Harry Shum Jr is an American actor, dancer, choreographer, and singer. He was born in Limón, Costa Rica, the son of Chinese immigrants. His mother is a native of Hong Kong and his father is from Guangzhou, China. They relocated to Costa Rica, where Shum and his two older sisters were born. When Shum was six years old, the family moved to San Francisco, California. Shum spent most of his schooling years in San Luis Obispo County, California and graduated from Arroyo Grande High School in 2000. Initially, he had been more interested in theater and sports but found a passion for dance after auditioning for his high school dance team on a dare. Shum attended San Francisco State University for a year, before dropping out to pursue a dance career.
Shum is best known for his roles as Mike Chang on the Fox television series Glee (2009–15), Magnus Bane on the Freeform television series Shadowhunters (2016–19), and Benson Kwan on the ABC television series Grey's Anatomy. He was nominated for four Screen Actors Guild Awards for his performance in Glee, winning once. He won the award for The Male TV Star of 2018 in the E! People's Choice Awards for Shadowhunters.
Shum has appeared in the films Step Up 2: The Streets (2008), Step Up 3D (2010), White Frog (2012), Revenge of the Green Dragons (2014), Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny (2016), Crazy Rich Asians (2018), the Hulu web series The Legion of Extraordinary Dancers (2010–2011) and the YouTube Originals series Single by 30 (2016). In 2020, he starred in Universal's romantic drama All My Life. In 2021 Shum starred in the thriller Broadcast Signal Intrusion and appeared in Netflix's holiday rom-com Love Hard. In 2022 Shum had a secondary role in A24's critically acclaimed movie Everything Everywhere All At Once, and is set to star in a Crazy Rich Asians spinoff movie centered around his and Gemma Chan's characters.
