Summer Qing is a native of Beijing, where she graduated from the renowned performing division of Beijing Film Academy. Her film debut was as the female lead in Kaige Chen's 1990 Cannes Film Festival-competing film, Life on a String, about a pair of blind musicians in a rural village. Qing's naturalistic performance greatly contributed to the film, which cemented Chen's reputation as one of the foremost international filmmakers.
Soon after, she played the lead in the film of acclaimed director Zifeng Ling's Kuang, and was nominated for Best Actress at the Hundred Flowers awards. Her role in the TV series "Close to Forbidden City" then shot her to fame across the country as a sweet-natured ingénue.
In 1996, she starred in the Chinese historical epic, The Emperor's Shadow, which is a fictionalized account of China's first emperor and his relationship with a court musician. The film was widely recognized for its vast scope and breathtaking visuals, and Qing's leading men were You Ge, one of China's most popular actors today, and Jiang Wen, the internationally renowned actor and director.
Testament to her popularity then was Disney's choice to have her voice the part of Mulan in the dubbed Chinese version of their 1998 worldwide hit animated movie. That period also saw her play memorable parts in TV series such as Sun Rise in the East, Rain in the West, and Coming and Going.
Most Chinese TV audiences remember her from the 2000 big-budget China Central Television landmark production of Laughing in the Wind, which was based on a popular martial arts novel by Louis Cha. She continued to play regularly in films and TV series over the course of the next decade.
In 2007, she was featured in the Hong Kong action movie, Flash Point, which was a box-office hit across Asia. Most memorably, she played the pivotal part of Soong Ching-ling, wife of Sun Yat-sen and an honored historical figure known to every Chinese person, in the hugely successful 2009 film The Founding of a Republic. The film was made to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the People's Republic of China and produced by China Film Group and DMG Entertainment, which is also one of the producers behind Looper.
For that role, she won a Hundred Flowers Award for Best Supporting Actress and the same prize at the Macau International Film Festival. In 2011, Qing joined the cast of Looper, working with director Rian Johnson, Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Emily Blunt in her first Hollywood production. Looper was released worldwide on September 28th, 2012.
