Canadian actor, comic, and activist Tommy Chong is greatest recognized for his string of marijuana-themed Cheech and Chong films with Los Angeles actor, comic, and activist Cheech Marin. While Chong has gone on to get pleasure from a fruitful performing profession, showing in thirty-plus movies since 1978, the Up in Smoke actor’s eldest daughter Rae Dawn Chong, may not be as recognizable as her father. Although not probably the most well-known actress within the leisure trade, Chong has labored arduous to solidify herself as a talented actress with minimal involvement from her extra fashionable father.
After Chong loved a profitable profession all through the Nineteen Eighties, her star progressively pale within the Nineties and continued to take action nicely into the brand new millennium. As many aware of Hollywood and its politics know, it’s troublesome for folks to start out a profession within the leisure trade, and that is very true for girls and other people of shade. However, followers of Rae Dawn Chong is likely to be shocked at how busy she’s been by the years, and this text will discover what the actress has been as much as recently.
Who Is Rae Dawn Chong?
Rae Dawn Chong is a Canadian-American actress and the oldest daughter of comedy legend Tommy Chong. Chong made her performing debut at 13 in 1974 as Greta within the tv present Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color. Four years later, Chong would make her feature-length debut at seventeen in 1978’s Stony Island, taking part in the function of Janetta and regardless of the movie’s low field workplace efficiency, would get pleasure from reward from critics.
After showing in a slew of movies all through the early ’80s, one in all which being 1984’s Cheech & Chong’s The Corsican Brothers, Chong’s recognition would enhance after co-starring within the Arnold Schwarzenegger motion automobile Commando and the Steven Spielberg interval drama The Color Purple, as Cindy and Squeak respectively. Critics and audiences praised Chong’s performances in each movies as Cindy wasn’t a damsel in misery, and Squeak showcased Chong’s dramatic vary. Chong starred in fifteen films all through the ’80s, six of them from 1985 alone, however there was one film particularly, 1986’s Soul Man, that will perpetually change her profession trajectory.
Rae Dawn Chong’s Career Slump
Despite the actresses’ prolific work ethic all through the Nineteen Eighties, Steve Miner’s mid-80s comedy Soul Man would negatively impression how audiences perceived Chong. Soul Man facilities round Mark Watson, a white college-aged scholar who needs to get into Harvard Law School however can’t as a result of his dad and mom refuse to pay for his tuition. After studying a few scholarship awarded to African American college students, he takes tanning tablets to darken his pores and skin and get accepted into the distinguished college. Critics and audiences panned the controversial movie because it was deemed insensitive and perpetuated stereotypes usually related to blackface. In the film, Chong performs Mark’s love curiosity, Sarah Walker, a hard-working African American scholar who didn’t obtain a scholarship as a result of Mark acquired it on behalf of his tanning capsule scheme.
At the time of Soul Man’s launch, Chong defended the movie and her resolution to look in it, however she would later reveal her resolution to take action is probably going what contributed to receiving fewer roles. Soul Man can be Chong’s final notable movie of the actress’ profession, as most of her work since has consisted of low-budget impartial movies, TV films, and both visitor or recurring roles in obscure tv exhibits. Nevertheless, Chong has stored busy and even acquired a Women Film Critics Circle Invisible Woman Award for her efficiency within the 2021 movie, The Sleeping Negro.
As if the controversy surrounding Soul Man wasn’t sufficient, Chong made headlines in 2013 when she expressed a couple of alternative phrases for former The Color Purple co-star Oprah Winfrey. In 2013, Chong did an interview for Matty P’s Radio Happy Hour, wherein she was ultimately requested about her performing profession, particularly her work in Commando and The Color Purple. Initially, issues had been cordial, however when the subject of working with Winfrey arose, issues bought awkward.
In the interview, Chong appears to flip-flop between praising her former co-star and criticizing her, at factors calling her “lovely” and at others, a “great brown-noser.” Despite releasing an apology shortly after the occasions of the interview, it’s broadly understood that leisure professionals respectably conduct themselves and reserve harsh feedback for face-to-face interactions. Nevertheless, the actress continues to be working, and we’re prepared to wager Winfrey is unfazed by Chong’s remarks.
Even although Chong’s movie profession didn’t attain the heights Commando and The Color Purple might have set her up for, she has remained busy and optimistic. From discovering Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 star Chris Pratt at a Bubba Gumps restaurant within the late ’90s to starring in AMC’s remake of Anne Rice’s 1976 novel, Interview with the Vampire, Chong hasn’t allowed any previous controversies cease her from pursuing new roles and serving to the following technology of actors do the identical.