The Green Room (今日VIP): Interview with Michael Miu and Felix Wong – PART 1

Just finished watching the episode of The Green Room where Carlo Ng Kar Lok interviews Michael Miu and Felix Wong a few days before “Gun Metal Grey” is slated to air.

Since I’m an 80s girl and a 5 Tigers fan (plus I love interview shows), I definitely paid attention to the interview so I could absorb what Felix and Michael had to say about their experiences filming GMG.

Some highlights from the episode:

.> I love Michael and Felix’s chemistry – it’s obvious that they have a long-time friendship (30 years!) and get together often in their personal lives, as they are very comfortable around each other. It was funny how they were able to finish each other’s sentences at certain points during the interview – in fact, it didn’t feel like a formal interview at all…instead, it felt like 3 friends (they’re good friends with Carlo as well) hanging out and talking.

.> Felix started off by recounting the story of how he came about agreeing to film GMG after 9 years away from the small screen. I was cracking up big time during this part because it was hilarious how Felix kept getting interrupted by Michael and how they kept joking with each other when telling the story. The story of how it occurred is quite funny!

.> As the story goes, Michael actually really wanted Felix to film GMG with him, but he knew that if he personally asked, Felix wouldn’t do it (Felix jokingly told the story of how Michael would always win his money whenever they played snooker and so Felix would pretend to get mad and out of ‘revenge’, refuse to do anything for him…lol!!). Therefore, Michael asked his wife Jamie (also good friends with Felix) to go talk to him and persuade him. So one day, Jamie went over to Felix’s house (apparently, Michael and Felix are ‘neighbors’ as well, since they live very close to each other), put on a very serious expression, and told him that she really needs his help. Felix thought at first that she needed help in terms of money or some other favor (the part where he says he doesn’t have any money was hilarious!), but it turns out she wanted him to consider filming a series with Michael.

.> As Felix was recounting the story, Michael interrupted at certain points to clarify some parts (like when Felix said there were 2 cop characters and he ended up portraying Stone Sir – Michael reminded him that he LET him choose which character he wanted to be because he so desperately wanted him to do the series – it was funny how Michael pulled out all the stops and agreed to do anything Felix wanted as long as he agreed to film the series).

.> When Felix was recounting the story of how Michael/Jamie convinced him to film GMG, he was saying how Jamie started off by saying "Hey, Baldie....", then Michael interrupts and tells him to tell everyone where that nickname came from (another funny moment!). Felix said that he got that nickname because back in the days, he filmed alot of ancient series and for almost every single one, he had to shave his head (practically the only ones he didn't have to shave his head for were the modern ones....lol!)....so Michael and Jamie took to calling him "Baldie" from that time on.

.> Michael kept teasing Felix on how he has such an 'easy, leisurely' life now (drinks tea, cuts the grass, takes care of rabbits, etc.)....hahahaha....cute!

.> During the interview, Michael revealed a "secret" behind how Felix came about returning to the small screen. Those of us who have raved on and on about how much we love Felix and enjoy seeing him on the small screen again (I'm one of them!!) can actually thank veteran actor (and the 2nd of my two idols) Chow Yun Fat!! Fat Gor is very good friends with Michael and Felix and get together quite often to 'drink tea' and go for walks in the mountains (Michael teased Felix that he is actually living that type of leisurely life right now). One day, after they went for a long walk in the mountains, Fat Gor told Felix that he should consider filming series again, since he's good at it and it's been so long....Michael jokingly recounted how Fat Gor pretty much told Felix that if he doesn't put those acting skills to use again and film another series, he will disown him as a friend (hahaha -- actually, Fat Gor didn't say that last part -- Michael was actually just kidding -- but Fat Gor did tell Felix that he should do another series). So when Michael heard this (he was there I assume), that's when he quickly got to work figuring out how he was going to convince his buddy to film another series.

.> Michael also revealed that when Felix films series (or anything for that matter), he never brings the script with him -- in fact, he leaves the script at home. Yet, as soon as the cameras roll, Felix has no problems doing his lines (except for this one time when the script changed and Felix wasn't aware). Michael kept saying how amazed he was that Felix is able to do that. Felix said that it goes back to his acting class days, as that was the way he was trained and that's actually the way alot of the veteran artists did things. He also said that it was actually Dodo (Carol) Cheng who opened his eyes to that because she always did it when filming series -- back in the early 80s when they filmed "The Lonely Hunter" together (he was a newbie back then), she told him that they are not allowed to have scripts on set and so took his script and threw it out of the studio. Since then, he's trained himself to memorize all his lines at home and not bring his script to work with him. (I actually already knew about this 'trait' of Felix's through weibo -- but it was awesome to hear him recount the story again -- plus I didn't know the part about Dodo).

.> Felix kept referring to himself as a "Newbie" to TVB (lol)....newbie or not, as Michael pointed out, the newer generation artists definitely have alot of respect for him -- especially those he worked with in GMG (i.e.: Oscar Leung, Grace Wong, Nancy Wu, etc.)

.> It was so cute how Michael would be the 'big brother' (though technically Felix entered the industry before Michael) for Felix during the filming of GMG. Michael said that he had promised Felix that he would 'take good care of him' (it was also one of the reasons why Felix agreed to comeback).....therefore, whenever Felix came across an issue while filming, he would let Michael know and Michael would work it out for him (not because Felix was afraid to say anything, but because he hasn't been back to TVB in 9 years and so was less familiar with things -- plus he didn't want to impose on others)

.> With GMG being a cop series, there are bound to be dangerous scenes chase scenes, so host Carlo asked Michael and Felix about the most dangerous scenes they had to film for the series and whether stunt doubles were used. Felix described this one scene where he had to jump off a building in order to chase a crook -- the way he described the shooting of that scene was absolutely hilarious!!! I won't go into detail about it here, since I wouldn't be able to do justice to it (gotta hear him describe it himself)...

.> All in all, the interview was a trip down memory lane for me because Felix and Michael also recounted how things were like during their generation (the senior artists / elders would teach the newbies how to act / give them pointers whereas now people pretty much do their own thing, etc.)

To be Continued (the interview is a two-parter)…..