1960-10-24

B.D. WONG, an American actor born on this date; Wong is a fourth generation Chinese-American, he made his Broadway debut in 1988 in M. Butterfly, for which he became and remains the only actor to win the five major theater prizes for the same role. But it was not enough to convince David Cronenberg to cast him in the movie version five years later, when he chose John Lone instead.

Wong starred with Margaret Cho in her much praised, quickly canceled series All American Girl, then played a priest on Oz, and Dr. George Huang, a psychiatrist, on NBC’s Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. He and his former partner Richie Jackson, an agent (who married producer Jordan Roth in 2012) are parents of a son named Foo, the surviving one of twins born extremely prematurely. Wong wrote a book about the experience called Following Foo. He made his debut as a television director on Comedy Central’s “Awkwafina is Nora from Queens.”

Wong donates his time and resources to a number of LGBT and arts-related charities, such as the Ali Forney Center, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, Materials for the Arts, and Rosie’s Theater Kids, of which he is also a board member.

In October 2018, Wong married Richert John Frederickson Schnorr, his partner of eight years, in Brooklyn, New York City.