Miyoshi Umeki (May 8, 1929 – August 28, 2007) was a Japanese American singer and actress. She was nominated for the Tony Award and Golden Globe Award and was the first East Asia-born woman to win an Academy Award for acting.

Born in Otaru, Hokkaido, Umeki was the youngest of nine children. Her father owned an iron factory. After World War II, she began her career as a nightclub singer in Japan, using the name Nancy Umeki. Her early influences were traditional kabuki theater and American pop music. Later in one of her appearances on The Merv Griffin Show, she treated viewers to her impression of singer Billy Eckstine, one of her American favorites growing up.

Umeki was best known for her Oscar-winning role as Katsumi in Sayonara (1957), as Mei Li in both the Broadway musical and 1961 film Flower Drum Song, and as Mrs. Livingston in the television series The Courtship of Eddie's Father. She was a shin Issei, or post-1945 immigrant from Japan.

She moved to the United States in 1955. After appearing on the Arthur Godfrey Talent Scouts (she was a series regular for one season), she signed with the Mercury Records label and released several singles and two albums. Her appearances on Godfrey's program brought her to the attention of director Joshua Logan, who cast her in Sayonara, for which she won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She was the first Asian to win an Academy Award for acting.

In 1958, she appeared twice on the variety show The Gisele MacKenzie Show, in which she performed "How Deep Is the Ocean.” That same year, she was also nominated for a Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical for her performance in the Broadway premiere production of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Flower Drum Song, where she played Mei Li.

From 1969 to 1972, she appeared in The Courtship of Eddie's Father as Mrs. Livingston the housekeeper, for which she was nominated for another Golden Globe Award. She retired from acting following the end of the series.

According to en.wikipedia.org