Desmond Chiam

Chiam was born to parents of Chinese Singaporean descent.^[1] As a child, he spent a third of the year in Singapore due to his father's job.^[2] He holds a law degree from the University of Melbourne and a master's degree in screenwriting from University of Southern California.^[3][2]

Chiam began working as a lawyer after he graduated from the University of Melbourne. After becoming unsatisfied with a law career, he decided to pursue breakdancing and acting.^[3][4][5]

He began acting in Australian short films before eventually appearing in Australian television series such as Neighbours and Better Man. He eventually moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting.^[6][7] Chiam has had roles in multiple American television series including NCIS: Los Angeles and Bones. He has also appeared in Con Man, a webseries by Alan Tudyk.^[8]

In February 2017, he joined the main cast of Spike TV's The Shannara Chronicles (the series was formerly on MTV) in the show's second season where he played the villain, General Riga.^[9] In 2018, he was cast as Jethro in the Starz series Now Apocalypse starring Avan Jogia.^[10] He then joined the cast of the Manila-set film Empty by Design, which featured alongside Chris Pang, Osric Chau, and Yoshi Sudarso.^[11]

In December 2018, he was cast as Wyatt Cole, the male lead in ABC and M6's 2019 crime series Reef Break opposite Poppy Montgomery.^{[12][13][14][15][16]} Following Reef Break's cancellation, Chiam joined the cast of the Marvel series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier as Dovich.^[17]

Chiam appears as Nick Zhao in Amazon's With Love, a romantic comedy television series that aired from 2021 to 2023.^[18] He provided the English voice of Werewolf Cookie in the video game Cookie Run: Kingdom.^[19]

In 2022, he appeared in Netflix's Partner Track, which starred Arden Cho.^[20] Chiam starred alongside Sherry Cola, Stephanie Hsu, Ashley Park, and Sabrina Wu in Joy Ride (2023), Adele Lim's directorial debut.^[21]

Chiam was CLEO Singapore's Bachelor of the Year in 2011.^[22]

As of 2019, he resides in Los Angeles with his wife.^[6][23]