Minh-Khai Phan-Thi

Minh-Khai Phan-Thi (1974-    ) is a German television personality and film actress of Vietnamese origin.

Born in Darmstadt, West Germany to Vietnamese parents, Minh-Khai Phan-Thi was raised in an upper middle-class family.  Both of her parents were highly educated professionals.  Her father was an engineer, while her mother was a chemist with a doctorate degree.  At the age of 10, Minh-Khai Phan-Thi and her family relocated to Munich where she would later graduate from high school.

Minh-Khai Phan-Thi got her first big break in 1994, after she had graduated from high school when she became host of the children's television program, Die Hugo Show, for the Kabel-1 channel in Germany.  Two years later, she would become the hostess and permanent veejay on the popular German music channel, VIVA.

As an actress, Minh-Khai Phan-Thi has enjoyed a successful career in both television and cinema of Germany.  In 1997, she was cast in her first major role in the German television movie, Jagdsaison.  Since then, Minh-Khai Phan-Thi has starred in many other German television movies including Gegetzt - Der Tod im Sucher (1998), Rette Deine Haut (Run While You Can) (2001), Die Novizin (2002), Herz Oder Knete (2002), Männer ticken, Frauen anders (2011) and Sieben Tage Ohne (2013).  She has also had several recurring roles on various German television series such as Dr. Yvonne Janus on Post Mortem (2008), Mimi Hu on Nachstschicht (2003-2015), Betty on Christine. Perfekt War Gestern! (2013) and Alexa Seifart on Notruf Hafenkante (2015).  In 2004, Minh-Khai Phan-Thi wrote, directed and starred in the German television documentary, Mein Vietnam - Land Und Kein Krieg.  On the German silver screen, she has starred in such feature films like Sonnenalle (Sun Alley) (1999), Ein göttlicher Job (A Goddamn Job) (2001), Planet der Kannibalen (2001), Hinh Bong (2002), Mein Verrucktes Jahr in Bangkok (2011).  

In 2005, Minh-Khai Phan-Thi and her longtime companion, German actor Max Timm, welcomed the birth of their first child.  She is bilingual and speaks both German and Vietnamese fluently.  Minh-Khai Phan-Thi has made many trips to Vietnam and has maintained her cultural identity as a German-born daughter of Vietnamese parents.  For more than two decades, she has been a practicing Buddhist despite having been raised in a Vietnamese Roman Catholic family.  

Link(s):

Minh-Khai Phan-Thi Official Website (in German)