enjoyed supporting roles in films like "Live Free or Die Hard" and "Ninja Assassin" (2009), as well as a rare venture into comedy as the president of Korea in the "Tae Do" sketches for "MADtv" (Fox, 1995-2009, The CW, 2016). Kang also starred in the short-lived Fox crime series "Gang Related" (2014), playing an FBI agent assisting a gang task force with the Los Angeles Police Department. He returned to television in 2017 in a supporting role on "Power" as an assistant U.S. attorney pursuing the series' drug-dealing antihero, Ghost (played by Omari Hardwick).
