Brenda Song - September 2024 - Toronto International Film Festival - Last Showgirl premiere - Avalon
Brenda Song got her big break just as her mom was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The 36-year-old actress had just landed the role of London Tipton, a hotel heiress who served as a parody of Paris Hilton, on the Disney Channel sitcom The Suite Life of Zack and Cody in 2004 but had to deal with sudden family issues and also choose between doing the show or going to college.
Speaking on a new episode of Mythical Kitchen's Last Meals series, she said: "It's kind of crazy because when you're young, you don't understand the levity of things.
"It was the first time in my life that I was like, 'Oh, this is a crossroads in my life. Like, this is a big turning point. Whatever choice I make is going to change the course of my life.'
"My dad, who's a second grade schoolteacher, was like, 'You go to college to figure out what you wanna do, and if you want to continue to act, you have a beautiful opportunity to do it, but it can't be an after-school activity anymore. It has to be your career.'
"I remember, I found out my mom [Mai] had breast cancer and it was just -- I mean, cancer is the scariest six-letter word in the dictionary, because it just means, like, death or unknown.
"Like, you just don't know. And I think it just didn't even hit me."
The Running Point star has no idea how her mother managed to deal with breast cancer at such a young age but admitted that it inspired her to work with children whose parents were going through the same thing because it can be just as "confusing and scary" for them.
She said: "I look back and I don't know how my mom did it, because she got breast cancer in her early 30s, when she was, like, 31.
"And at that time, she had a teenager and two young kids and going through all of this. And I don't know how she was going through this and still my support system.
"When I was working with Disney, I worked a lot with families with kids who have been affected by cancer, because of course we wanna focus on whoever's going through the treatment.
"It also, you know, having the conversation with your family and being able to have an open conversation with younger children, because it's just so confusing and scary. And because I had two younger brothers, it was something that I felt very passionate about."