Jason Keng-Kwin Chan (born December 1, 1971) is a Malaysian-born Australian actor best known for his role as

Cameron Watanabe ''Power Rangers Ninja Storm'' is the 2003 Power Rangers season that tells the story of the fight between the Wind Ninja Rangers and the evil Space Ninjas led by Lothor. The Power Rangers This generation of Power Rangers is unique in which they ...

, the Green Samurai Ranger, as well as his clone, Cyber Cam, in '' Power Rangers: Ninja Storm''. He is currently a multi-award-winning writer, director, composer and actor based in Singapore. He is co-founder of BananaMana Films, which is one of Singapore's premiere production companies for creating Asian dramas in English for global distribution.

Background & Training

Born in

Kuala Lumpur , anthem = ''Maju dan Sejahtera'' , image_map = , map_caption = , pushpin_map = Malaysia#Southeast Asia#Asia , pushpin_map_caption = , coordinates = , sub ...

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

, Chan is of

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

descent and moved to

Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth i ...

, Western Australia with his family when he was only 5 years old. He entered medical school at the

University of Western Australia The University of Western Australia (UWA) is a public research university in the Australian state of Western Australia. The university's main campus is in Perth, the state capital, with a secondary campus in Albany and various other facilitie ...

, but Chan continued to pursue the creative arts, studying

ballet Ballet () is a type of performance dance that originated during the Italian Renaissance in the fifteenth century and later developed into a concert dance form in France and Russia. It has since become a widespread and highly technical form of ...

, contemporary dance, and

jazz dance Jazz dance is a performance dance and style that arose in the United States in the mid 20th century. Jazz dance may allude to vernacular jazz about to Broadway or dramatic jazz. The two types expand on African American vernacular styles of danc ...

at the

Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts The Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) at Edith Cowan University (ECU) was established in 1980 to provide performing arts tuition. WAAPA (commonly pronounced "whopp-a") operates as a part of ECU, located at the ECU campus in ...

. After graduating, he obtained his Fellowship in General Practice and worked as a General Practitioner for a few years before gaining a place in the renowned

National Institute of Dramatic Art The National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) is an Australian educational institution for the performing arts is based in Sydney, New South Wales. Founded in 1958, many of Australia's leading actors and directors trained at NIDA, including Cat ...

(NIDA) in Sydney (other graduates include:

Mel Gibson Mel Columcille Gerard Gibson (born January 3, 1956) is an American actor, film director, and producer. He is best known for his action hero roles, particularly his breakout role as Max Rockatansky in the first three films of the post-apoca ...

, Cate Blanchett,

Judy Davis Judith Davis (born 23 April 1955) is an Australian actress in film, television, and on stage. With a career spanning over 40 years, she has been commended for her versatility and regarded as one of the finest actresses of her generation. Frequen ...

Baz Luhrmann Mark Anthony Luhrmann (born 17 September 1962), known professionally as Baz Luhrmann, is an Australian film director, producer, writer and actor. With projects spanning film, television, opera, theatre, music and recording industries, he is re ...

and

Hugo Weaving Hugo Wallace Weaving (born 4 April 1960) is an English actor. Born in Colonial Nigeria to English parents, he has resided in Australia for the entirety of his career. He is the recipient of six Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts ...

) where he obtained a Bachelor of Dramatic Arts in Acting. He is the co-founder of the Production Company "BananaMana Films" along with Christian Lee. Chan currently resides in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

Current Work

Since co-founding BananaMana Films, Jason has gone on to write, direct, edit and produce for various projects. The first series he co-wrote, directed, produced and acted in was a web series: "What Do Men Want?". However, prior to production the national broadcaster of Singapore asked to have it converted into a full length TV series and it aired in 2014 as a 13 x half hour Romantic comedic TV drama. Jason and Christian won an outstanding directing in a drama series award at LA Webfest for this drama. Their second drama "Perfect Girl" was created as a 10 x 5-8min web series. This series went on to win 7 international awards from 16 nominations. Jason was credited as writer and composer, and shared directing and editing credits. Recently, Jason has co-written, directed and scored a TV pilot "Bang Bang Club" which has gone on to win a Platinum REMI award at the Worldfest Houston International Film Festival 2016. Jason was also nominated for Best Editing and Best Original Score for this project at the Indie Series Awards (LA) 2016.

Awards

Jason has been a recipient of numerous awards and nominations in various categories: writing, directing, acting, editing, composing. Awards * Platinum Remi (Houston International Film Fest 2016) * Outstanding Writing (LA Webfest 2015) * Outstanding Directing (LA Webfest 2015) * Outstanding Editing (LA Webfest 2015) * Outstanding Drama Series (LA Webfest 2015) * Outstanding Drama (Toronto Webfest 2015) * Best International Series (Atlanta Webfest 2014) Nominations * Best Editing (Indie Series Awards 2016) * Best Score (Indie Series Awards 2016) * Outstanding Lead Actor (LA Webfest 2015) * Outstanding Cinematography (LA Webfest 2015) * Triple Threat Auteur (Toronto Webfest 2015) * Best Overall Series (Toronto Webfest 2015) * Best Drama (Vancouver Webfest 2015)

Film

Most recently "Perfect Girl", originally a web series, was picked up as a short feature by global streaming platform VIKI.com. It stars Jason Chan and Khaleila Hisham as the leads and won them both Outstanding Acting nominations and awards in US web series festivals. His feature film credits include: the animated feature ''Sing to the Dawn''. where he played the villain, and ''

The Leap Years ''The Leap Years'' (also known as ''Leap of Love'') is a Singapore film produced by Mediacorp Raintree Pictures, based on the novella ''Leap of Love'' by the author Catherine Lim. The production for the film started in 2005, and the film was init ...

'' in which he plays the role of "Raymond" alongside Ananda Everingham and

Wong Li-Lin Wong Li Lin () (born 30 August 1972) is a Singaporean media personality and businesswoman. She was formerly an actress and host on Singaporean television. Early life Wong Li Lin is the youngest in a family of 4 siblings. She has 3 elder bro ...

. He appeared briefly in '' Candy'', an Australian film, as

Heath Ledger Heath Andrew Ledger (4 April 1979 – 22 January 2008) was an Australian actor and music video director. After playing roles in several Australian television and film productions during the 1990s, Ledger moved to the United States in 1998 to ...

's doctor and very briefly in "Stealth" as one of the technicians. He co-wrote, co-produced and co-directed the 2017 cross-cultural food film '' Jimami Tofu'' with Christian Lee, where it world premiered and won the Audience Choice Award at the 37th

Hawaii International Film Festival The Hawai'i International Film Festival (HIFF) is an annual film festival held in the United States state of Hawaii. HIFF has a focus on Asian-Pacific cinema, education, and the work of new and emerging filmmakers. HIFF’s primary festival is ...

Television

In 2014, Jason appeared as co-lead in "What Do Men Want?" - a 13 x half hour romantic drama co-created and directed by himself and his business partner Christian Lee. The drama won them both an Outstanding Directing award at LA Webfest 2016 and aired on national TV in Singapore in 2014. On graduating from drama school, Chan appeared as host of Disney Channel's

Playhouse Disney Playhouse Disney was a brand of programming blocks and international cable and satellite television channels that were owned by the Disney Channels Worldwide unit (now Disney Branded Television) of The Walt Disney Company's Disney–ABC Televi ...

block which aired throughout Australia. In 2003, he then garnered a role as the Green Samurai Ranger, Cameron Watanabe, in the American TV series: ''

Power Rangers Ninja Storm ''Power Rangers Ninja Storm'' is a television series and the eleventh season of the ''Power Rangers'' franchise, based on the 26th Super Sentai series '' Ninpuu Sentai Hurricaneger''. The season marked a series of firsts in the franchise, being ...

''. In

he has appeared in many

Mediacorp Mediacorp Pte. Ltd., doing business as Mediacorp and stylised as mediacorp, is a media conglomerate in Singapore. Owned by Temasek Holdings—the holding company of the Government of Singapore—it owns television, radio, and digital media prope ...

Channel 5 and Art Central productions including: ''My Sassy Neighbour'', ''Six Weeks'', ''Parental Guidance'', ''9 Lives'', Mental and ''The Secret Lives of Sorry Stars.'' In Australia he played opposite Jaqueline Macqenzie in ''

Two Twisted ''Two Twisted'' is an Australian TV mystery anthology drama which premiered on the Nine Network on 14 August 2006. Narrated by Bryan Brown, who also produced the series' predecessor, ''Twisted Tales'', each episode of the series contains two sh ...

''. Jason has also played leads in German telemovies including: "Love in the Lion City", "The Last Patriarch", "Love and Death in Java" and "House of Harmony".

Theatre

In theatre, Jason debuted in the lead role of 'Kevin' in "Connie and Kevin and the Secret Life of Groceries" in Sydney, then continued in Singapore with ‘Chris’ in Action Theatre's “The Admiral’s Odyssey”, Clifford Bradshaw in Toyfactory's "Cabaret", Lysander in SRT's "A Midsummer Night's Dream", Andy in SRT's "The Office Party", Claudio in SRT's "Much Ado About Nothing" and Marc in The Ensemble Theatre's production of "ART".

References

External links

* http://www.BananaManaFilms.com * http://www.aadb.com.sg/jason/ * {{DEFAULTSORT:Chan, Jason 1971 births 21st-century Australian male actors Australian expatriates in Singapore Australian people of Chinese descent Australian people of Malaysian descent Living people Malaysian emigrants to Australia Malaysian people of Chinese descent National Institute of Dramatic Art alumni University of Western Australia alumni People who lost Malaysian citizenship Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts alumni