That woman was Meeyian Yong, who, nearly 10 years later, is still Q's manager. She lent her money and found her a place to stay until she started getting work.
At 165cm, she was too short for runway work, but she eventually began to find jobs in commercials. A photo shoot with the pop singer Nicholas Tse (謝霆鋒) changed everything. By all rights, Q said, she should not have gotten the job, but all the other models interviewed were taller than Tse.
The modeling gig caught the attention of the Hong Kong celebrity media. "It wasn't me," she said. "It was like, 'Who's that girl next to this super-famous guy?' That's how it all started." (She was born Margaret Denise Quigley, but her name was shortened to the more easily pronounceable Maggie Q by a Hong Kong newspaper.)
Q has been working steadily ever since, in roles both large (the leads in Naked Weapon and Manhattan Midnight) and less so. (She was cast as "girl in car" in Rush Hour 2.) In a weird twist, the model not tall or white or Asian enough for Asia appeared last year on the covers of Harper's Bazaar in Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Kazakhstan — not because tastes in models have changed so drastically, but because she had a part in one of the biggest Hollywood movies of that summer, Mission: Impossible III.
But as big as Asian-American talent can become in Asia, true success is still often measured in American terms. "My manager's biggest dream is for me to be on Letterman," Q said. "Letterman comes on at, like, 2am in Hong Kong, and she watches him every night."
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