UCPN SPECIAL: SAMANTHA JO

Samantha Jo was born at The Royal Victoria Hospital in Barrie in 1991 to the parents of Charles and Leslie Tjhia. She attended Monsignor Clair Elementary School and was always heavily involved in sports. From her beginnings on the school volleyball team, basketball team and martial arts practice at “The Barrie Jiu-Jitsu”, her preparation for stunt work was well under way.

 

At the age of 11, Samantha dipped her first toe into the industry after winning “Child of the Year” at the Model and Talent Search Canada in 2002. From here, she studied at the Toronto Academy of Acting and appeared in numerous commercials and on a number of print ads for companies like Sears and The May Company. She also took up a new Martial Art called “Wushu” (at Sunny Tang Martial Arts) which is a performance based style most recognizable as the style that Jet-Li practices. Knowing that it would only help her career in the performing arts, she moved to Richmond Hill, dedicated her life to the sport and went on the become a member of the National Wushu Team representing Canada at various international competitions. She is a double Gold-medalist in the 2006 and 2008 Pan-American Wushu Championships, Bronze medalist in the 2007 World Wushu Championships and even went on to compete in the 2008 Olympic Wushu Event in Beijing as a part of Team Canada.

 

It is after her Olympic feat that she got her first introductions into the Hollywood stunt industry. By age 18 and with a filmography that already included Scott Pilgrim vs. The World and Sucker Punch (in which she stunt doubled Jena Malone), Samantha moved to Los Angeles to further pursue her career. It is here that landed her breakout role of “Kitana” in the Mortal Kombat: Legacy web-series as well as “Car-vex” in the superhero blockbuster: Man of Steel.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3hRVbv4cE4

Now, she has been studying at Studio 4, a Los Angeles based acting school for the past 3 years and steadily growing as an artist. You can watch her in episodes of TNT’s Agent X and look out for her in the upcoming Wonder Woman and Justice League films set to release this year.

PHOTOS:

SJO1: Samantha Jo (2016) - Photo Credit: Madeline Machado

WushuSJ02: Samantha Jo, Wushu stance (2016) - Photo Credit: Alan Tang

Keep up with Samantha via her social media:

https://www.facebook.com/OfficialSamanthaJo

https://twitter.com/SamWJo