Designer, painter, actor, restaurateur, collector and frustrated director - Michael Chow is a cultural icon who has directs his kaleidoscope vision to the creation of beauty and style in every aspect of his life.

His enigmatic visage, the singular nature of his life path, his repertoire of talents, and his ability to spark trends with uncommon clarity has captured the imagination of many and immortalized on canvas by artists such as Andy Warhol, David Hockney, Keith Haring (who painted “M. Chow as Green Prawn in a Bowl of Needle” in recognition of MR CHOW’s specialty dish – Green Prawns) and Jean Michael Basquiat.

This artistic visionary was born to a professional theatrical family in the Middle Kingdom in the City of Shanghai. His father, Zhou Xing Fang, was a legendary grand master of the Peking Opera who whetted his appetite for applause and the theater life. His mother gave her six children Western names.

Michael Chow left his homeland in 1952 (with his older sister and actress Tsai Chin – who adopted a Chinese name given by her father for the stage) at the tender age of twelve and ventured to London where he studied architecture and later worked as a painter/sculptor.

Chow endured the bullying of other adolescents at two dismal boarding schools before finding his way to London. He spent a year at St. Martin's, the art school, and two more years in architecture school before assuming the role of starving Bohemian artist.

Despite his sensitivity to Chinese stereotypes, he has portrayed--and continues to portray them in films since 1957 such as "You Only Live Twice," “Basquiat” (he played himself), “Rush Hour I & II,” British production of “Violent Playground” (played a Chinese laundry boy in 1958), "Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?" and "Lethal Weapon 4." He played himself in "Basquiat." His Korean-born wife, who moved here at 17, refused sugar cane and ramen noodle commercials when she was modeling.

He rarely held a traditional job; he was a dishwasher and a waiter in restaurants for a matter of months. His first big break was his much-acclaimed design of a London hair salon in 1965. After that, he only did entrepreneurial projects, indulging his creative talent, his sense of glamour and his prescience of the next hot thing.

As a self-designated "cultural ambassador," he opened the London “MR. CHOW” in 1968 when the British capital was the center of chic in music, art and fashion. He became the catalyst of the “designer restaurant” movement when he launched the restaurant and remains as a world renowned blueprint for restaurateurs.

When he became a restaurateur in London 31 years ago, he wanted to show Westerners two things: that Chinese cuisine was one of the remaining great cultural contributions of his native land and that it could be the centerpiece of an elegant restaurant.

In the process, the restaurant business provided him with the dignity denied him as a young Chinese immigrant in 1950s and '60s London and the renown, not to mention wealth, that eluded him as a struggling young artist.

MR CHOW London, the semi-legendary Beverly Hills location (At the 1974 opening, Clint Eastwood and Eartha Kitt rubbed shoulders with Robert Wise and Olivia de Havilland in a style that was the antithesis of “Chinoiserie” that was started by a $500,000 investment from A&M Records co-founder Jerry Moss), Miami, Mexico, Westwood (his most unusual restaurant built on a 1929 historic building that once was the site of a domed Bank of America branch that at the opening had people such as Ed Ruscha, Vidal Sassoon, Eric Clapton, Lauren Holly and Michael York), New York and Seoul (institution that opened in 2004 in the Apgujeong-dong district) are institutions that have consistently hosting the elite aristocracy of film, music, fashion and art.

Starting in 1965, he has designed boutiques in London as well as a dozen restaurants. His architectural design acumen earned the admiration of Giorgio Armani, and in 1988 Michael designed the Armani boutique on Rodeo Drive. In 1998, he designed a second boutique for Armani at the Bellagio hotel in Las Vegas.

After deciding to move to Los Angeles in 1985, two years later, Michael met his current wife, Eva Chun, a fashion designer. She was a prodigy of two great masters of traditional Chinese ink painting. Michael and Eva were married in 1992 and two years later had a daughter named Asia. Chun was keen on promoting MR CHOW's tradition as a global "cultural ambassador" after inspiring great artists, such as Armani, Andy Warhol, David Hockney and Jean Michael Basquiat.

His efforts to break into film directing have not been successful. Regarding an area that he hasn’t yet conquered, can you imagine what he'd be like as a film director? Autocratic, audacious and, just when you think you have him pegged, unexpectedly wry. All the traits that have distinguished him in the arena of tables and silverware and uplighting (a favorite ploy) would serve him well in Hollywood, the world he has yet to conquer.

All three of his wives came from the fashion world. At the time that he was opening his London restaurant, his yearlong marriage to Vogue creative director Grace Coddington (married in 1969), then a fashion editor at British Vogue, fell apart.

In 1972, he then married Tina Chow in 1972, a former model and jewelry designer who was revered as an icon of international style. In the late '70s and early '80s, Michael and Tina Chow epitomized the jet-set lifestyle, commuting between continents to their restaurants, being photographed by Helmut Newton in an edgy 1984 tableau that featured Tina tied to the bar of Mr Chow in Beverly Hills while Michael eyed her.

The stunning daughter of a Japanese war-bride mother and American father, Tina had two children with Michael—China (25, an actress) and Maximillian (22, student). She died from AIDS complications (reportedly from an affair with a Frenchman) in 1992 at the age of 41.

Regarding success - "Whether it's food or movies or designer interiors, the key is always the same," says Chow, "which is, without sounding too corny, faith. Believe in God and believe in the truth. If you do everything correctly with faith, what I call a 'controlled accident' happens. Masterpieces are controlled accidents. If masterpieces were not controlled accidents, then people would be producing masterpieces all day long. It's a reward from God. You've been faithful."

"I want to be creative and I want to have fame," he says. "That eliminates racism. If I am famous, people look at fame first before the race."

His sister, the film and stage actress Tsai Chin, wrote in her 1988 autobiography, "Daughter of Shanghai," that her brother's decision to use the title was a "brilliant stroke, for people would now address him unconsciously with respect." It worked.

What he most worships is his creative vision that has held him in relatively good stead as an entrepreneur. He has had failures (he has opened, by his count, 11 restaurants across the world) and aborted projects. A plan three years ago to open four Chow restaurants on the site of the old Chasen's was scrapped.

But for the most part, Michael Chow has had success that reflects his highly developed sense of style in food, design and art. He has become known for his personal style as well--the signature black-framed glasses, the black suits with mandarin collars, the customized convertible Bentley he drives around town.

"I usually risk all," Chow says calmly. "Either you believe in it or you don't."

 

.JULIE CHEN

	Julie Chen

Julie Chen has been an anchor of The Early Show, CBS News' weekday morning broadcast since October 2002. Her recent duties included delivering foreign reports for the program from Kuwait and Qatar during the war in Iraq.

Before that, Chen served as news anchor of The Early Show and anchor of the CBS Morning News, the CBS Television Network's early-morning, half-hour broadcast, since Nov. 1, 1999, when The Early Show debuted.

Chen had previously filled in as news anchor for the CBS Morning News and "This Morning" (June-November 1999). She served as a reporter and anchor for WCBS-TV, the CBS Owned station in New York (1997-99). Before joining CBS News, Chen was a reporter for WDTN-TV Dayton (1995-97). She was a producer for ABC News One (1992-95), that network's affiliate news service, and she was a desk assistant in ABC News' Los Angeles bureau (1990-91), where she worked on the award-winning primetime special "Anatomy of a Riot."

Chen has also hosts Big Brother, a summer reality series, for CBS.

Chen was born on Jan. 6, 1970 in Queens, N.Y. She was graduated from the University of Southern California in 1991 with a degree in broadcast journalism and English. Chen lives in New York.

Julie Chen, the youngest daughter of Chinese immigrants, was born in New York, as the youngest of three girls. She was raised in Bayside, Queens, the only family home she's ever known. "She was a good baby. She was a very easy, you know, to take care of," says her mom, Wan Ling Chen. She was, by all accounts, happy, and a handful. "We had three girls, and the elder (Gladys) and the second, they are more like girlish. And she is a little bit naughtier," says her mom.

After high school graduation, she went to journalism school at the University of Southern California. "We were very committed to our schoolwork. But we were also very, very committed to the social aspect of being in college. She knew what she wanted to do, whether it was journalism or going to the hottest clubs. And we did it all the time," says college buddy Jennifer Bresnan.

Her talents including being a “pop diva wannabe” who is a great singer and dancer, states her family after watching her accurately imitating Michael Jackson's "Beat It." Her many talents, skills and beauty has made her an item with CBS head Les Moonves.