CBS' Julie Chen: Unique Blend of Cultural Influences Motivates Big Brother Host

In seventh grade Julie Chen joined her parents when they took her older sister Gladys to her first year at Wellesley College and Julie decided then and there she also wanted to attend school at Wellesley But her mom explained to the average quotBquot student she39d better crack the books if she hoped to be accepted Ultimately Julie went west to the University of Southern California but the New England trip was an eyeopener about college life and she became in her words quota geekquot and high honors student at Junior High School 194 in Queens voted by her classmates the quotmost intelligent and most likely to succeedquotBut by the time Julie graduated from St Francis Prep High School the sobriquet attached to her by her classmates was quotmost sophisticatedquot and New England ivystyle colleges no longer held appeal High school was a time of redirection for Julie who wrote in her school39s junior yearbook that her goal was to be an anchor woman on a New York television station and who has risen well beyond that to become one of TV39s most popular personalities as host of CBS39 The Early Show and for six years running the incredibly successful CBS series Big Brother She39s also half of one of Hollywood39s most beautiful professional couples with her husband of a year Leslie Moonves CEO of CBSJulie39s selfimposed life as a nerd geek and math wizard came to an embarrassing end when she tested poorly and was not accepted for the Bronx School of Science which both her older sisters attended Her pride wounded she opted instead for nearby St Francis where she was popular but didn39t date quotI even went to the Senior Prom with the friend of my best friend39s boyfriend and I was convinced I would never get marriedquotDuring our long lunch at Michael39s Restaurant in New York where Candace Bergen dined nearby with casting director Toni Howard Julie laughed quotI never said I would never get married but I never envisioned it I never envisioned having children either so if half is not true maybe not having children isn39t true eitherquotamp160But Julie is also well aware of the potential conflicts quotI don39t think I could deal with the guilt of not being there 110 percent like my mother was but I also don39t know if I would be happy not working I don39t know who I would bequot Julie39s mom and dad still live in the same small house in Bayside Queens where she grew up the house she still calls home quotThey have had an amazing love storyquot Julie shared Her mom grew up in Rangoon Burma where Julie39s grandfather was a leading industrialist quotthe Donald Trump of Burmaquot and her dad was born in China where his father was one of the top leaders in the government of Chiang Kaishek When the Communist government forced Chiang into exile Julie39s grandmother and her six children moved throughout China quotten steps ahead of the Communistsquot trying to escape to TaiwanIn one of those surreal twists of fate Taiwan had captured a ship in its territorial waters flying a Chinese flag In a negotiation to have the ship returned its owner agreed to assist several families escape from China to Taiwan One of those families included Julie39s dad and his five brothers and sisters The ship39s owner Of course it was Julie39s mom39s father The family successfully escaped going first to Burma where Julie39s mom and dad met and fell in love But the story of love triumphant doesn39t end thereJulie39s dad moved to Taiwan while her mom stayed in Burma and after college and military service her dad left Taiwan to attend graduate school at the University of Florida quotThey still have their love letters written on those old onion skin international air mail papersquot Julie smiles Feeling settled in the United States Julie39s dad sent a college application to WanLing asking her to come to the United States quotHe learned the University of Tennessee had a program that my mom would qualify for even though she spoke very little English She was accepted and moved to Knoxville and my dad drove hundreds of miles from Florida every weekend to see her When they graduated they moved to New York and got marriedquotquotThey were classic Chinese parents We couldn39t have sleepovers they had to meet our friends and I remember when Gladys was dating it was a big issue that her boyfriend was not Chinese My dadquot she adds quotalso had total control over the TV He would yell for us all to come running when he saw an Asian face on a program We laughed but it was a proud moment for him When Kaity Tong became an anchor on WABCTV it was my version of my dad seeing an Asian face on TV She was a real role model for me for the first time I realized it was okay to be an Asian female and to be a professional and on televisionquotJulie grew up with an incredible blend of cultural influences quotI was taught the Chinese work ethic and that failing was not an option My dad left the house every day at 6 AM taking a bus to the subway to the train to get to his job as a civil engineer in Newark New Jersey He never complained My mom made sure we went to fine restaurants and that we took advantage of Manhattan She took us to all the Broadway musicals the ballet and the museumsquot The family also regularly returned to Singapore to visit family and quotI saw how our family lived there with cooks and drivers and a wealthy lifestyle My mom would tell me if I wanted the finer things in life I would have to work hardquotJulie39s parents although traditional also did not impose on their daughters the traditional malefemale roles quotI was never able to follow the traditional gender rules I can39t be so accepting and can39t just go with the flow I need to be a decisionmakerquot One of her early decisions was to go to USC for college quotI wanted a big city and a school with a good broadcast program and I didn39t want to be in New York where my parents could check up on me all the timequot she laughed over her Salad Nicoise as her former Early Show colleague Lisa Bernbach and lunch companion Cathy Berlin stopped by to say hello quotA letter came from USC inviting me to apply and I thought if they want me it39s meant to bequot Of course Julie didn39t realize USC in the 1980s she was there from 1987 to 1991 was a quotsuitcasequot school quotAll my friends went home on weekends and I didn39t have a car in my freshman year So I focused on studying and on what I wanted to do which is what I39m actually doing nowquotHer first professional break came in the summer of 1989 quotthe summer of Tiananmen Squarequot she remembers when she was hired as an intern ironically on the CBS Morning News the same show she now anchors Harry Smith and Kathleen Sullivan a USC alumnus were anchors and Julie was disappointed she had virtually no contact with them instead answering phones and copying faxes for distribution She laughingly remembers her one chance to go on a live shoot an At Home segment with Wynton Marsalis quotWe set up the cameras and Kathleen did the interview from the studio We taped a photo of Kathleen to the camera so Wynton would have an image of who he was talking to It was the closest I got to KathleenquotA year later Julie got her first paid position 931 an hour as vacation relief desk assistant at ABC39s Nightline quotIt was the summer the first Gulf War broke out and it was a live show It was an amazing learning experiencequot she says After graduation Julie continued to work for ABC News in Los Angeles for three years capturing her first onair reporting job with WDTNTV in Dayton and quickly moving to become reporter and anchor for WCBSTV in New York until joining the CBS Morning News and The Early ShowJulie and Leslie commute between New York and Los Angeles and although she feels at home in both cities she considers that small house in Queens to be her true home quotIt still has the smell of my mother39s cooking and there is nothing to compare to thatquot Those happy memories remain strong influences in Julie39s life along with her two nephews who she loves and her cousin39s three children quotI get to be an aunt and spoil them and Leslie is wonderful with themquot As Julie smiles at the mental images of family life it seems almost inevitable that she and Leslie will soon be starting a family of their ownTo contact Julie Chen please email contactmediavillagecom

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CBS' Julie Chen: Unique Blend of Cultural Influences Motivates Big Brother Host

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