Meiling Melançon was born to a Chinese/Japanese father and French mother, but was raised by her step-father who is American. Her childhood was spent in countries in Asia and Europe. At the age of five she learned to play guitar and was in a Summer children’s band called The Blossoms that toured around Japan. In her early teens, her family moved to the United States for the first time. She originally was aiming to pursue a career in Law. However, things changed when at the age of 18, her friend submitted her to the renowned modeling agency Kim Dawson in Dallas, Texas. Thus began a successful career as a model in both print and commercials. To date, she has appeared in over 75 commercials worldwide. From the advertising side, casting directors started calling her in for theatrical roles. Her first booked, being a small role as “Girl in Car” with then Hong Kong star Maggie Q. She soon booked guest starring roles in shows such as CSI and Deadwood. Mei realized early on the necessity of practice in order to be a truly free, authentic actor and has trained extensively for the last 12 years under Larry Moss and Nancy Banks.
She has played an eclectic group of characters in both film and television. More roles followed in The L Word’s last season as the popular character “Jamie Chen”; as Psylocke in X-Men: The Last Stand; as “Miyu”, Kevin Spacey’s assistant in Shrink, as Lynda in the HK-shot film Irreversi; as Dr. Catherine Ivy in the psychological thriller/horror film Pathology with Milo Ventimiglia. Mei also starred as Lotus Long in the biopic Keye Luke, which premiered at the 2012 Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival. In the warm-hearted comedy, Blumenthal she played Scottish actor Brian Cox’s niece, which premiered in 2013 at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival. Most recently she starred in the Di Boneventura produced Sci-fi Higher Power opposite Ron Eldard. She co-wrote and acted in the Americana thriller American Romance in 2014. The 3D Sci-fi thriller Shockwave Darkside premiered in August at the London Film4 Frightfest where she played a Sergeant named The Machine.
In 2013, Mei decided to put acting on the back-burner to focus on the creative side. She directed a short film Cafe On A Staircase; wrote a comedy short Inner Beauty, starring Liz Carey and Victoria’s Secret model Frankie Rayder for Funnyordie.com; Co-wrote a short film entitled Stephany + Me with Ben Duhl co-starring Tara Summers which won an audience award at the Palm Spring Film Festival.
Mei produced a PSA starring comedian Todd Glass called Is It? Which won a student Emmy and has been covered by The Huffington Post, Perez Hilton, and Upworthy, among other news outlets.
As a creator, Mei has numerous projects in development. Including, Fallen 8 which is based on the 8 Immortals of Chinese legend. She is also a freelance writer for Giant Robot Magazine.
She resides in Los Angeles.
