Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#689
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Ken Leung represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 29 years in, and Ken is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Ken Leung appears in 19 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Ken. Project Hail Mary is the clearest case: a film rated 8.8 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.
The recognisable elements are versatility, transformation, quiet performance. Watch two of these films back to back and the method separates from the material — the same instrument, tuned differently for science fiction, adventure, action. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Phil Lord, Justin Lin, Todd Phillips and others, Ken Leung helped set a standard other performers now audition against. Awards bodies have been slower than the work, which is usually the sign of a career built on choices rather than campaigns.
Project Hail Mary (2026) as Yao · Saw (2004) as Detective Steven Sing · Last Days (2025) as Patrick
Career snapshot
Ranked #689 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
19
1997–2026
Career length
29 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
8.8
Project Hail Mary
Average Nutevio score
6.6
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
8.7
Project Hail Mary
Most frequent director
Brett Ratner
4 films together
Longest collaboration
4×
With Brett Ratner
Most common genre
Drama
9 titles
Average runtime
1h 56m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
7.0
out of 10
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio metric
Cultural impact and legacy, measured separately from craft — how far the work travelled once it left the cinema.
Nutevio Influence Score
6.8
out of 10
A quieter influence — felt inside the films rather than across the industry.
How far the work travelled past the people who saw it first.
What survives once the release-week conversation has burned off.
Institutional acknowledgement, weighted but never decisive.
Years of chosen, relevant work rather than years merely employed.
Statuettes, read as evidence rather than verdict.
Roles named without needing the film named alongside them.
Directors who wrote parts because this performer existed.
The reading other performers now have to answer.
Actor DNA
A fingerprint derived from the roles themselves — register, range and the kind of film they carry.
The shape of a career
Every performance plotted in time. Hover a point to read the title behind it.
Peak years
Where the scores, the awards and the sheer volume of work agree with each other.
Best decade
2020s
7.1 average MV
The 2020s are where the work and the material meet. Project Hail Mary, Last Days, Joker: Folie à Deux — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2020s
7.1
Across 5 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2020s
7.1
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
1990s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Rush Hour, Kundun.
Most productive era
2000s
10 films
The busiest stretch of the catalogue — volume that reads as appetite rather than availability.
Range, mapped
Genres down the side, decades across the top. Warmer cells mean stronger titles.
| Genre | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.71 film | 7.14 films | 0.01 film | 6.83 films |
| Action | 7.21 film | 6.72 films | 7.51 film | 7.51 film |
| Thriller | — | 7.23 films | — | 6.43 films |
| Comedy | 7.21 film | 6.63 films | — | — |
| Crime | 7.21 film | 7.34 films | — | 5.41 film |
| Romance | — | 6.63 films | — | — |
| Horror | — | 7.32 films | — | 6.31 film |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
1997Kundun
Where our catalogue meets this career, as (voice).
Highest rated performance · Career peak · Most recent film
8.8 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer. Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once. The current state of the argument, as Yao.
Our order
Every performance in the catalogue, ordered by Nutevio Score.
Every title
Filter by genre or decade, and compare any two titles side by side.
19 of 19 films
as Kevin
Directed by Will Merrick
as Patrick
Directed by Justin Lin
as Admiral Statura
Directed by J.J. Abrams
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
Loading credits…
The defining work
#1
Yao
Project Hail Mary (2026)
Performance score8.7
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Yao gives Ken Leung a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Kevin
Missing (2023)
Performance score7.7
Missing asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Kevin is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Detective Steven Sing
Saw (2004)
Performance score7.7
Saw asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Detective Steven Sing is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Patrick
Last Days (2025)
Performance score7.6
Last Days asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Patrick is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movieStart here
A guided path through the work, ordered so each film explains the next.
Best entry point
as Yao
Start here. Project Hail Mary is the clearest statement of what Ken Leung does — accessible, 157 minutes, and rated 8.8 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Ken at the most legible performance, then move forward in time so each film reads as a response to the one before it rather than a repetition of it.
Saw (2004)
A deliberate change of key after Project Hail Mary — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)
A deliberate change of key after Saw — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Missing (2023)
A deliberate change of key after Star Wars: The Force Awakens — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Last Days (2025)
Keeps the drama register of Missing but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Brett Ratner
Director
4 films together
Notably Rush Hour
Martin Scorsese
Director
1 film together
Notably Kundun
Edward Norton
Director
1 film together
Notably Keeping the Faith
Cameron Crowe
Director
1 film together
Notably Vanilla Sky
Tony Scott
Director
1 film together
Notably Spy Game
Steven Spielberg
Director
1 film together
Notably A.I. Artificial Intelligence
James Wan
Director
1 film together
Notably Saw
Noah Baumbach
Director
1 film together
Notably The Squid and the Whale
Spike Lee
Director
1 film together
Notably Inside Man
J.J. Abrams
Director
1 film together
Notably Star Wars: The Force Awakens
M. Night Shyamalan
Director
1 film together
Notably Old
Will Merrick
Director
1 film together
Notably Missing
Todd Phillips
Director
1 film together
Notably Joker: Folie à Deux
Justin Lin
Director
1 film together
Notably Last Days
Phil Lord
Director
1 film together
Notably Project Hail Mary
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Brett Ratner
Director
4 films together · 6.9 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 4 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Rush HourPhil Lord
Director
1 film together · 8.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Project Hail MaryJames Wan
Director
1 film together · 7.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
SawJustin Lin
Director
1 film together · 7.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Last DaysJ.J. Abrams
Director
1 film together · 7.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Star Wars: The Force AwakensSpike Lee
Director
1 film together · 7.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Inside ManWill Merrick
Director
1 film together · 7.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
MissingSteven Spielberg
Director
1 film together · 7.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
A.I. Artificial IntelligenceNoah Baumbach
Director
1 film together · 7.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Squid and the WhaleTony Scott
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Spy GameCameron Crowe
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Vanilla SkyMartin Scorsese
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
KundunM. Night Shyamalan
Director
1 film together · 6.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
OldEdward Norton
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Keeping the FaithTodd Phillips
Director
1 film together · 5.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Joker: Folie à DeuxSix degrees
Follow the thread outward — director, film, co-star, and the film after that.
Categories of our own
Six editorial categories we apply to every performer we cover.
Most rewatchable
Project Hail Mary
as Yao
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
The Family Man
as Sam Wong
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Project Hail Mary
as Yao
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
X-Men: The Last Stand
as Kid Omega
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Project Hail Mary
as Yao
If the career had to be argued in a single scene, our editors would pick one from this film and rest the case.
In their films' words
“You can build a whole film around a performer who knows when not to speak. Ken Leung has known it for a long time.”
Head to head
Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.
Ours alone
Recognitions handed out by this desk, on criteria no awards body uses.
Career Achievement
Awarded
29 years of relevant work — not merely a long career, but a long career of choices.
Modern Classic Performer
Awarded
Defining performances delivered inside the last twenty-five years, in films already being taught rather than merely remembered.
Drama Legend
Awarded
9 catalogue titles in drama, each one a reference point for the films that followed.
Our desk
Best ending, best opening, best twist and the rest — categories we apply to everyone we cover.
Best ending
Project Hail Mary
as Yao
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Saw
as Detective Steven Sing
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
The Family Man
as Sam Wong
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Saw
as Detective Steven Sing
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Project Hail Mary
as Yao
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Last Days
as Patrick
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
The Family Man
as Sam Wong
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
as Admiral Statura
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
If you like this performer
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Works with the same directors — Martin Scorsese
Robert De Niro
Works with the same directors — Martin Scorsese
David Krumholtz
Built a career in the same territory: action and adventure
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Built a career in the same territory: drama and history
Have your say
Community
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Reference
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