Continuing with my 'book review' of "Cong Ling Kai Shi (Now and Then)", the next 80s/90s artist I would like to write about is late singer / actor Leslie Cheung.
** Disclaimer #1: The below is a recap of one of the chapters in the book and is written from my perspective – it is not by any means a direct translation of the entire chapter. For a detailed description of what this particular book is about, please refer to post #1.
** Disclaimer #2: This book does NOT tell the entire life story of Leslie, but rather focuses only on certain aspects of his life and career gathered from previous interviews with him (as well as the writer's own knowledge of him). Therefore, please understand that the below recap won't be 'all-inclusive'.
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April 1st, 2003 -- a day when we tragically lost one of the HK entertainment industry's biggest stars: singer/actor Leslie Cheung. It was a sad day, one that most Hong Kongers (as well as Leslie’s fans everywhere) will never forget.
Though I don't live in HK, I've been an avid 'follower' of HK entertainment my entire life -- even before I knew how to talk, I was already watching HK TV series, movies, show and listening to HK music (though I didn't really know what was going on at the time) -- so for me, the HK entertainment industry has always been a huge part of my life. I grew up in the 80s, so there is definitely a special place in my heart for anything related to that time period -- including the artists who were active in the industry during that time. And of course, Leslie was one of them -- he was one of the biggest names in the HK music world at the time (and was already an established television actor prior to that) so of course everyone knew who he was. Though I can't really call myself a "fan" (in the true sense of the word, since I have a certain 'definition' in my mind of what being a 'fan' is about), I still adored Leslie, just like I adored all the other talented artists from that generation.
I remember vividly where I was and what I was doing the day news came out that Leslie had died. I had just gotten in my car and was driving to work (since I'm in the U.S., it was actually morning for me), listening to the radio (the local Cantonese language station that I normally listen to). As I stopped at a traffic light, my hand reached over to turn up the volume on the radio when an announcement came through (interrupting the program I was listening to): superstar Leslie Cheung had committed suicide, jumping to his death from the 24th floor of a famous HK hotel. The first thought that went through my mind at the time was: Is this some sort of cruel April Fool's joke? Because if it is, then whoever made it up should be sought out and publicly ridiculed for the rest of their life! Apparently, the hosts of the program thought the same thing and were even commenting on how "not funny" that news was and reprimanding the colleague who had given them the information. Not too long after that, as I parked my car in front of our building, the "confirmation" that none of us wanted to hear came through the radio: the report of Leslie's death was true. As some of the details started coming through, I just sat there in a state of shock, with my ears practically glued to the radio....needless to say, it was pretty difficult to concentrate at work, but I made it through and when I got home, the rest of the night was spent watching / reading the news and finding out as much information as I could.
Just like many of Leslie’s fans and other close friends have stated throughout the past 8 years: even now, so many years later, it’s still hard to accept the reality of Leslie truly being gone. Sometimes, when I watch his past performances, I can’t help but feel saddened at what we (the Chinese community as a whole) had lost.
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INTRODUCTION
To his many friends, colleagues, and fans, Leslie was known by the nickname ‘Gor Gor’ (elder brother). In terms of the story behind how Leslie got this nickname, there have actually been a few different ‘versions’ over the years, but in my opinion, the 2 ‘versions’ recounted in the book seem to be the most plausible, so those are the 2 that I’ve chosen to go with all these years.
.—Version 1: In 1993, Leslie collaborated with popular Taiwanese actress Brigitte Lin (林青霞) in the movie “The Bride with White Hair” (白髮魔女傳) directed by Ronny Yu. It was said that the cast and crew on the set liked to call Brigitte (who was a big star at the time) ‘Jie Jie’ (Big Sister) – therefore, in a joking manner, Leslie would say to her: “If you’re Jie Jie, then that means I’m Gor Gor!” From that moment on, the 2 ‘superstars’ would refer to each other as ‘Jie Jie’ and ‘Gor Gor’ – after awhile, people started getting used to the nickname and soon enough, Leslie started to become ‘Gor Gor’ to everyone else as well.
.—Version 2: In 2008, during the musical tribute concert that was specially organized to commemorate the 5 year anniversary of Leslie’s death, his good friend So Sze Wong (蘇施黃) recounted a completely different story about how Leslie got his nickname. We all know that Leslie loves to play Mahjong whenever he has time and many of his friends in the entertainment industry are his Mahjong ‘buddies’. As the story goes, a bunch of his Mahjong buddies were having a conversation one day and it was mentioned that someone in their group had the nickname ‘Gor Gor’ – actress Carina Lau (one of Leslie’s good friends and Mahjong buddies) mistakenly thought that the ‘Gor Gor’ they were referring to was Leslie. The friends didn’t bother to correct her and let her continue to believe that the ‘Gor Gor’ they were talking about was indeed Leslie (probably as a joke?) – therefore, from that point on, everyone started referring to Leslie as Gor Gor.
Interestingly enough, Leslie is affectionately known as ‘elder brother’ to almost everyone, however in his own family, he was actually the youngest child in the household.
CHILDHOOD / PERSONAL LIFE
Born the youngest of 10 children (3 of his siblings died at birth), Leslie’s original name at birth was Cheung Fat Chung (張發宗 ) – it wasn’t until later that he changed his name to Cheung Kwok Wing. His father (Cheung Wut Hoi) was a well-known tailor whose clients included many Hollywood stars who didn’t mind taking the long trip to HK to have him specially fit their suits for them. Leslie’s parents were very busy people and rarely had time to see their children – therefore, the children were placed under the care of their grandmother and it was only during special occasions (such as Chinese New Year) when the entire family would gather together for dinner. Leslie in particular was actually raised by his nanny, Luk Jie (六姐) and for him, she was one of the most important women in his life (aside from his mother) – Luk Jie loved and cared for Leslie as though he were her own son. It’s no surprise then that when Luk Jie passed away in 1991, Leslie was deeply grieved.
In terms of his relationship with his parents, Leslie once described it this way: “A lot of people ask me – Leslie Cheung, now that you already have everything, there should be no more regrets in life, right? Actually, in my childhood, I did not receive adequate love from my parents – to me, this is a huge regret.”
Even though Leslie’s relationship with his parents was not very close, he still loved his mother dearly. Unfortunately, the same couldn’t be said about his father – to the Cheung family, the father was viewed as the ‘source’ of much unhappiness for them and in fact, a few of the children were even estranged from him at some point (when Leslie’s eighth brother got married in 1986, he refused to invite his father to the wedding). In 1986, the author (Wong Lai Ling) asked Leslie whether he had a certain fear of marriage due to the way his parents’ marriage turned out, to which Leslie replied: “Yes, perhaps because my parents’ marriage was not happy, it affected me. When my dad was young, he was a ‘player’ who had many women – I actually had 2 mothers and both lived under the same roof at one point. But because there were too many conflicts, the mistress moved out right before I was born – she only has one adopted daughter and I haven’t seen either of them in over 20 years…if I were to bump into them in the street, I would not know who they are.” Leslie continued: “All along, my mom loved my dad very much, so a lot of times, she would just endure the pain he caused without a word. However, several years ago, my dad did something that my mom could not take and finally, they separated. Amongst the seven of us [Leslie & his siblings], only myself as well as another brother are still willing to call him ‘dad’. As far as the issues between my mom and dad, I’ve always tried to maintain a neutral position – after all, no matter what, he is still my dad.”
In his early teens, Leslie went to study in London – he attended a boarding school there and during his days off, he would go live at the home of a long-time family friend (the friend was late actor Alexander Fu Sheng’s sister) and also work part time at her restaurant, which had a band that performed regularly. It was at this restaurant that Leslie ‘performed’ publicly for the first time, singing with the band on the weekends.
After 4 years in England, he returned to Hong Kong, but due to the difference in education levels between the 2 regions, he ended up having to repeat certain courses – plus his exam results were not very good, so he decided to give up on school and try his luck in singing instead. He participated in the HK region pre-qualification round of the ‘Asia Singing Contest’ held by Rediffusion Television (ATV’s predecessor) in 1977 and with his rendition of the song ‘American Pie’, he won second place and was allowed to advance to the final level of the contest, representing HK. Despite his singing skill, Leslie was not able to make it into top 3 in the final contest, but not because he didn’t sing well (one of the judges on the panel of the contest had actually ‘rigged’ the scoring in favor of his own country’s contestants, so none of the contestants from HK made it into any of the top positions). Even though he lost the contest, Leslie’s talent was recognized by RTV and so he signed a 2 year contract with them, thereby officially becoming an RTV artist. That same year (1977), he also signed with his first record company (Polydor) and released his first album, ‘Day Dreaming’. With this, Leslie ‘officially’ began his career in the entertainment industry.
RELATIONSHIPS: THE WOMEN LESLIE ONCE LOVED
It’s no secret that when it came to his sexual orientation, Leslie was bisexual – even though he denied it early on, he did admit this fact later on in his career. Of course, we all know that the ‘significant other’ who accompanied Leslie during most of his life was his same sex partner Daffy Tong (唐鶴德). I’ll talk more about Leslie and Daffy’s relationship later on in this post, since there is a huge section about it in the book and this relationship was definitely an important one in Leslie’s life. However, for now, the focus will be on the women who were once a part of Leslie’s life: the girlfriends that he had after he entered the entertainment industry starting in the late 70s (and prior to meeting Daffy).
Teresa Mo: his first girlfriend
In 1977, while filming the series “Love Story” for RTV, rumors surfaced that 20 year old Leslie had fallen in love with his 17 year old co-star, Teresa Mo (毛舜筠). When asked about this, Leslie graciously admitted the relationship to reporters: “Yes! At first, it was only a promotional tactic for the series – when filming the promotional clip, we were asked to hold each other’s hand, so I jokingly told Teresa: ‘I’ll be your boyfriend, ok?’, to which she replied ‘Ok!’. After we finished filming the series, I felt that she was a very good girl, very cute, and we got along well, so I invited her to watch a movie together and hang out. Even though neither of us have ever expressed that we are really really in love with each other, I truly do like her a lot and I believe that she feels the same way about me. But, she has a lot of boyfriends. She and I are different in that regard – I am very dedicated and once I like a girl, I will continue to be good to her only.” Leslie also emphasized: “We are very serious about our relationship.”
Teresa was Leslie’s first girlfriend after he entered the entertainment industry (though she was not the first woman in his life – his ‘first love’ occurred when he was studying in England, but he was only with the girl for 2 weeks and they broke up). Even though he may not have realized it at first, Leslie was definitely smitten with Teresa the first time he saw her, to the point that he wanted to marry her not too long into their romance: “Towards her [Teresa], you can say that it was love at first sight. Not too long after we met, I was already in front of her with flowers, asking her to marry me.” Unfortunately, Leslie’s good intention backfired, as his sudden proposal actually scared Teresa, causing her to drift away from him. Of course, it’s understandable why Teresa would reject Leslie’s marriage proposal, as she was only 17 at the time, not even at legal age – plus Leslie was very young as well, so it probably wasn’t a good idea to get married at such a young age. Even though the romance between Leslie and Teresa did not last, the 2 still remained good friends even after they broke up (in fact, Leslie is good friends with Teresa’s current husband Tony Au Ding Ping).
Years later, during a TV program that she hosted for i-Cable, Teresa invited her good friend Leslie for a one-on-one interview, during which both very openly discussed their previous relationship. During that interview, Leslie told Teresa: “If back then you had agreed to marry me, it very possibly would have changed my life forever.”
Shirley Yim: a short-lived romance
In 1979, Leslie met a young woman while dancing at a local disco – her name was Shirley Yim (雪梨), the younger sister of actress Michelle Yim (米雪). Shirley was also an actress herself, just getting her start in the TV industry around that time. A year after that first meeting, Leslie and Shirley bumped into each other again during a charity sport event and that same evening, Leslie gave her a ride home. Not long after that, rumors started to surface that the two were dating. The next time the author met up with Leslie, she asked him about his relationship with Shirley and he graciously admitted it: “She can’t be counted as tremendously pretty, but she is very refined and a very interesting person. She told me that people usually call her by her nickname ‘baby elephant’.”
Again, this relationship was short-lived, as Leslie and Shirley were still young at the time and to a certain extent, were not entirely compatible. The couple tried hard to adapt to each other’s interests – Shirley liked to dance, so Leslie would accompany her to discos and Leslie liked for women to wear dresses, so Shirley would wear them occasionally to please him (even though she hated wearing dresses). However, having to constantly accommodate each other eventually took a toll on the relationship and it pretty much ended not too long after it started.
Ngai Si Pei: sweet young love
In 1981, while filming the RTV series “Agency 24”, Leslie again fell in love with his co-star, but this time it was actress Ngai Si Pei (倪詩蓓). A year later, when Ngai Si Pei was involved in a bitter contract dispute with RTV, Leslie immediately came to her defense and it was around that time that their relationship was made public. Their relationship lasted only two years.
Many years later, when asked about her relationship with her former lover, Ngai Si Pei praised Leslie for being a very romantic, good man: “When we were dating, neither of us had drivers licenses. Every time we went on a date, he would come pick me up and show up at the doorstep with a bouquet of yellow roses because he knew I liked that type of flower. We dated for close to 2 years – later on, I went to England to study fashion design and our relationship eventually dissolved.”
I personally don’t know too much about Ngai Si Pei, and unfortunately, there is very little information out there about her nowadays. In my research, I discovered that in addition to being one of Leslie’s former girlfriends, she was also linked to actor Kent Tong at one point (though it’s my understanding that they didn’t have a very good relationship at all). She married Asia’s ‘Cartoon King’ Wang Yuk Long in the late 1990s and they divorced 6 years later.
Cindy Yeung: from lovers to friends
In 1985, the author asked Leslie about his current love life and he revealed to her that his new girlfriend is someone he has known for 7 years already, but was never romantically involved with until now. The ‘girlfriend’ he was referring to was Cindy Yeung (楊諾思), the eldest daughter of Emperor Entertainment Group’s chairman Albert Yeung. In 1984, Leslie went to Albert Yeung’s house often, as he was a friend of the family’s and that year, he had to borrow the family’s swimming pool to film the cover of his latest album. With more opportunity to meet up and get to know each other better, Leslie and Cindy eventually started dating – however, they parted ways amicably a year later, though they still continued to remain good friends.
Currently, Cindy is a successful businesswoman overseeing part of her father’s business empire (she is in charge of Emperor Watch and Jewelry Company).
CAREER: THE LONG AND DIFFICULT ROAD TO FAME
Even with his natural talent and hard work, Leslie’s path to success in the entertainment industry was not an easy one at all. Despite a steady acting career in television, Leslie did not do too well on the music front early on in his career – not only were his first 2 albums (‘Day Dreaming’ from 1977 and ‘Lover’s Arrow’ from 1979) poorly received by the general public, he also did not have much luck with his performances or position in the music industry either. He once told the author: “I admit that at one point, I felt discouraged and disappointed – I would ask myself why I always ended up in a ‘secondary’ position? But I continued to bear with it and persevere. I remember one performance in particular where, in the hopes of accommodating the atmosphere at the time, I tossed the hat that I was wearing out into the audience – to my surprise, the hat was immediately tossed back up to me. I was very hurt and embarrassed by this and at the time, I just wanted to dig a hole in the ground and bury myself in it.”
Fortunately for Leslie, he had a chance meeting with Florence Chan (陳淑芬) in 1982; working for record company Capital Artists at the time, Mrs. Chan (as she is known in the industry) knew that Leslie had just ended his contract with Polygram and so she invited him to join Capital Artists as a singer. This proved to be the beginning of a ‘golden’ partnership, as it was after Leslie signed with Capital Artists and Mrs. Chan became his manager that he started to achieve fame and success as a singer. Their first collaboration in 1983, when Leslie released the song 風繼續吹 (‘The Wind Blows On’) was an instant hit and the next year (1984), Leslie’s singing career reached new heights with his first award-winning hit ‘Monica’. In 1985, with the release of his album 為你鍾情 (‘For Your Love Only’), he set records when the album achieved ‘double platinum’ status not long after it was released. [Note that currently, an album achieves Platinum status when it sells more than 1 million units – back in the 80s, I believe that number was higher, so for an album to achieve ‘double platinum’ in such a short amount of time is definitely a huge achievement!] That same year (1985), Leslie held his very first concert at HK Coliseum.
Another important person in Leslie’s career was music composer / producer Michael Lai (黎小田). Michael was actually one of the judges of the ‘Asia Singing Contest’ (the HK pre-qualification round) back when Leslie participated in the contest (Michael was RTV’s music director at the time). Michael remembered Leslie so vividly at the time because Leslie was the only contestant who actually dared to argue with him; Michael admired Leslie’s personality and respected his persistence – from that moment forward, they developed a close friendship (Michael became Leslie’s ‘god-father’) and they subsequently collaborated frequently on albums and concert performances.
To conclude this section about Leslie’s music career and his relationship with Florence Chan, I felt the need to include the subsequent paragraph recounting the final moments of Leslie’s life – after reading this section, I have to say that I admire Mrs. Chan’s strength in overcoming the tragedy of Leslie’s death:
Indeed, it can be said that Florence Chan was truly the one responsible for Leslie becoming the ‘superstar’ that he is. From 1982 on, Mrs. Chan became Leslie’s manager as well as close friend and confidante – for the next 2 decades, Mrs. Chan would become one of the most important women in Leslie’s life – their relationship was akin to that of mother and son. With the closeness of Leslie and Mrs. Chan’s relationship, I’m sure we can understand how painful it must have been for her to ‘witness’ Leslie’s death on that fateful day. As most of us know, Mrs. Chan was the last person to speak with Leslie on the phone prior to his death – she was scheduled to meet up with Leslie for tea that evening and had actually arrived at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel a few minutes before their scheduled time of 6pm. When Mrs. Chan checked the usual places at the hotel where Leslie usually frequented, she was not able to find him, so she called him to find out where he was. Leslie told her that he had stepped out for a bit and would be back shortly, so Mrs. Chan decided to wait for him (in reality, Leslie had not stepped out – he was actually on the 24th floor, writing a note and making a few phone calls). A few minutes before 6:41pm HKT (the moment Leslie jumped from the hotel), Leslie calls Mrs. Chan and tells her to wait for him near the entrance of the hotel – she immediately heads toward the specificed location and waits there for Leslie. Five minutes later, she hears a huge ‘thud’ sound and sees a crowd forming a few feet away from her – from where she was standing, she could vaguely make out the outline of a human body near where the crowd was -- she thought that perhaps there was an accident of some sort, but she did not dare move from the area she was standing to go look because she was afraid Leslie wouldn’t be able to find her once he arrived…..little did she know that her waiting would be in vain. Tragically, by the time she realized what had happened, Leslie was already gone.
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ANITA MUI: LESLIE’S BELOVED ‘LITTLE SISTER’
Of course, it is impossible to write about Leslie without mentioning his long-time friend and ‘sister’ Anita Mui (梅艷芳). Leslie and Anita had a very special relationship, one that was rare and probably will never occur again in the HK entertainment industry. Leslie met Anita for the first time in 1982, when he signed with Capital Artists; that was also the same year that Anita won the New Talent Singing Contest and had also signed to the same record company – so it can be said that the two of them started on their path to fame together.
Prior to her death, Anita had described her relationship with Leslie this way: “A lot of people think that I’m a very ‘tough’ person -- it is only in front of Gor Gor [Leslie] that I can completely become myself once again. I can be a ‘woman’ again and no longer need to pretend to be strong, because I have him here to protect me – he is an elder brother who truly truly loves me and dotes on me very much.” She continues: “[Gor Gor] and I are great partners and confidantes. We started out together, working from scratch at Capital Artists. All I know is that when I have him around, I feel most at ease, and by the same token, when he has me around, he is also most at ease.”
In 1985, when Leslie held his first HK Coliseum concert, his special musical guest was none other than his ‘little sister’ Anita. It was actually Leslie’s idea to invite Anita as musical guest (not the company’s idea, as some people might think)…at the time, Leslie himself stated: “[Anita] and I are good friends and in the near future, she will be holding her own concerts, so I felt that she should have the opportunity to ‘test the waters’ and see how the audience reacts – for a singer, this is very important. During the show, when I heard the applause and cheers that the audiences gave to Anita, I thought in my heart: ‘Anita, you’ve succeeded!’” Thinking back to those early days in both their careers, Leslie and Anita constantly talked about how the two of them would travel all over the world together, performing at various venues and going through ‘thick and thin’ together – no matter how tiring or difficult things became, they had the assurance of knowing that they were in it together. Even during their travels, when they would stay at hotels, they would make sure to book rooms that had a common door so that in the event anything happened, they could be there for each other.
Having endured hardship and success together, it’s no surprise that Leslie and Anita developed such a strong bond. They were truly a ‘perfect match’ and ‘dream team’ in every aspect (except romantically), even though their personalities and hobbies were complete opposites. Anita was the bold, adventurous type who enjoyed high risk activities such as roller coasters and thrill rides, whereas Leslie could barely stand to go near those types of things because he had an incredible fear of heights (ironically, he chose to end his life by jumping off a building). Nevertheless, their different personalities did not prevent them from enjoying each other’s company and developing a ‘non-romance’ closeness that was practically unheard of (especially between a man and a woman) at the time. In describing how much Leslie meant to her, Anita stated that he knew her better than her own family – in fact, every time she met a new boyfriend, she would make sure to take him to meet her protective ‘big brother’ Leslie so he could give his blessing.
When Leslie passed away, Anita not only cried endless tears for him, she also was so upset that she was not able to eat for the longest time: “The first few days after his passing, my heart hurt so badly, I was barely able to speak – I felt that all of a sudden, I had aged 10 years. I would ask the Heavens non-stop: ‘Why did it have to be like this?’” During the last few months of Anita’s life, when she herself was courageously battling cancer, she met with the author one last time – during that interview, she stated: “[Leslie] is forever my elder brother! Our relationship is as close as……” she was not able to find an appropriate word to describe the relationship… “In any case, it’s not something that can be expressed in a few words; he is forever branded in my heart.”
On December 30th, 2003 – 8 months after her beloved Gor Gor passed away – Anita was finally reunited with him in Heaven.
RETIREMENT AND COMEBACK
It was in 1987, while at the height of his career, that Leslie told his friends for the first time that he wanted to retire from singing (though it was something that he had thought about numerous times in the past). At the time, most of Leslie’s friends didn’t believe that he was serious about retiring, but it turns out that his mind was already set: on December 21, 1988, Leslie kicked off his Farewell Concert Tour – his way of saying goodbye to his fans – and during the very last show held on January 22, 1990, he performed a special ‘hanging up the microphone’ ceremony to show that from then on, he would leave his singing career behind him.
After he left the music industry (as a singer that is), Leslie invested a lot more time into his movie career, as he wanted to focus on acting and also try his hand at directing some day. It definitely seemed that he had made the right decision to retire at that time, as his movie career started to soar (well, technically he was already a well-known movie actor by that time anyway, but it was in the early 90s that he truly achieved ultimate success in acting in terms of awards and international recognition).
I’m actually not going to go too much into Leslie’s movie career, as this is one area that most people are already familiar with. Instead, I am going to skip to the year 1995, when Leslie made his official comeback to the music industry. (The reason why I decided to focus on this aspect is because I feel it’s more important to understand Leslie’s inner thought process with regard to his retirement and comeback rather than recount which films he had starred in.) Just like starting off in the industry was not easy for him, returning was even more difficult – primarily because of all the ‘pressure’ that he had to deal with from the Media. During the contract-signing event marking his ‘official’ return in 1995, Leslie was surrounded by reporters who started firing questions at him left and right, asking him if he felt that he was ‘going back on his word’ by making a comeback…. Leslie patiently responded to the reporters’ questions: “My thought process has definitely changed. Back then, I was insistent on retiring, but I have matured now, so my thinking is no longer the same. After filming movies for so many years, I would be lying if I told you that I had not thought about singing again. You can say that I am going back on my word – regardless, my thought process has changed.” Indeed, Leslie’s decision to come out of retirement was not a brash one, as he had already considered it for 2 years before actually proceeding. During his return concert in 1997, Leslie told his fans: “Leaving the stage for 7 years, I have never regretted it – at the time, I had left wholeheartedly…having another concert now is a good thing, as I feel that my foundation is deeper – hopefully I can reach another peak in my career. If everyone where to ask me how long I hope to continue singing, I would respond: Forever….” (Though the Media did not seem to share in his ‘happiness’ of returning to singing, at least his fans did!)
One thing I don’t understand is -- with Leslie’s popularity and talent, shouldn’t people be happy that he decided to come out of retirement and release albums again? Since when is coming out of retirement and returning to the music industry a bad thing? Personally, it’s hard for me to understand the Media’s (and general public to some extent) method of thinking in this regard…why should it matter whether Leslie coming out of retirement meant that he ‘went back on his word’? I find it sad that the Media would choose to focus on the ‘negative’ aspect of his decision rather than the more important piece of how much joy his return brought to fans. Once again, this is another example of what is wrong with HK Media (a point that I had talked about earlier in the post about Danny Chan). It’s no surprise then that Leslie felt so disappointed in the Media at the time.
Unfortunately though, this would not be the last time that Leslie would be ‘hurt’ by the Media (in fact, this was only the beginning). In 2000, Leslie held what would eventually be the very last concert of his career and life (due to his passing 3 years later). His ‘Passion Tour’ concert series had special meaning for Leslie, as it marked the first time that he would serve as art director as well as singer for a concert -- to demonstrate how important the concert was to him, he specially invited renowned designer Jean Paul Gaultier to design all the costumes for the concert. One of Leslie’s goals for this concert was to express himself artistically (hence the long haired wig and the beard) – to some extent, he was able to achieve this goal, as many of his colleagues and industry people who saw the concert praised his efforts and told him that his concert was “true art”. After the opening show, when he happily met with reporters, all of them praised him in unison as well, telling him how great the show was – this gave Leslie confidence and truly made him believe the show was near perfection artistically….never in a million years could he have imagined that the reporters that night were merely giving him ‘lip service’: when the Media reports came out the next day, the ‘praise’ turned into severe criticism – a completely opposite reaction from what the reporters told him to his face the night before. Towards this, he was extremely disappointed and heartbroken. Even though the ‘Passion Tour’ eventually became a huge success on the international front and Leslie won many awards because of it, the HK Media’s harsh criticism had already done its damage…..
In November 2000, during his acceptance speech for the “Grand Salute Award” bestowed on him by Mingpao Weekly (for his work on the Passion Tour concerts), Leslie finally spoke the words that had been in his heart for several months [my apologies for the long excerpt, but this speech is a very important one and in order to do it justice, I felt the need to include the entire quote that was in the book]: “After the opening night performance, there were a lot of reporters who came backstage – the reaction I had gotten from them at that time was: ‘the show was absolutely awesome!’ However, the next day, when I opened the newspaper, what I saw was: ‘the long hair means that he is Zhen Zi [TN: a female ghost from a horror flick] and wearing a skirt means that he is a woman’, as well as other criticisms -- all of this only shows how superficial the Media is….sometimes, I feel that entertainers at our level should try things that no one else has done before and help set precedence; to be honest, during my 1997 concert, when I wore high heels onstage, I could understand being called a woman, but during this concert [Passion Tour], I never once thought of myself as a woman! Perhaps they [the Media] did not pay close enough attention – the ‘woman’ that they talked about in their reports actually has a mustache!”
Leslie continues: “On the 3rd day of the concert, Jean-Paul Gaultier [the renown designer who was responsible for Leslie’s wardrobe for the concert] emailed me from France – after I read the email, I almost fell to the floor. He wrote: ‘You Hong Kong people are ridiculous! In the future, NO international level designer will ever collaborate or work on HK shows again.’ I feel that this is something the HK Media needs to self-reflect upon because there are many of us entertainers whose level has already reached international standards. I recently held 10 shows in Japan and afterwards, the Japanese Media used the word ‘FANTASTIC!’ to describe the shows – at the same time, I was asked by other international Media outlets and concert organizers: ‘why is it that the Media in Hong Kong would choose to destroy and hurt its entertainers [with its reporting]?’”
Leslie’s words at that time were truly a reflection of what was in his own heart, but I’m sure that he also expressed the sentiments of all HK entertainers as well. He was very blunt in his criticism of the HK Media and I admire as well as respect him for that. Leslie’s personality has always been very straightforward and genuine -- it’s part of what endears him to so many people. Towards his personality, Leslie had this to say: “All these years, whether I encounter success or failure, I’ve always spoken what is in my heart. Unfortunately, this type of personality has brought me much pain and suffering.”
DAFFY TONG: LESLIE’S PARTNER UNTIL THE END
In January 1997, at the end of the 24th show of his post-retirement concert, Leslie publicly thanked 2 of the ‘most beloved’ people in his life. The first person was his mother Mrs. Cheung and the second one was his long-time partner, Daffy Tong: “Over 10 years ago, when I was at the lowest point in my life and had problems financially, this particular friend took several months worth of his salary and lent it entirely to me, helping me get through my crisis. Actually, I don’t have to say it, as you guys probably already know. Mom, he is your god-son, Mr. Tong.” Then, in 1999, during an interview with a radio show, Leslie once again spoke of the 2 most important people in his life – with this revelation, speculations over Leslie’s sexual orientation that had been running rampant for many years -- finally ended.
On April 1, 2003, Leslie’s sudden death not only shocked the entire entertainment industry, but also the entire Asian community worldwide. Unfortunately, within just hours after his death, the rumor mill was ‘ignited’ again: all kinds of speculations and rumors concerning Leslie’s death spread like wildfire, with the most ‘hurtful’ rumors coming from local gossip magazines and tabloids, which focused on Leslie’s sexual orientation and possible relationship issues as ‘reasons’ for his suicide. Due to the intensity of the rumors and the strong desire to allow Leslie to rest in peace, his family – including his partner Daffy – had to take a moment out of their immense grieving to refute some of the rumors that surfaced (shame on the Media for inflicting so much pain on a grieving family!!).
The below passages translated directly from the book demonstrate the frustration and anguish that Daffy especially had to go through :
With Leslie’s sudden death, Daffy was more hurt and grieved than anyone – yet in order to dispel rumors that were already surfacing, he agreed to be interviewed by reporters through the screen door of his home the morning of April 2nd (just hours after Leslie’s death). Daffy was wearing a white bathrobe, his eyes were red and swollen, his face was tired and worn. He told reporters: “Our relationship of more than a decade has always been good – there was never a ‘third party’ in our relationship and my feelings for him have never changed; all these years, my love for him has never wavered.” He also revealed that the first time Leslie had attempted to end his own life was back in November of last year (2002) – he said that Gor Gor suffered from depression and had been seeing various doctors for awhile already.
Unfortunately, Daffy’s confirmation of Leslie’s illness did not do much to dispel the ruthless rumors and speculations that continued to run rampant in the Media. In an attempt to quell the rumor mill, Leslie’s close confidante and manager Florence Chan stepped forward in Daffy’s (and Leslie’s) defense: “Leslie and Daffy met back in 1982 and since then, have been through thick and then together – their relationship all these years has always been good. In the past year that Leslie has been ill, Daffy has stood by him unwaveringly, taking care of him without complaint, their relationship stronger than ever. Leslie is already gone and Daffy is already in tremendous pain – what’s the point of inflicting even more pain on him? Leslie has always been very loyal in his relationships – in the past 20 years, his feelings for Daffy have never changed.”
In an interview with the author several days later, Daffy once again reiterated the unchanging devotion that he and Leslie had for each other – and he once again implored that the Media allow Leslie to rest in peace: “….In the past, whenever there were rumors about us, both Leslie and I would choose to remain silent and instead dispel those rumors through our actions – for example, going out together publicly to watch a movie or have dinner….but now, this is no longer possible…Leslie is already gone, there is no way for him to defend himself or refute the rumors, yet some people still choose to use written or verbal words to attack his spirit! The dead is already gone, let the rumors be buried as well! Instead [of focusing on the rumors], I hope that everyone can appreciate Gor Gor’s contributions and his great love and passion for his work….let’s allow Leslie to truly leave in peace!”
Sadly, to this day, there are still many rumors and speculations surrounding Leslie’s death, though the intensity of those speculations has (fortunately) died down. Despite Leslie’s own confession in his suicide note that he was suffering from depression as well as confirmation of this from his closest friends and relatives (it was also mentioned at his funeral), some people (perhaps out of ignorance or lack of understanding of the disease?) still refuse to accept the fact that it was this illness that drove Leslie to take his own life and instead continue to conjure up various other ‘reasons’ to explain it– as an HK entertainment fan, it’s definitely upsetting and at the same time frustrating to see this type of thinking. Hopefully, this post will help those who are still of this particular mindset gain better clarification.
OTHER INTERESTING FACTS
The book actually clarified a few things regarding Leslie that devoted fans may already know, but most of the general public might not -- therefore, I felt it was appropriate to include a few of these ‘interesting facts’ in this particular post:
.-- At one point in time, it was thought that actor/singer Dicky Cheung (張衛健)was Leslie's cousin. This is actually not true -- even though both Dicky and Leslie have the same surname, they are not related to each other at all. Below is a direct quote from Leslie on how the whole thing about Dicky being his cousin came about:
He [Leslie] has a heart of gold – in order to help others, he does mind telling a well-intentioned ‘untruth’. In 1984, Leslie was already a well-known first-line singer – in that year’s New Talent Singing Competition, there was a kid named Dicky Cheung who was rumored to be a cousin of his. It wasn’t until after Dicky won the gold award that Leslie refuted the rumors of Dicky being a relative: “Dicky and I met a year ago. Not sure how he got my phone number, but he called me and we agreed to meet up. At the time, he was singing at restaurants in order to support his entire family. For a period of time, he didn’t have any work opportunities while I would do occasional restaurant gigs myself, so I figured I would help introduce him to the restaurant people I knew. At first, I introduced him as my friend, but that didn’t seem to help, as he still didn’t get many opportunities, so I figured why don’t I just claim him as my cousin – after that, I was able to help him find quite a few jobs.”
Leslie later clarified in an interview that Dicky wasn’t his cousin – but he chose to do it way after Dicky won the NTSA competition, as he didn’t want to affect Dicky’s chances and also didn’t want to hurt his feelings.
.-- Alot of people say that Roger Kwok (郭晉安) – in his younger days especially -- bore a striking resemblance to Leslie and some even mistakenly thought that perhaps they are related. The truth is that they are NOT related, but Roger definitely did look a little like Leslie back in the 80s, especially between 1986 and 1988. Roger's fellow colleagues at TVB apparently thought so as well: during TVB's Anniversary Gala in 1988, Leslie was one of the special musical performers at the end of the show -- while he was performing, a bunch of people pushed Roger out to the front of the stage where Leslie was. Roger had a (cute) slightly embarrassed smile on his face -- being the good sport that he is, Leslie hugged Roger and said loudly into the microphone: "My Brother!" (Aww, such a sweet moment! I remember that particular Anniversary Gala show, as I've seen it several times -- it's among my favorites in terms of TVB galas).
.-- Leslie is very good friends with [my idol] Jacky Cheung. Part of the reason is because of Anita, since Jacky is Anita's 'brother-in-law' and of course, Anita is Leslie's close friend and 'sister' -- plus they all started around the same time (in the 80s) and all had mutual friends, so they hung out together alot and also collaborated alot onscreen (in music and movies) as well. But of course, the other 'common link' between Leslie and Jacky is Florence Chan -- as already stated above, Mrs. Chan was Leslie's manager for most of his singing career (starting in the early 80s) and in the mid-90s, she became Jacky's concert manager (Jacky's manager in the 80s and early 90s was 'golden' manager Willie Chan), a position she continues to hold currently. (When Leslie made his comeback to the music industry, Mrs. Chan continued her role as his manager, up until the point of his death in 2003). So with the added relationship of being Mrs. Chan's 'sons', it's no surprise that Jacky and Leslie were close.
In 2001, during a celebration dinner for Mrs. Chan’s birthday, Leslie talked with Jacky about the 2 of them doing a musical together as their mutual gift to Mrs. Chan for her birthday. By the next year, Jacky had already completed the initial script for the musical and had even showed it to Leslie for review. Unfortunately, before Jacky was able to complete the final revisions to the script, Leslie was already gone. …
.--.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
I’m sure everyone would agree that even when he was alive, Leslie was already an ICON in every sense of the word – with his passing, he has become more than just an icon….he has become a LEGEND.
In a sense, this post can be viewed as a ‘coping mechanism’ to help those (like me) who still struggle from time to time in accepting the fact that Leslie is truly gone…. but most importantly though – just like with my previous posts on Anita and Danny -- it’s also my way of paying tribute to a legend. I hope that whoever gets the chance to read this post – whether you’re a Leslie fan or not – can benefit from it in some way: whether it’s learning things about Leslie that you may not have known previously, or, in the case of his fans, simply serving as a reminder of why your love for Leslie continues to remain strong and steadfast so many years after his death. In putting together this post, I myself have definitely gained a better appreciation for Leslie, both as an artist and as a person.
One last thing…..
I wish I could include some of the pictures from the book in these posts, as each chapter shows a collection of pictures from Mingpao’s archives that are relevant to the people or events being discussed. One of the many things I like about this book is that the author really took the time to look through her picture archives and choose pictures that created a ‘historical chronology’ of sorts for each artist (for example, the section talking about the artist’s childhood included baby pictures and other family pictures, the section about the artist’s relationships has pictures of their significant other(s), all with detailed captions and the year the picture was taken). For me, while reading this book, looking through all the pictures and reading the captions that accompanied each picture was almost as good as reading the book itself!
LL's Musings 小賢角落
Monday, October 31, 2011
Monday, October 17, 2011
TVB Acting Classes: 3rd Year Artists List – Class of 1974 (Part 4 in a series)
Part 4 in my “TVB Acting Class History” series covers the 3rd year acting class – those who entered the class in 1973 and graduated in 1974 (keep in mind that during this time, the acting classes were still a 1 year program).
** Note 1: The artists’ names listed in BOLD are the ones who were actually active in the HK entertainment industry (as far as I know) and /or ones whom most audiences will probably be familiar with.
** Note 2: Under the “Summary & Thoughts” section, I’ve listed various tidbits as well as other descriptive info about some of the artists that I’ve highlighted in BOLD.
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TVB 藝員訓練班（第三期）- 1973 -74年
TVB’s Acting Class – 3rd year (1973-74)
周潤發 (Chow Yun Fat)、吳孟達 (Ng Man Tat)、任達華 (Simon Yam Tat Wah)、林嶺東 (Ringo Lam Ling Dong)、盧海鵬 (Lo Hoi Pang)、鄧英敏 (English Tang Ying Mun)、伍潤泉 (Thomas Ng Yun Chuen)、蕭健鏗 (Hsiao Kin Heng)、林文偉 (Lam Man Wai)
SUMMARY and THOUGHTS:
.— As I stated in my previous post (part 3), starting with the 3rd year class and moving forward, we will start to see a lot of the ‘big names’ in HK entertainment, most of whom still have a significant impact on the industry even today.
.—I’m sure I don’t need to explain who Chow Yun Fat is, correct? In all my years following HK entertainment, I have never encountered a single Hong Konger who wasn’t familiar with Chow Yun Fat – he’s definitely one of the biggest stars to come out of HK and for most of us, he is pretty much a ‘household name’. Therefore, I am not going to go into detail about him in this particular post. However, for those who are interested in learning more about Chow Yun Fat’s life and why he is one of the most respected celebrities on the planet, feel free to check out the Book Review I wrote awhile back ago: Now and Then II: Chow Yun Fat
.—Ng Man Tat (Tat Gor) should definitely be a familiar name to audiences, especially movie audiences (more on that piece later). Known as a ‘golden’ supporting actor, Tat Gor has never played a lead role in his life – he started off in TV as a supporting actor and even when he started doing movies, he continued in supporting roles, eventually making a name for himself and becoming one of the most successful and highest paid supporting actors in the Chinese-speaking regions of Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China (he’s actually one of the few HK actors to achieve such success completely relying on supporting roles).
After Tat Gor graduated from Acting Class, he participated in numerous series in the 70s, but mostly had only minor roles. He started becoming familiar to audiences through his performance in the 1979 version of “Chor Lau Heung” (he played Chor Lau Heung’s good friend Wu Tiet Fa). In the 1980s, Tat Gor participated in many ancient series, though he also had quite a few memorable roles in modern series as well, mostly as a ‘stern’ father figure – for me, his most memorable ‘serious’ role from the early 80s was as ‘Yip Sir’ in the “Police Cadet” trilogy (in “Police Cadet ‘84”, he was Tony Leung’s mentor at the cadet training school and in “Police Cade ‘85”, he played Margie Tsang and Jamie Chik’s father – same role but focused more on his family life).
In 1989, Tat Gor collaborated with rising comedic star Stephen Chow (周星馳) on 2 major series (ancient series “The Final Combat” and also modern series “The Justice of Life”) and from that point forward, a comedic ‘dream team’ was born. In 1990, Tat Gor started to focus his career more on movies and with that, continued his ‘dream team’ collaboration with Stephen Chow, participating in almost every single one of Stephen’s movies. He received his first nomination for Best Supporting Actor at the HK Film Awards for his performance in the gambling-themed “All for the Winner” (賭聖) [the Stephen Chow spin-off of Chow Yun Fat’s “God of Gamblers” franchise]. He didn’t win that year, but the following year, he was nominated again in the same category for “A Moment of Romance” (天若有情) [the famous Andy Lau film] and finally took home the award (ironically, in a non-Stephen Chow collaboration). Tat Gor is no longer active in the HK film industry, as he shifted his career to Taiwan and the Mainland in the late 90s, participating mostly in TV series over there. He did reunite briefly with Stephen Chow in 2001 for the film “Shaolin Soccer” however 3 years later when Stephen started filming for “Kung Fu Hustle”, Tat Gor was noticeably absent from the movie (it was rumored that the two had fallen out of favor with each other and therefore ended their long-standing collaboration – supposedly, things are fine now, at least according to Tat Gor).
.—Simon Yam is one of those rare success stories whose decorated career is proof that an actor typecasted as a ‘sex symbol’ can still go on to become one of the most solid and respected actors in the entertainment industry. Prior to joining TVB, Simon worked as a model (not surprising, given his good looks, tall stature, and nearly perfect physique) – after entering the Acting Class and then graduating, he started participating in TV series and films almost simultaneously (though of course at that time, there was more focus placed on his TV career). With such a long career (over 30 years), Simon had the opportunity to play many different roles and is probably one of the few actors who actually had such a wide acting range. But it actually wasn’t like that all the time – in the early years of his career, he was pretty much typecast into either ‘sex symbol’ bad boy type roles or given the role of the villain, though there was the occaisonal ‘honest good guy’ role thrown in there from time to time. Simon had so many memorable performances when he was at TVB, it’s actually very difficult to pick a ‘favorite’ -- though if I had to choose, I would probably count his performances in “The New Adventures of Chor Lau Heung” (1984), “Police Cade ‘85” (1985), “The New Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre” (1986), and his most representative work (at TVB) “War of the Dragon” (1989) amongst my favorites. In fact, I actually feel that his performance in “War of the Dragon” was so good, it was absolutely award-worthy (too bad there were no TV awards back then) – that series definitely secured Simon’s ‘lead actor’ status and proved that he definitely had acting skill. Ironically, it was also around that time that he left TVB and went to ATV – though technically, he was also continuing to focus more on his movie career as well, since it was also around that time (early 90s) that he really started participating in a lot of movies. And then, in the mid-90s, he pretty much left ATV to focus completely on his movie career (though still participating in a series or two here and there) – definitely a wise decision given how successful he eventually became in the movie industry (finally winning the HKFA Best Actor award in 2010 for his performance in “Echoes of the Rainbow.”)
Some interesting facts about Simon’s background – he actually comes from a family of police officers, as his dad was a Police Corporal (he died while on duty when Simon was just 14 years old) and his older brother was the former Deputy Commissioner of Police in HK. Of course, we all know that his wife is famous model Qi Qi and together, they have a daughter named Ella.
.—Ringo Lam is a famous movie director who was most active back in the 80s and 90s. After graduating from the Acting Class, he had a few minor roles in a few series, but then switched to doing behind the scenes work, first as an assistant editor, then as a choreographer. He participated in the production of a few TVB series in the late 70s. He then left TVB in 1978 and went to Commercial Television, but his career there was short-lived, since CTV went belly up not too long after that. Therefore, Ringo decided to immigrate to Canada and study film at York University. He returned to HK in the early 80s and that’s when his career really took off, as he started applying the skills he learned and became a director. The genre that he specialized in was action drama, though he did occasionally direct a comedy or two. I’m actually not too familiar with Ringo’s work, but I do know that he was most famous for the “On Fire” films [“City on Fire” (龍虎風雲), “Prison on Fire” (監獄風雲), and “School on Fire” (學校風雲)] back in the late 80s and had won an HKFA Best Director award for one of the films. Out of the 3 films, I’m only familiar with the first two, which starred Chow Yun Fat.
.—The best way to describe Lo Hoi Pang (Pang Gor) is ‘multi-talented comedic genius’. Even though he was naturally born with a ‘sour-looking’ face, that’s certainly not the image that audiences have of him all these years. As the mainstay of TVB’s long-running flagship variety show “Enjoy Yourself Tonight” (E.Y.T.), Pang Gor made audiences laugh day in and day out with his hilarious comedic routines (usually consisting of ad-libbed dialogue), funny and oftentimes irreverent jokes, and most famously, his great imitation skills. His cutting dialogue in the E.Y.T. skit “The Shrimp Family” as well as his habit of ad-libbing and speaking in rhyme on the show left a deep impression on audiences and to this day, that particular skit still goes down in history as one of the all time classics in HK TV history. Pang Gor was also known for his acting skills and throughout his career, he participated in numerous TV series, movies, as well stage productions. He most recently participated in the stage production of “Shrimp Crazy Family”, which was a reunion of sorts for the E.Y.T. and Shrimp Family cast. (For more information regarding the “Shrimp Crazy Family” stage production, feel free to check out this post: The Return of a Classic)
I remember growing up watching Pang Gor on many of TVB’s variety shows, especially the Anniversary Gala skits and I can tell you first hand that he is absolutely hilarious! He’s definitely the ‘master’ of imitation and was even one of the early artists to perform in drag -- honestly speaking, he puts those imitation wannabees (the current ‘3 gods’, whom I can’t stand, especially when they dress up in drag!!) absolutely to shame! He’s definitely one of the few ‘all –around entertainers’ out there who is able to excel in all disciplines – I can’t think of anyone else in the industry with his caliber of skill.
.—English Tang is another one of those artists whose face audiences will surely recognize, since he participated in so many series in the past few decades and is still active even now (though on the acting front, most of his roles have always been minor ones). English is actually best known for being a host, as that’s where his strength lies – he hosted a variety of shows back in the day, but his most famous ‘gig’ was hosting TVB’s long-running E.Y.T., which he had done from the late 70s until E.Y.T. ended in the 90s (of course, he didn’t host every single episode, but he did host a majority of them). His daughter is Shermon Tang (鄧上文), a former Miss HK contestant from 2005 (I think she won the Most Photogenic award that year, though I’m not sure if she actually made it into top 3 or not, since I pretty much stopped watching the Miss HK pageants in the late 90s) who eventually became an actress and participated in quite a few TVB series (mostly minor roles though).
.—Thomas Ng may not be a familiar name to most audiences, as he is a producer and so works behind the scenes, plus there is so little information about him out there nowadays. Actually, to be more specific, I should say that Thomas is a FORMER producer for TVB (and subsequently ATV) because to be honest, I’m not sure if he’s still producing anymore (again, there is very little information about him, so I’m not too sure what he is doing career-wise now). Back in the 80s, he produced quite a few popular series that most 80s fanatics will be familiar with – for example: “The Legend of Master So” (1982) starring Chow Yun Fat and Andy Lau, “The Fearless Duo” (1984) starring Michael Miu and Barbara Yung, “Siblings of Vice and Virtue” (1986) starring Eddie Cheung, Barbara Chan, Kenneth Tsang, “The Two Most Honorable Knights” (1988) starring Tony Leung and Hugo Ng, etc. The only other thing I found out about Thomas Ng is that he was a very close friend of Barbara Yung’s and during her funeral, he was one of the pallbearers along with the Tigers.
.—The remaining 2 artists listed I’m not familiar with at all, though if they were actually actors onscreen (even in ‘ke le fe’ roles), I would probably recognize them if I saw their pictures. If anyone is familiar with them, please let me know.
Stay tuned for post #5.
** Note 1: The artists’ names listed in BOLD are the ones who were actually active in the HK entertainment industry (as far as I know) and /or ones whom most audiences will probably be familiar with.
** Note 2: Under the “Summary & Thoughts” section, I’ve listed various tidbits as well as other descriptive info about some of the artists that I’ve highlighted in BOLD.
.---.
TVB 藝員訓練班（第三期）- 1973 -74年
TVB’s Acting Class – 3rd year (1973-74)
周潤發 (Chow Yun Fat)、吳孟達 (Ng Man Tat)、任達華 (Simon Yam Tat Wah)、林嶺東 (Ringo Lam Ling Dong)、盧海鵬 (Lo Hoi Pang)、鄧英敏 (English Tang Ying Mun)、伍潤泉 (Thomas Ng Yun Chuen)、蕭健鏗 (Hsiao Kin Heng)、林文偉 (Lam Man Wai)
SUMMARY and THOUGHTS:
.— As I stated in my previous post (part 3), starting with the 3rd year class and moving forward, we will start to see a lot of the ‘big names’ in HK entertainment, most of whom still have a significant impact on the industry even today.
.—I’m sure I don’t need to explain who Chow Yun Fat is, correct? In all my years following HK entertainment, I have never encountered a single Hong Konger who wasn’t familiar with Chow Yun Fat – he’s definitely one of the biggest stars to come out of HK and for most of us, he is pretty much a ‘household name’. Therefore, I am not going to go into detail about him in this particular post. However, for those who are interested in learning more about Chow Yun Fat’s life and why he is one of the most respected celebrities on the planet, feel free to check out the Book Review I wrote awhile back ago: Now and Then II: Chow Yun Fat
.—Ng Man Tat (Tat Gor) should definitely be a familiar name to audiences, especially movie audiences (more on that piece later). Known as a ‘golden’ supporting actor, Tat Gor has never played a lead role in his life – he started off in TV as a supporting actor and even when he started doing movies, he continued in supporting roles, eventually making a name for himself and becoming one of the most successful and highest paid supporting actors in the Chinese-speaking regions of Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China (he’s actually one of the few HK actors to achieve such success completely relying on supporting roles).
After Tat Gor graduated from Acting Class, he participated in numerous series in the 70s, but mostly had only minor roles. He started becoming familiar to audiences through his performance in the 1979 version of “Chor Lau Heung” (he played Chor Lau Heung’s good friend Wu Tiet Fa). In the 1980s, Tat Gor participated in many ancient series, though he also had quite a few memorable roles in modern series as well, mostly as a ‘stern’ father figure – for me, his most memorable ‘serious’ role from the early 80s was as ‘Yip Sir’ in the “Police Cadet” trilogy (in “Police Cadet ‘84”, he was Tony Leung’s mentor at the cadet training school and in “Police Cade ‘85”, he played Margie Tsang and Jamie Chik’s father – same role but focused more on his family life).
In 1989, Tat Gor collaborated with rising comedic star Stephen Chow (周星馳) on 2 major series (ancient series “The Final Combat” and also modern series “The Justice of Life”) and from that point forward, a comedic ‘dream team’ was born. In 1990, Tat Gor started to focus his career more on movies and with that, continued his ‘dream team’ collaboration with Stephen Chow, participating in almost every single one of Stephen’s movies. He received his first nomination for Best Supporting Actor at the HK Film Awards for his performance in the gambling-themed “All for the Winner” (賭聖) [the Stephen Chow spin-off of Chow Yun Fat’s “God of Gamblers” franchise]. He didn’t win that year, but the following year, he was nominated again in the same category for “A Moment of Romance” (天若有情) [the famous Andy Lau film] and finally took home the award (ironically, in a non-Stephen Chow collaboration). Tat Gor is no longer active in the HK film industry, as he shifted his career to Taiwan and the Mainland in the late 90s, participating mostly in TV series over there. He did reunite briefly with Stephen Chow in 2001 for the film “Shaolin Soccer” however 3 years later when Stephen started filming for “Kung Fu Hustle”, Tat Gor was noticeably absent from the movie (it was rumored that the two had fallen out of favor with each other and therefore ended their long-standing collaboration – supposedly, things are fine now, at least according to Tat Gor).
.—Simon Yam is one of those rare success stories whose decorated career is proof that an actor typecasted as a ‘sex symbol’ can still go on to become one of the most solid and respected actors in the entertainment industry. Prior to joining TVB, Simon worked as a model (not surprising, given his good looks, tall stature, and nearly perfect physique) – after entering the Acting Class and then graduating, he started participating in TV series and films almost simultaneously (though of course at that time, there was more focus placed on his TV career). With such a long career (over 30 years), Simon had the opportunity to play many different roles and is probably one of the few actors who actually had such a wide acting range. But it actually wasn’t like that all the time – in the early years of his career, he was pretty much typecast into either ‘sex symbol’ bad boy type roles or given the role of the villain, though there was the occaisonal ‘honest good guy’ role thrown in there from time to time. Simon had so many memorable performances when he was at TVB, it’s actually very difficult to pick a ‘favorite’ -- though if I had to choose, I would probably count his performances in “The New Adventures of Chor Lau Heung” (1984), “Police Cade ‘85” (1985), “The New Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre” (1986), and his most representative work (at TVB) “War of the Dragon” (1989) amongst my favorites. In fact, I actually feel that his performance in “War of the Dragon” was so good, it was absolutely award-worthy (too bad there were no TV awards back then) – that series definitely secured Simon’s ‘lead actor’ status and proved that he definitely had acting skill. Ironically, it was also around that time that he left TVB and went to ATV – though technically, he was also continuing to focus more on his movie career as well, since it was also around that time (early 90s) that he really started participating in a lot of movies. And then, in the mid-90s, he pretty much left ATV to focus completely on his movie career (though still participating in a series or two here and there) – definitely a wise decision given how successful he eventually became in the movie industry (finally winning the HKFA Best Actor award in 2010 for his performance in “Echoes of the Rainbow.”)
Some interesting facts about Simon’s background – he actually comes from a family of police officers, as his dad was a Police Corporal (he died while on duty when Simon was just 14 years old) and his older brother was the former Deputy Commissioner of Police in HK. Of course, we all know that his wife is famous model Qi Qi and together, they have a daughter named Ella.
.—Ringo Lam is a famous movie director who was most active back in the 80s and 90s. After graduating from the Acting Class, he had a few minor roles in a few series, but then switched to doing behind the scenes work, first as an assistant editor, then as a choreographer. He participated in the production of a few TVB series in the late 70s. He then left TVB in 1978 and went to Commercial Television, but his career there was short-lived, since CTV went belly up not too long after that. Therefore, Ringo decided to immigrate to Canada and study film at York University. He returned to HK in the early 80s and that’s when his career really took off, as he started applying the skills he learned and became a director. The genre that he specialized in was action drama, though he did occasionally direct a comedy or two. I’m actually not too familiar with Ringo’s work, but I do know that he was most famous for the “On Fire” films [“City on Fire” (龍虎風雲), “Prison on Fire” (監獄風雲), and “School on Fire” (學校風雲)] back in the late 80s and had won an HKFA Best Director award for one of the films. Out of the 3 films, I’m only familiar with the first two, which starred Chow Yun Fat.
.—The best way to describe Lo Hoi Pang (Pang Gor) is ‘multi-talented comedic genius’. Even though he was naturally born with a ‘sour-looking’ face, that’s certainly not the image that audiences have of him all these years. As the mainstay of TVB’s long-running flagship variety show “Enjoy Yourself Tonight” (E.Y.T.), Pang Gor made audiences laugh day in and day out with his hilarious comedic routines (usually consisting of ad-libbed dialogue), funny and oftentimes irreverent jokes, and most famously, his great imitation skills. His cutting dialogue in the E.Y.T. skit “The Shrimp Family” as well as his habit of ad-libbing and speaking in rhyme on the show left a deep impression on audiences and to this day, that particular skit still goes down in history as one of the all time classics in HK TV history. Pang Gor was also known for his acting skills and throughout his career, he participated in numerous TV series, movies, as well stage productions. He most recently participated in the stage production of “Shrimp Crazy Family”, which was a reunion of sorts for the E.Y.T. and Shrimp Family cast. (For more information regarding the “Shrimp Crazy Family” stage production, feel free to check out this post: The Return of a Classic)
I remember growing up watching Pang Gor on many of TVB’s variety shows, especially the Anniversary Gala skits and I can tell you first hand that he is absolutely hilarious! He’s definitely the ‘master’ of imitation and was even one of the early artists to perform in drag -- honestly speaking, he puts those imitation wannabees (the current ‘3 gods’, whom I can’t stand, especially when they dress up in drag!!) absolutely to shame! He’s definitely one of the few ‘all –around entertainers’ out there who is able to excel in all disciplines – I can’t think of anyone else in the industry with his caliber of skill.
.—English Tang is another one of those artists whose face audiences will surely recognize, since he participated in so many series in the past few decades and is still active even now (though on the acting front, most of his roles have always been minor ones). English is actually best known for being a host, as that’s where his strength lies – he hosted a variety of shows back in the day, but his most famous ‘gig’ was hosting TVB’s long-running E.Y.T., which he had done from the late 70s until E.Y.T. ended in the 90s (of course, he didn’t host every single episode, but he did host a majority of them). His daughter is Shermon Tang (鄧上文), a former Miss HK contestant from 2005 (I think she won the Most Photogenic award that year, though I’m not sure if she actually made it into top 3 or not, since I pretty much stopped watching the Miss HK pageants in the late 90s) who eventually became an actress and participated in quite a few TVB series (mostly minor roles though).
.—Thomas Ng may not be a familiar name to most audiences, as he is a producer and so works behind the scenes, plus there is so little information about him out there nowadays. Actually, to be more specific, I should say that Thomas is a FORMER producer for TVB (and subsequently ATV) because to be honest, I’m not sure if he’s still producing anymore (again, there is very little information about him, so I’m not too sure what he is doing career-wise now). Back in the 80s, he produced quite a few popular series that most 80s fanatics will be familiar with – for example: “The Legend of Master So” (1982) starring Chow Yun Fat and Andy Lau, “The Fearless Duo” (1984) starring Michael Miu and Barbara Yung, “Siblings of Vice and Virtue” (1986) starring Eddie Cheung, Barbara Chan, Kenneth Tsang, “The Two Most Honorable Knights” (1988) starring Tony Leung and Hugo Ng, etc. The only other thing I found out about Thomas Ng is that he was a very close friend of Barbara Yung’s and during her funeral, he was one of the pallbearers along with the Tigers.
.—The remaining 2 artists listed I’m not familiar with at all, though if they were actually actors onscreen (even in ‘ke le fe’ roles), I would probably recognize them if I saw their pictures. If anyone is familiar with them, please let me know.
Stay tuned for post #5.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
2011 TVB Anniversary Awards: Who has the best chances of getting TV King? (My personal analysis / assessment)
I had said earlier that I'm not going to do a full-fledged "predictions" post for the 2011 TVB Anniversary Awards and I'm still standing by my decision. The main reason for this is because I didn't like majority of the series that aired this year and was not impressed by most of the performances -- plus I only watched 1 series completely from beginning to end so far this year (goes to show how BAD this year's series were if I wasn't able to bring myself to sit through most of them). [As a means of clarification, when I say that I only watched 1 series completely from beginning to end, that means that I watched every single episode without distraction….the rest of the series I either didn’t finish watching, watched only a few episodes here and there, or was doing something else while watching so didn’t really pay close attention]. Therefore, it would be a waste of time for me to do a full predictions post in all categories when none of the performances really stood out.
With that said, the 'hype' this year among the general public seems to revolve around the TV King category and since that's the only category that I actually have a strong opinion on this time around, I figured it would be more appropriate for me to just write about that particular category and forfeit all the rest of them.
So far this year, here are some of the 'names' that I've seen come up the most often (in the Media as well as on discussion forums) in terms of potential candidates for TV King:
Note 1: I am just listing out names I’ve heard, regardless of whether they are truly in contention or not (some of the roles may actually be considered supporting roles – I realize that, but please keep in mind that this post is meant to be hypothetical only).
Note 2: This list is not all-inclusive by any means – there may be male artists you feel should belong on this list in addition to the ones I listed…that’s fine – if I missed anyone or you disagree with any of what I wrote, feel free to comment and state your argument.
Note 3: The numbers next to each name do not mean anything – numbering is my way of bullet-pointing in this post
List of 'potentials':
Steven Ma
Roger Kwok
Bowie Lam
Bobby Au Yeung
Sunny Chan
Wayne Lai
Bosco Wong
Raymond Lam
Michael Tse
Moses Chan
Kevin Cheng
Based on the above list as well as my knowledge of TVB, below is my assessment of what I think each candidate’s chances are:
1) Steven Ma
I already outlined in detail how I feel about Steven’s performance in my earlier review of “The Life and Times of a Sentinel”, so I’m not going to rehash all of that here (those interested can read the review at this link). As I stated in my review, Steven is definitely my number one choice for TV King this year, as his performance was truly phenomenal in my opinion (though some can argue that he’s just doing what he does best – either way, doesn’t matter to me – he still turned in the best performance so far in my opinion). So far, Steven has been the only one to move me emotionally with his performance this year. Of course, we all know that Steven’s chances of getting the award this year is pretty much ZERO given that whole fiasco with Virginia Lok a few months back and the early contract termination issue (plus add to that the fact that TVB traditionally frowns upon artists who are ‘disobedient’ and ‘vocal’ – two “sore spots” that, in TVB’s eyes, Steven has been ‘guilty’ of pressing recently). Even though he is the most deserving of the bunch and my vote goes to him for sure, I have pretty much resigned myself to the reality that he will once again be denied the award (unless by some miracle, Mona Fong intervenes and orders for justice to be done – not likely though). Nonetheless, I will continue to support him all the way!
2) Roger Kwok
Roger is actually my second choice for TV King this year, as his performance in “Wax & Wane” was truly awesome (despite the series itself being hugely mediocre). In fact, he was pretty much the only ‘saving grace’ to that series (in my opinion anyways) – if it weren’t for his steady performance, I doubt too many people would have bothered watching. Unfortunately though, his chances of getting the award this year is pretty much zero as well – for obvious reasons. First, with TVB’s focus on promoting their favorites the past few years, a lot of the veterans have pretty much been thrown by the wayside – Roger is already an established actor plus he already received the award twice, so from TVB’s perspective, how important is it to give him the award again? Plus in recent years, Roger has shifted his career to the Mainland and pretty much only films one series per year for TVB nowadays – so with a lot less exposure in the HK market (which translates to less audience exposure) and the fact that Roger will still work for TVB (when he’s in HK that is) irregardless of what happens, there’s really no incentive for TVB to give him the award. I actually don’t even think that Roger will get into Top 5 for that matter (remember that when it comes to awards, TVB is all about the politics, not about who is deserving or who is not). Regardless, I still feel that he turned in one of the best performances so far this year!
3) Bowie Lam
Bowie only has 1 series in contention this year – “River of Wine” – which just finished airing a week or so ago. Though he turned in a solid performance, the series overall was not well-received, as many people considered the cast ‘weak’ and also the storyline was way too draggy. Irregardless of what people thought of the series though, TVB is still not going to give him the award anyway because 1) he already left the company in May, and 2) he could care less about that particular award, since he already won the ‘Asia TV King’ award and that is WAY more prestigious than a stupid old TVB award. Also, it has already been made known (loud and clear in fact) that Bowie definitely has options – in Mainland China as well as other parts of Asia…so in comparisons, TVB is ‘small potatoes’ to him. There’s no point for TVB to give him the award because they are not going to get any return for their investment (except maybe his participation in the “War and Beauty” sequel next year – but if the schedule works out, he will probably still participate anyway regardless of the award).
** As a side note: I find it laughable that certain gossip mags placed Bowie in Top 5 contention for the TV King award based on his performance in “Heaven and Earth” (yes, I literally laughed out loud) – um, unless they got some sort of sneak preview that the rest of us audiences weren’t privvy to (which I doubt), there is no basis whatsoever for that ‘prediction’. I mean, come on now – that series isn’t even scheduled to air until mid to late November – which means that it’s not even going to finish in time for the awards ceremony! Besides, it makes no sense whatsoever to nominate someone for top 5 contention in an award category based on how they WILL perform in a series that no one has seen yet rather than how they ALREADY performed in a series that everyone has seen. All the more reason why people shouldn’t take what the gossip mags write seriously!
4) Bobby Au Yeung
Ah, dear ole Bobby – gotta love the guy (I certainly do..LOL)! He only has 1 series in contention this year (“Men with No Shadows”), but unfortunately, that series did not do too well in the ratings category. I actually see Bobby’s situation as similar to Roger’s in that there is no need to give him any awards because he’s pretty much already past that point in his career. Besides, he has a certain loyalty to TVB and has already said that he will make time in his schedule to film 1 series per year for them regardless of what happens – so then from TVB’s perspective, there is no need to reward him. For me, I’m at the point where I don’t care if TVB gives him an award or not because he already received the award a long time ago and it’s not like it’s going to change his status in our (audience’s) hearts anyway. Sort of off-topic, but I just wish that TVB would stop “using” him to promote their own biological sons and daughters….is that too much to ask?
5) Sunny Chan
I’ve ranted about Sunny so much over the past 7 to 8 years, I’m starting to sound like a broken record! I’ve always liked Sunny (ever since the 90s) and he is definitely a great actor, but unfortunately, TVB hasn’t treated him too well all these years. It’s interesting that he actually has the most series on the air this year amongst the veteran first line male leads (“Wax and Wane”, “River of Wine”, “Curse of the Royal Harem”, cameo role in “The Life and Times of a Sentinel”), but yet he has the least chance of even making it to Top 5 (forget about winning)! Maybe he’s just unlucky or TVB just hates his guts – whatever the reason, he’s gotten very few ‘decent’ roles this past decade, as most of the roles were mostly forgettable ones in forgettable series (for example: the series "The Wintermelon Tale" -- I mean, really? TVB put him in THAT ridiculous series?). Also, a lot of his series that he did in the past 7-8 years had been warehoused (for example: “Strike At Heart”, “The Slicing of the Demon”, “Phoenix Rising”, “The Greatness of a Hero”, etc. “The Wintermelon Tale” was warehoused for 1 year before it aired). He's had the most series warehoused out of all the artists -- to the point that he's dubbed "Warehouse King" by some insiders). Since his return, I have not seen a single breakthrough role for him (and he had plenty of them in the 90s)....plus I don't see him getting promoted either (despite being a skilled actor). Oh, and he is currently a TVB managed artist, but obviously to TVB, he's less important than the others that they are promoting right now...In any case, I feel sorry for him because I know that he is pretty much going to stay at TVB forever now (he wants to remain in HK to take care of his wife and son and has no interest in re-locating), which means that he is going to continue to get crappy roles and waste all that talent of his. Such a shame!
6) Wayne Lai
I love Wayne and with his awesome acting skills, I’m confident he will deliver a great performance as he always does (after all, he’s known for being consistent and meticulous with his acting and so far, based on all the series that I’ve watched of his, I’ve never been disappointed). BUT, since “Forensic Heroes 3” just started airing yesterday, it’s still too early to tell whether his performance in the series will be ‘award-worthy’ (though I have no doubt that he will do a good job). Without commenting specifically on his performance in FH3 as of yet, l actually think that Wayne’s chances of pulling a ‘three-peat’ victory are extremely slim….now don’t get me wrong – the reason I think this way has nothing to do with his acting or even the series that he will be competing with…I’m basing it purely on the fact that he has already won 2 years in a row (the first year because he had tremendous audience support so they HAD to give it to him and the second year because he was the ‘safest’ choice given the ‘playing field’ at that time)….this year, the dynamics are a bit different -- because of all the negative publicity that TVB has been getting, there’s more incentive for them to use the awards as a political tool to further their agenda (plus the past 3 years or so, they’ve pretty much treated Wayne as a ‘cash cow’ anyway – as long as he continues to remain popular with audiences and business sponsors, then they will continue to benefit, so it’s not like it’s absolutely necessary to give him the award). Of course, if by chance Wayne does end up getting the award, I am totally fine with it (because the way I see it, TVB is making up for neglecting him for 20 years) – but I highly doubt it will happen.
7) Bosco Wong
One advantage that Bosco has is that all of his performances this year (as Bai Co in “Lives of Omission” and also his earlier performances in “Grace Under Fire” and “7 Days in Life”) were pretty well-received by audiences – in fact, some people even feel that his performance in LOO overshadowed primary lead Michael Tse. With that said though, Bosco is also the most ‘junior’ among the field of candidates and technically, he isn’t even considered a ‘first line’ siu sang yet – I honestly don’t think that it will sit well with people if he is given the award when there are others at a higher level than him in contention (TVB may be stupid, but not THAT stupid!). By the looks of things (i.e. a lot of the first line siu sangs leaving and TVB’s supposed focus on promoting the 2nd line to first line in the coming year, plus the fact that he is a biological son who is on the ‘favored’ list), Bosco will have a lot of opportunities in the coming year, so he still has time to refine his acting and gain more experience….there’s definitely no rush to give him the award right now.
8) Raymond Lam
Every year, TVB tries to push Raymond up onto the TV King throne and every year, it doesn’t work (that strategy is starting to get old now and TVB should seriously consider giving up on it! ). And honestly, this year, it’s not going to work either, considering both of his series (“Sister of Eternal Flower” and “Men with No Shadows”) pretty much tanked (in terms of ratings and word of mouth). Also, despite what people may say, the negative publicity he’s gotten this year with all those relationship issues (and the whole bed photos mess) truly did impact his image and reputation, which indirectly affected his chances. Of course, TVB could still give him the award if they wanted to, but I don’t think it would go over well because 1) the favoritism would be too obvious, especially if TVB is supposedly using the ratings of the series as a benchmark for the award – it’s too hard for them to justify why they would give him the award when his series flopped, and 2) it would create too much controversy due to the ‘Virginia Lok’ factor (I’m sure you all know what I mean) – VL has been ‘in the news’ a lot lately and not for ‘good’ reasons either…given all the bad press that she’s been getting (plus Raymond’s), it’s probably not a wise idea for TVB to pile even more controversy on top of that!
9) Michael Tse
I will be upfront right now -- Michael Tse isn’t even on my list of potential ‘contenders’ for TV King because, frankly speaking, he ISN’T WORTHY!! His acting is ‘mediocre’ at best and the only reason why he’s so ‘popular’ right now is because of the Laughing Gor persona – it’s unfortunate that he let the whole Laughing Gor thing get to his head and as a result, has been acting all arrogant and cocky. He’s definitely NOT lead actor material (um, yea, let’s see him carry an entire series by himself, without any help from anyone!) and his acting isn’t even that great, yet he has the audacity to go around thinking that he is the ‘next best thing since sliced bread’!! (yea, right – in your dreams, dude!). Anyway, I highly doubt that TVB is going to give him the award (even if they considered it previously), especially after how poorly he handled the Steven Ma situation – a lot of audiences have a bad impression of him now (the number one comment I’ve been hearing on forums is: “I don’t care who gets the award, as long as it’s not Michael Tse!”). TVB is in a precarious position right now (given everything that has happened to them the past year or so) and I doubt that they can afford to take on the type of ‘backlash’ (similar to what they got back in 2006) that will inevitably come if they give the award to an undeserving jerk like MT.
10) Moses Chan
What are Moses’ chances of being crowned TV King for the 2nd time? Well, to be honest, it’s really hard to say…I personally couldn’t stand him in “Yes Sir, Sorry Sir” (in fact, I couldn’t stand that series PERIOD), but he IS a somewhat ‘safe’ choice because 1) he’s a biological son, 2) he’s gotten the award before, so that does put him up a notch over others who never got that recognition, and 3) though his acting in recent years hasn’t been good, it hasn’t been horrible either (generally speaking). I used to have a certain appreciation for Moses’ acting when he first started, but after so many years of watching one OTT (over the top) performance after another, it has started to become annoying to the point of boring. I don’t know how I’ll feel if he gets crowned TV King again – I guess it’s one of those ‘better him than MT’ situations for me. Realistically speaking though – unless TVB really has no other choice, I doubt that they will give him the award again (at least not this year).
11) Kevin Cheng
Very honestly speaking, I think that Kevin actually has a very good chance at the award this year (I know what you’re thinking.…I can’t believe I’m saying this either, but to be fair, I do have to give credit where it’s due). His acting definitely improved a lot in “Ghetto Justice” (and he wasn’t too bad in “Only You” either) and the ‘Law Ba’ role was a breakthrough for him – plus the feedback from the general public for his performance in that series has been overwhelmingly positive. Also, don’t forget that his popularity has soared in recent months due to his latest Mainland series "Bu Bu Jing Xin" (with Nicky Wu, Damian Lau, etc.) being a HUGE hit over there – he actually received much acclaim for his portrayal of the 8th Prince (I have yet to watch the series, so not going to pass judgement on the validity of those praises) – to the point that he now officially has a fan club with thousands of fans in the Mainland. True, it can be argued that the Mainland series shouldn’t have anything to do with the TV King award, but the point I’m trying to make is that the stars could potentially be aligned for it to be Kevin’s year this year. For the record, I am known for being ANTI-Kevin Cheng and to some extent, I still am (and yes I'm still adamant that TVB made a really BAD BS decision by giving him the award back in 2006 when he wasn't anywhere near deserving of it), but even I have to admit that his acting has improved in the past year or so. (And just to be very clear for people who may misunderstand….no, I'm not ‘suddenly changing course’ -- I'm merely giving an honest assessment of who I feel has the best chance based on how things look so far this year).
.--.
Concluding Thoughts
With the above, I tried as best I could to give an honest assessment and analysis of some of the actors who were mentioned at some point this year as a ‘possible candidate’ for TV King. Of course, with more than a month left until the awards show, pretty much anything can happen at this point.
One point that I do want to emphasize is that I pretty much stopped caring about the awards years ago – therefore, no matter who wins TV King this year, I probably won’t have any reaction to it from an emotional standpoint (that is, unless Steven wins….)
With that said, the 'hype' this year among the general public seems to revolve around the TV King category and since that's the only category that I actually have a strong opinion on this time around, I figured it would be more appropriate for me to just write about that particular category and forfeit all the rest of them.
So far this year, here are some of the 'names' that I've seen come up the most often (in the Media as well as on discussion forums) in terms of potential candidates for TV King:
Note 1: I am just listing out names I’ve heard, regardless of whether they are truly in contention or not (some of the roles may actually be considered supporting roles – I realize that, but please keep in mind that this post is meant to be hypothetical only).
Note 2: This list is not all-inclusive by any means – there may be male artists you feel should belong on this list in addition to the ones I listed…that’s fine – if I missed anyone or you disagree with any of what I wrote, feel free to comment and state your argument.
Note 3: The numbers next to each name do not mean anything – numbering is my way of bullet-pointing in this post
List of 'potentials':
Steven Ma
Roger Kwok
Bowie Lam
Bobby Au Yeung
Sunny Chan
Wayne Lai
Bosco Wong
Raymond Lam
Michael Tse
Moses Chan
Kevin Cheng
Based on the above list as well as my knowledge of TVB, below is my assessment of what I think each candidate’s chances are:
1) Steven Ma
I already outlined in detail how I feel about Steven’s performance in my earlier review of “The Life and Times of a Sentinel”, so I’m not going to rehash all of that here (those interested can read the review at this link). As I stated in my review, Steven is definitely my number one choice for TV King this year, as his performance was truly phenomenal in my opinion (though some can argue that he’s just doing what he does best – either way, doesn’t matter to me – he still turned in the best performance so far in my opinion). So far, Steven has been the only one to move me emotionally with his performance this year. Of course, we all know that Steven’s chances of getting the award this year is pretty much ZERO given that whole fiasco with Virginia Lok a few months back and the early contract termination issue (plus add to that the fact that TVB traditionally frowns upon artists who are ‘disobedient’ and ‘vocal’ – two “sore spots” that, in TVB’s eyes, Steven has been ‘guilty’ of pressing recently). Even though he is the most deserving of the bunch and my vote goes to him for sure, I have pretty much resigned myself to the reality that he will once again be denied the award (unless by some miracle, Mona Fong intervenes and orders for justice to be done – not likely though). Nonetheless, I will continue to support him all the way!
2) Roger Kwok
Roger is actually my second choice for TV King this year, as his performance in “Wax & Wane” was truly awesome (despite the series itself being hugely mediocre). In fact, he was pretty much the only ‘saving grace’ to that series (in my opinion anyways) – if it weren’t for his steady performance, I doubt too many people would have bothered watching. Unfortunately though, his chances of getting the award this year is pretty much zero as well – for obvious reasons. First, with TVB’s focus on promoting their favorites the past few years, a lot of the veterans have pretty much been thrown by the wayside – Roger is already an established actor plus he already received the award twice, so from TVB’s perspective, how important is it to give him the award again? Plus in recent years, Roger has shifted his career to the Mainland and pretty much only films one series per year for TVB nowadays – so with a lot less exposure in the HK market (which translates to less audience exposure) and the fact that Roger will still work for TVB (when he’s in HK that is) irregardless of what happens, there’s really no incentive for TVB to give him the award. I actually don’t even think that Roger will get into Top 5 for that matter (remember that when it comes to awards, TVB is all about the politics, not about who is deserving or who is not). Regardless, I still feel that he turned in one of the best performances so far this year!
3) Bowie Lam
Bowie only has 1 series in contention this year – “River of Wine” – which just finished airing a week or so ago. Though he turned in a solid performance, the series overall was not well-received, as many people considered the cast ‘weak’ and also the storyline was way too draggy. Irregardless of what people thought of the series though, TVB is still not going to give him the award anyway because 1) he already left the company in May, and 2) he could care less about that particular award, since he already won the ‘Asia TV King’ award and that is WAY more prestigious than a stupid old TVB award. Also, it has already been made known (loud and clear in fact) that Bowie definitely has options – in Mainland China as well as other parts of Asia…so in comparisons, TVB is ‘small potatoes’ to him. There’s no point for TVB to give him the award because they are not going to get any return for their investment (except maybe his participation in the “War and Beauty” sequel next year – but if the schedule works out, he will probably still participate anyway regardless of the award).
** As a side note: I find it laughable that certain gossip mags placed Bowie in Top 5 contention for the TV King award based on his performance in “Heaven and Earth” (yes, I literally laughed out loud) – um, unless they got some sort of sneak preview that the rest of us audiences weren’t privvy to (which I doubt), there is no basis whatsoever for that ‘prediction’. I mean, come on now – that series isn’t even scheduled to air until mid to late November – which means that it’s not even going to finish in time for the awards ceremony! Besides, it makes no sense whatsoever to nominate someone for top 5 contention in an award category based on how they WILL perform in a series that no one has seen yet rather than how they ALREADY performed in a series that everyone has seen. All the more reason why people shouldn’t take what the gossip mags write seriously!
4) Bobby Au Yeung
Ah, dear ole Bobby – gotta love the guy (I certainly do..LOL)! He only has 1 series in contention this year (“Men with No Shadows”), but unfortunately, that series did not do too well in the ratings category. I actually see Bobby’s situation as similar to Roger’s in that there is no need to give him any awards because he’s pretty much already past that point in his career. Besides, he has a certain loyalty to TVB and has already said that he will make time in his schedule to film 1 series per year for them regardless of what happens – so then from TVB’s perspective, there is no need to reward him. For me, I’m at the point where I don’t care if TVB gives him an award or not because he already received the award a long time ago and it’s not like it’s going to change his status in our (audience’s) hearts anyway. Sort of off-topic, but I just wish that TVB would stop “using” him to promote their own biological sons and daughters….is that too much to ask?
5) Sunny Chan
I’ve ranted about Sunny so much over the past 7 to 8 years, I’m starting to sound like a broken record! I’ve always liked Sunny (ever since the 90s) and he is definitely a great actor, but unfortunately, TVB hasn’t treated him too well all these years. It’s interesting that he actually has the most series on the air this year amongst the veteran first line male leads (“Wax and Wane”, “River of Wine”, “Curse of the Royal Harem”, cameo role in “The Life and Times of a Sentinel”), but yet he has the least chance of even making it to Top 5 (forget about winning)! Maybe he’s just unlucky or TVB just hates his guts – whatever the reason, he’s gotten very few ‘decent’ roles this past decade, as most of the roles were mostly forgettable ones in forgettable series (for example: the series "The Wintermelon Tale" -- I mean, really? TVB put him in THAT ridiculous series?). Also, a lot of his series that he did in the past 7-8 years had been warehoused (for example: “Strike At Heart”, “The Slicing of the Demon”, “Phoenix Rising”, “The Greatness of a Hero”, etc. “The Wintermelon Tale” was warehoused for 1 year before it aired). He's had the most series warehoused out of all the artists -- to the point that he's dubbed "Warehouse King" by some insiders). Since his return, I have not seen a single breakthrough role for him (and he had plenty of them in the 90s)....plus I don't see him getting promoted either (despite being a skilled actor). Oh, and he is currently a TVB managed artist, but obviously to TVB, he's less important than the others that they are promoting right now...In any case, I feel sorry for him because I know that he is pretty much going to stay at TVB forever now (he wants to remain in HK to take care of his wife and son and has no interest in re-locating), which means that he is going to continue to get crappy roles and waste all that talent of his. Such a shame!
6) Wayne Lai
I love Wayne and with his awesome acting skills, I’m confident he will deliver a great performance as he always does (after all, he’s known for being consistent and meticulous with his acting and so far, based on all the series that I’ve watched of his, I’ve never been disappointed). BUT, since “Forensic Heroes 3” just started airing yesterday, it’s still too early to tell whether his performance in the series will be ‘award-worthy’ (though I have no doubt that he will do a good job). Without commenting specifically on his performance in FH3 as of yet, l actually think that Wayne’s chances of pulling a ‘three-peat’ victory are extremely slim….now don’t get me wrong – the reason I think this way has nothing to do with his acting or even the series that he will be competing with…I’m basing it purely on the fact that he has already won 2 years in a row (the first year because he had tremendous audience support so they HAD to give it to him and the second year because he was the ‘safest’ choice given the ‘playing field’ at that time)….this year, the dynamics are a bit different -- because of all the negative publicity that TVB has been getting, there’s more incentive for them to use the awards as a political tool to further their agenda (plus the past 3 years or so, they’ve pretty much treated Wayne as a ‘cash cow’ anyway – as long as he continues to remain popular with audiences and business sponsors, then they will continue to benefit, so it’s not like it’s absolutely necessary to give him the award). Of course, if by chance Wayne does end up getting the award, I am totally fine with it (because the way I see it, TVB is making up for neglecting him for 20 years) – but I highly doubt it will happen.
7) Bosco Wong
One advantage that Bosco has is that all of his performances this year (as Bai Co in “Lives of Omission” and also his earlier performances in “Grace Under Fire” and “7 Days in Life”) were pretty well-received by audiences – in fact, some people even feel that his performance in LOO overshadowed primary lead Michael Tse. With that said though, Bosco is also the most ‘junior’ among the field of candidates and technically, he isn’t even considered a ‘first line’ siu sang yet – I honestly don’t think that it will sit well with people if he is given the award when there are others at a higher level than him in contention (TVB may be stupid, but not THAT stupid!). By the looks of things (i.e. a lot of the first line siu sangs leaving and TVB’s supposed focus on promoting the 2nd line to first line in the coming year, plus the fact that he is a biological son who is on the ‘favored’ list), Bosco will have a lot of opportunities in the coming year, so he still has time to refine his acting and gain more experience….there’s definitely no rush to give him the award right now.
8) Raymond Lam
Every year, TVB tries to push Raymond up onto the TV King throne and every year, it doesn’t work (that strategy is starting to get old now and TVB should seriously consider giving up on it! ). And honestly, this year, it’s not going to work either, considering both of his series (“Sister of Eternal Flower” and “Men with No Shadows”) pretty much tanked (in terms of ratings and word of mouth). Also, despite what people may say, the negative publicity he’s gotten this year with all those relationship issues (and the whole bed photos mess) truly did impact his image and reputation, which indirectly affected his chances. Of course, TVB could still give him the award if they wanted to, but I don’t think it would go over well because 1) the favoritism would be too obvious, especially if TVB is supposedly using the ratings of the series as a benchmark for the award – it’s too hard for them to justify why they would give him the award when his series flopped, and 2) it would create too much controversy due to the ‘Virginia Lok’ factor (I’m sure you all know what I mean) – VL has been ‘in the news’ a lot lately and not for ‘good’ reasons either…given all the bad press that she’s been getting (plus Raymond’s), it’s probably not a wise idea for TVB to pile even more controversy on top of that!
9) Michael Tse
I will be upfront right now -- Michael Tse isn’t even on my list of potential ‘contenders’ for TV King because, frankly speaking, he ISN’T WORTHY!! His acting is ‘mediocre’ at best and the only reason why he’s so ‘popular’ right now is because of the Laughing Gor persona – it’s unfortunate that he let the whole Laughing Gor thing get to his head and as a result, has been acting all arrogant and cocky. He’s definitely NOT lead actor material (um, yea, let’s see him carry an entire series by himself, without any help from anyone!) and his acting isn’t even that great, yet he has the audacity to go around thinking that he is the ‘next best thing since sliced bread’!! (yea, right – in your dreams, dude!). Anyway, I highly doubt that TVB is going to give him the award (even if they considered it previously), especially after how poorly he handled the Steven Ma situation – a lot of audiences have a bad impression of him now (the number one comment I’ve been hearing on forums is: “I don’t care who gets the award, as long as it’s not Michael Tse!”). TVB is in a precarious position right now (given everything that has happened to them the past year or so) and I doubt that they can afford to take on the type of ‘backlash’ (similar to what they got back in 2006) that will inevitably come if they give the award to an undeserving jerk like MT.
10) Moses Chan
What are Moses’ chances of being crowned TV King for the 2nd time? Well, to be honest, it’s really hard to say…I personally couldn’t stand him in “Yes Sir, Sorry Sir” (in fact, I couldn’t stand that series PERIOD), but he IS a somewhat ‘safe’ choice because 1) he’s a biological son, 2) he’s gotten the award before, so that does put him up a notch over others who never got that recognition, and 3) though his acting in recent years hasn’t been good, it hasn’t been horrible either (generally speaking). I used to have a certain appreciation for Moses’ acting when he first started, but after so many years of watching one OTT (over the top) performance after another, it has started to become annoying to the point of boring. I don’t know how I’ll feel if he gets crowned TV King again – I guess it’s one of those ‘better him than MT’ situations for me. Realistically speaking though – unless TVB really has no other choice, I doubt that they will give him the award again (at least not this year).
11) Kevin Cheng
Very honestly speaking, I think that Kevin actually has a very good chance at the award this year (I know what you’re thinking.…I can’t believe I’m saying this either, but to be fair, I do have to give credit where it’s due). His acting definitely improved a lot in “Ghetto Justice” (and he wasn’t too bad in “Only You” either) and the ‘Law Ba’ role was a breakthrough for him – plus the feedback from the general public for his performance in that series has been overwhelmingly positive. Also, don’t forget that his popularity has soared in recent months due to his latest Mainland series "Bu Bu Jing Xin" (with Nicky Wu, Damian Lau, etc.) being a HUGE hit over there – he actually received much acclaim for his portrayal of the 8th Prince (I have yet to watch the series, so not going to pass judgement on the validity of those praises) – to the point that he now officially has a fan club with thousands of fans in the Mainland. True, it can be argued that the Mainland series shouldn’t have anything to do with the TV King award, but the point I’m trying to make is that the stars could potentially be aligned for it to be Kevin’s year this year. For the record, I am known for being ANTI-Kevin Cheng and to some extent, I still am (and yes I'm still adamant that TVB made a really BAD BS decision by giving him the award back in 2006 when he wasn't anywhere near deserving of it), but even I have to admit that his acting has improved in the past year or so. (And just to be very clear for people who may misunderstand….no, I'm not ‘suddenly changing course’ -- I'm merely giving an honest assessment of who I feel has the best chance based on how things look so far this year).
.--.
Concluding Thoughts
With the above, I tried as best I could to give an honest assessment and analysis of some of the actors who were mentioned at some point this year as a ‘possible candidate’ for TV King. Of course, with more than a month left until the awards show, pretty much anything can happen at this point.
One point that I do want to emphasize is that I pretty much stopped caring about the awards years ago – therefore, no matter who wins TV King this year, I probably won’t have any reaction to it from an emotional standpoint (that is, unless Steven wins….)
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Review of series “To Love With Love 水餃皇后” (1995)
This particular series recently came on TV and it so happened that I had never seen this series before, so I figured I’d give it a try. The premise of the story wasn’t bad and actually, the first half of the series was quite interesting, but near the second half, there was too much focus on parts that weren’t really necessary to the plot and were very obviously fillers. If the second half of the series was less draggy, I think I probably would have liked it more.
This series from the mid-90s is a modern series starring Nnadia Chan (陳松伶), Timmy Ho (何寶生), Wayne Lai (黎耀祥), Joyce Chan (陳彥行), Angie Cheong (張慧儀) and veteran artists So Hang Suen (蘇杏璇) and Wong Ching (王青). When I watched the opening theme video and also the first few episodes, I thought that this was perhaps another one of those typical ‘love story’ type series that TVB is famous for doing. Turns out that the series goes beyond that, as the message it tries to convey is not just about love conquering all, but also about perseverance, never giving up, and overcoming adversity in life. To be honest, there were definitely a lot of ‘predictable’ elements to the plot and I could see that the storyline does follow the ‘mold’ of the typical ‘tale of encouragement’ type series – so it definitely wasn’t unique and in fact some segments were too predictable to the point of being a bit boring -- if it weren’t for the cast (especially Nnadia and Wayne), I don’t think the series would have endured.
For the purposes of this review, I’m going to focus mostly on the characters, as I personally feel that this is the type of series where character development is important and it’s really the characters as well as the acting (rather than the storyline) that drives the series forward.
Main Cast / Characters
Nnadia Chan (Chu Yan Ping) – Nnadia’s character (nicknamed Ah Bien) is a poor village girl who lost her mother at a young age and so growing up, she had to take care of her 2 younger brothers while her father worked at a local restaurant. As the only female in the house, she was already cooking and cleaning and taking care of the household even before she reached her teens – though life was difficult, she still maintained a positive and optimistic attitude, as she believed that as long as one was willing to persevere and work hard, things would eventually get better. In the village, she didn’t have too many friends, but she was very close with the two best friends that she had grown up with (played by Timmy Ho and Wayne Lai). When she grows up, she eventually marries one of the ‘best friends’ (Timmy), but of course things happen in her life that test her marriage as well as her relationship with her family – at the same time, she needs to take care of her family and so makes a career out of what she knows best: making dumplings. Basically, the entire story revolves around Ah Bien’s trials and tribulations in life and how she eventually went from being a poor village girl to a well-known ‘queen of dumplings’.
Nnadia is definitely one of my favorite actresses. I love how her acting is so natural and convincing, to the point that no matter what roles she takes on, it never seems as though she is acting – rather, it always feels like she IS the character. Even with a lot of the difficult scenes such as crying or arguing, she does it so naturally (unlike other actresses where you can usually tell when they are faking it). I always enjoy watching Nnadia’s performances, even if I don’t like the series or the character that she may be portraying.
Once again, Nnadia did an excellent job with her performance in this series. If you think about it, the character is actually quite tragic and has to endure through a lot of difficult situations, yet throughout that time, remain positive and optimistic. She was perfect for the role and I honestly feel that no other actress would have been able to do as good a job as her in this series. Even though Nnadia’s character wasn’t my favorite in this series, I couldn’t help but admire and respect her. Interestingly, I think that part of the reason why Nnadia was so good in this series (aside from her natural born acting skills) is because in terms of personality and attitude, the character of Chu Yan Ping is very similar to how Nnadia is in real life. (After reading Nnadia’s interview with Mingpao that I translated back in August, this fact was made even more clear – looking back at that interview, I felt as though the woman being described was in fact Chu Yan Ping!).
It’s really too bad that Nnadia is no longer active in the HK TV industry – she is one of the few naturally talented actresses out there and it’s definitely the industry’s loss.
Timmy Ho (Yu Chi Fung) – Timmy’s character is a ‘young master’ of sorts from a well-to-do family in the village. His family owns the restaurant where Ah Bien’s dad works and for years, the family has run the establishment with an iron first. Timmy’s character in the series is actually quite stereotypical, as he is extremely smart and talented, highly educated (college grad who studied abroad overseas), and excels at pretty much everything he does – however he has a very compassionate personality and despite his status, he is very down to earth. He’s very independent and doesn’t let societal norms govern his life – also, he has no problems speaking out against injustice and rebelling against his overbearing, bossy, unreasonable mother (played by So Hang Suen) whenever her actions would get out of hand. For example, he ends up falling in love with Nnadia’s character Ah Bien and marries her against his mother’s wishes; then when his mother is mean to Ah Bien and her family, he is fiercely protective of her and even moves out with her to prevent her from being treated badly by his mother. With that said though, no matter how much he disapproves of his mother’s actions, he is ultimately still a filial son -- this will be an important fact later on, as it is precisely because of this filialness that he ends up going to jail for 2 years, which changes his life completely and also strains his marriage as well as his relationship with his family later on in the series.
Those who followed TVB’s series in the 90s will probably be familiar with Timmy Ho, as he was in quite a few series in the mid-90s (he was most active at TVB from 1995 to 1998 – in those 4 years alone, he participated in close to 15 series, with important roles in majority of those series). Timmy is actually from a very well-to-do family in real life, as his father is a rich bank tycoon with a net worth in the millions. His father was a skilled businessman who passed on his keen business acumen to his son – therefore, when Timmy returned to HK after studying abroad in Canada, he started his own business (in a completely unrelated field) and without any help from his father, was able to become extremely successful. He actually entered the entertainment industry by chance, as he was out singing with some friends and because he had good singing skills, he was ‘discovered’ and signed by a record company. When he joined TVB in the early 90s, he actually wasn’t part of the drama department – he had hosting talent, so he was chosen to host various variety shows as well as entertainment news show such as 娛樂新聞眼 (yes, the same entertainment news show that Leo Ku started in as well). It wasn’t until a few years later that he was chosen to participate in drama series and eventually in movies as well – it sounded like TVB had high hopes for him, as he was very heavily promoted in the mid-90s, with involvement in all three disciplines of music, television, and movies. I’ve actually never heard Timmy sing, so I can’t pass judgement on that piece, but I have seen quite a few of his series and must admit that he definitely had a lot of potential in terms of acting – plus he also had the advantage of being tall and relatively good-looking, so I think that if he had stayed in the industry, he probably would have been able to have a decent career.
So where is Timmy Ho now? Well, some time in the late 90s, he started studying Buddhism and became fascinated with the religion. I had read that prior to Timmy finding the religion, he was actually a bit of a spoiled rich kid (though not as extreme as some others in his same position) with a very bad habit – gambling; but after he started studying Buddhism, his personality changed completely, becoming more low-key and foregoing a lot of the excesses that were once a part of his world (for example, he moved out of the luxury hilltop mansion he had lived in for years and instead moved into a small rented apartment in the city). Timmy once said in an interview that he really felt a great affinity with Buddhism and really wanted to pursue it more in-depth – based on this, I guess it was really not a surprise then that he chose to enter the monastery and become a monk in 2005. Interestingly, he was very low-key about it – to the point that a lot of people (including the Media) did not know that he became a monk until 2 or 3 years ago.
Wayne Lai (Teng Nai Keung) – Wayne’s character Ah Nai is the other childhood friend that Nnadia’s character Ah Bien grows up with – in their childhood, he and Ah Bien along with Chi Fung were very close and had a ‘Three Musketeers’-like friendship. Ah Nai is actually a very interesting character: his father and grandfather were both the head of the village when they were alive, so naturally, he inherited the position after his father died (he was only in his twenties, yet he was already in such a highly respected position overseeing the entire village) – however he was not the typical village head, as he was neither stern nor strict nor did he put on airs or act self-important. Instead, he had a very ‘happy-go-lucky’ personality and was pretty much a kid at heart – he always took an optimistic and cheerful approach to things, no matter how difficult or tragic the situation was. He loved to hang out with the local kids and play video games, or hang out with his friends or help the villagers solve problems / disputes (the scenes where he went around looking for problems to resolve because he was so bored out of his wits – to the point that he had to resort to talking to the floor in his living room and imitating a sitting Buddha statue – were SO HILARIOUS, I was practically on the floor laughing!). Even with his playful personality though, he understood his responsibilities as village head and always made sure things that needed to get done were done. Despite having a crush on Ah Bien since childhood, he was genuinely happy for her when she married Chi Fung, as he knew that Chi Fung was better than him in many ways (talent, education, smarts, etc.) and was a better match for Ah Bien than himself. And throughout the entire series, no matter what situations occurred or what challenges arose, the 3 of them remained very close – their friendship never got affected. Later on, Ah Nai ends up falling in love with Chi Fung’s sister Ah Huo (played by Joyce Chan) and they eventually get married.
Ah Nai was definitely my favorite character in this series. He provided a lot of comic relief in an otherwise tragic story – in my opinion, his character really kept the series lighthearted and uplifting and actually really complemented the theme of the series quite well. For example, even when Ah Nai is diagnosed with a terminal illness (brain tumor) and knows that he doesn’t have long to live, he still remains true to his personality by remaining upbeat and spending whatever days he had left living life to the fullest. I love how the character was able to balance the comedic and tragic so perfectly, to the point that all of the scenes with him in it were thoroughly enjoyable. This was true even up until the end, when Ah Nai eventually dies from his illness – this part of the story was handled extremely well, as it wasn’t overly tragic yet still effectively got the point across.
To be honest, I don’t know who I should give credit to for the great job with the character of Ah Nai – I’m sure some of the credit goes to the writers for the well-written character, but in my opinion, a lot of the credit should also go to Wayne for his brilliant portrayal of the character (and I’m not just saying this because Wayne is one of my favorite actors). Just like with Nnadia’s character, no one else could have portrayed Wayne’s character better than him….which of course brings me back to the point that even back then, Wayne’s great acting skills were apparent and I really feel that once again, he ‘stole the show’ (that seems to be a pattern with many of the series where he is in the supporting role – even with series where I like the main leads, I still thoroughly enjoy Wayne’s role way more). Wayne is definitely ‘the best of the best’ when it comes to acting and so far, with all the series that I’ve seen of his (there are still some out there I have yet to watch), I have never been disappointed by his performance! (And once again, shame on TVB for taking more than 20 years to recognize him for his brilliant acting skills!).
So Hang Suen (Chi Fung’s mother Mrs. Yu) – So Han Suen’s character Mrs. Yu is one of those characters that we as audiences love to hate. For the first half of the series, she is pretty much the typical overbearing mother – bossy, unreasonable, constantly yelling at people for no good reason and never lets them get a word in edgewise, doesn’t trust anyone, etc. – pretty much, her attitude is that everything has to go her way no matter what. I would have to say that her character was downright annoying. Of course, in the second half of the series, after her family loses everything (their restaurant business and all their money), her son goes to jail because of her, and her older daughter betrays her, she becomes humbled and changes her tyrannical ways. She moves in with her daughter-in-law Ah Bien (Nnadia’s character) and after awhile, she realizes how wrongly she had treated Ah Bien in the past. Even though Mrs. Yu still has somewhat of a fiesty personality in the second half of the series, she actually becomes more likable due to her transformation from an overbearing tyrant to a reasonable mother who finally realizes how much her family means to her.
So Hang Suen is one of my favorite veteran female actresses. I pretty much grew up watching her series and to me, her acting always comes across so natural. Throughout her career, she has played numerous ‘mother’ characters – from the ‘benevolent’ type to the ‘overbearing’ type – and each time, her portrayal is very convincing. I mean, who can forget So Hang Suen’s many ‘classic’ mother characters: Kwok Jing’s (Felix Wong) mother Lee Ping in 1983’s “Legend of the Condor Heroes”, Cheung Wah Kit’s (Tony Leung) mother in all 3 installments of “Police Cadet”, Ding Yau Kin’s (Felix Wong) and Ding Yau Hong’s (Deric Wan) adoptive mother Auntie Wan in 1989’s “Looking Back in Anger”, etc. (just to name a few). If I were asked to give a list of actresses who do the best ‘mother’ roles, So Hang Suen would definitely be number one on my list!
So Hang Suen is retired from the industry now, but she does participate in the occasional series or two when she feels like it (primarily ATV series though). The latest I read was that last year, she and a group of fellow veteran ‘green leaf’ artists opened up an Acting School and she currently teaches there.
Joyce Chan (Ah Huo) – Joyce’s character Ah Huo is the younger sister of Yu Chi Fung. As the youngest daughter in the family, it was expected that she would be the most loved or spoiled, but actually, things were quite opposite for her – even though her dad and brother were good to her and treated her well, her mother always seem to be annoyed with her and yelled at her no matter what she did. She later finds out the reason why her mother treats her this way is because she is actually not her biological daughter – her father had an affair many years ago and she was the ‘result’ of that affair. When she finds out, she becomes depressed and runs away from home – not surprisingly, Ah Nai (Wayne) talks to her and eventually helps her get back on track, which is how they end up becoming a couple.
To me, Joyce’s role in the series wasn’t tremendously important, as it seemed that her function was mainly as a love interest for Wayne’s character. This could be why the writers didn’t spend a whole lot of time developing the storyline involving her.
As far as Joyce’s acting is concerned – well, I pretty much don’t have an opinion either way. I’ve always been neutral towards Joyce, as I don’t watch enough of her series to really be able to formulate an opinion. If you were to ask me what her ‘representative work’ is, I would have to say “Virtues of Harmony”, but that’s only because that series was on for close to 4 years, so it’s hard not to remember that series somewhat. I had read that at one point in the 90s, TVB was planning on heavily promoting her – but I’m actually not sure if they did or not because most of the series that I’ve seen of hers, she only had minor or supporting roles….even when she left TVB (to go to ATV), I really don’t feel she had any type of breakthrough role (maybe that’s why TVB gave up on her?).
Angie Cheong (Cheng Si Nga) – Angie’s role is a supporting one, as she plays Timmy Ho’s ex-girlfriend (coincidentally also named Angie) who breaks up with him, but then regrets it later because she still has feelings for him – but it’s too late because he had already married Nnadia. Even though on the surface, she appears to have gotten over it and even becomes good friends with the couple, she is actually deeply jealous of them on the inside and ‘predictably’ spends most of the series trying to sabotage the couple. (Ok, to put it bluntly, she is once again the ‘bxxch’ in this series). Needless to say, she doesn’t succeed in the end, since Timmy and Nnadia remain together.
Honestly, I really didn’t see the point in having Angie’s character there. Sure, they tried to make the storyline more interesting by putting in the ‘third wheel’ element to the relationship and such, but I feel they could have still gotten the same effect without her character – or perhaps still keep her character, but reduce her screentime (not that she had a lot of screentime to begin with). Some of the draggy scenes in the series were actually between her and Timmy and honestly, they really weren’t necessary to further the plot – I mean, how many scenes do we need to tell us that she still has feelings for Timmy and wants to get back with him, despite him no longer loving her? Not a whole lot, to be honest – they should have just cut out a lot of those ‘filler’ scenes instead of boring the audiences with them.
Those of you who watched “A Kindred Spirit” (which ran from 1995 to 1999) should be VERY familiar with Angie. In fact, for me, that was the first series of hers that I saw – prior to that, I had no clue who she was. Not surprisingly, she came out of a beauty pageant (Miss Asia International?) and actually did not participate in a whole lot of series if you really think about it. I’m actually neutral towards Angie because I honestly can’t tell whether she has acting potential or not – yes, she did well in “A Kindred Spirit”, but in that series as well as almost every other series she did, she had pretty much been typecasted as a ‘sex symbol’ actress (probably because of her good looks and figure) who is always ‘second fiddle’ to the main female leads…all her roles are actually pretty similar.
Honorable Mentions
.—Veteran actress Lai Suen (actress Gigi Lai’s aunt) played the role of Wayne’s grandmother in the series. Not surprisingly, her portrayal was excellent, but what I loved most though was actually her chemistry with Wayne – the two of them portrayed the grandmother / grandson relationship so well that if you were to tell me they were really related, I would probably believe it (of course, we know they aren’t related in real life though). I must say that whoever did the casting for the 2 characters did a great job!
.—Veteran actor Wong Ching played the role of Nnadia’s dad. His character was loud and obnoxious at times and had a big temper, but at the end of the day, he truly did love his children – it’s just that he wasn’t good at expressing it (or, more likely, he didn’t have time to, since he pretty much worked nonstop day and night in order to put food on the table). I enjoyed Wong Ching’s portrayal of the dad – he was funny at times (though he didn’t mean to be funny) but still did all the serious scenes quite well.
.—A very young Ruco Chan was also in this series (I’ve started to notice him in a lot of the older series that I’ve been watching lately). He played one of Nnadia’s younger brothers in the series. I will tell you that I definitely didn’t recognize him at first, as he looked so tremendously different back then. His role was actually a minor one and he didn’t have a whole lot of screen time – but I felt that he still did a good job nonetheless.
Concluding Thoughts
Overall, this series wasn’t bad in my opinion…BUT because of the genre and the message that it tries to get across, this series may not necessarily suit the tastes of all audiences. This is definitely one of those series where there is a big focus on ‘inner emotion acting’ (內心戲), which means that the series is a bit slower pace than most audiences would like (especially the second half, which was very draggy). I would still recommend this series (Nnadia and Wayne’s performances alone are absolutely worth watching) to those interested in the genre – BUT just make sure that you have plenty of patience to sit through the second half.
This series from the mid-90s is a modern series starring Nnadia Chan (陳松伶), Timmy Ho (何寶生), Wayne Lai (黎耀祥), Joyce Chan (陳彥行), Angie Cheong (張慧儀) and veteran artists So Hang Suen (蘇杏璇) and Wong Ching (王青). When I watched the opening theme video and also the first few episodes, I thought that this was perhaps another one of those typical ‘love story’ type series that TVB is famous for doing. Turns out that the series goes beyond that, as the message it tries to convey is not just about love conquering all, but also about perseverance, never giving up, and overcoming adversity in life. To be honest, there were definitely a lot of ‘predictable’ elements to the plot and I could see that the storyline does follow the ‘mold’ of the typical ‘tale of encouragement’ type series – so it definitely wasn’t unique and in fact some segments were too predictable to the point of being a bit boring -- if it weren’t for the cast (especially Nnadia and Wayne), I don’t think the series would have endured.
For the purposes of this review, I’m going to focus mostly on the characters, as I personally feel that this is the type of series where character development is important and it’s really the characters as well as the acting (rather than the storyline) that drives the series forward.
Main Cast / Characters
Nnadia Chan (Chu Yan Ping) – Nnadia’s character (nicknamed Ah Bien) is a poor village girl who lost her mother at a young age and so growing up, she had to take care of her 2 younger brothers while her father worked at a local restaurant. As the only female in the house, she was already cooking and cleaning and taking care of the household even before she reached her teens – though life was difficult, she still maintained a positive and optimistic attitude, as she believed that as long as one was willing to persevere and work hard, things would eventually get better. In the village, she didn’t have too many friends, but she was very close with the two best friends that she had grown up with (played by Timmy Ho and Wayne Lai). When she grows up, she eventually marries one of the ‘best friends’ (Timmy), but of course things happen in her life that test her marriage as well as her relationship with her family – at the same time, she needs to take care of her family and so makes a career out of what she knows best: making dumplings. Basically, the entire story revolves around Ah Bien’s trials and tribulations in life and how she eventually went from being a poor village girl to a well-known ‘queen of dumplings’.
Nnadia is definitely one of my favorite actresses. I love how her acting is so natural and convincing, to the point that no matter what roles she takes on, it never seems as though she is acting – rather, it always feels like she IS the character. Even with a lot of the difficult scenes such as crying or arguing, she does it so naturally (unlike other actresses where you can usually tell when they are faking it). I always enjoy watching Nnadia’s performances, even if I don’t like the series or the character that she may be portraying.
Once again, Nnadia did an excellent job with her performance in this series. If you think about it, the character is actually quite tragic and has to endure through a lot of difficult situations, yet throughout that time, remain positive and optimistic. She was perfect for the role and I honestly feel that no other actress would have been able to do as good a job as her in this series. Even though Nnadia’s character wasn’t my favorite in this series, I couldn’t help but admire and respect her. Interestingly, I think that part of the reason why Nnadia was so good in this series (aside from her natural born acting skills) is because in terms of personality and attitude, the character of Chu Yan Ping is very similar to how Nnadia is in real life. (After reading Nnadia’s interview with Mingpao that I translated back in August, this fact was made even more clear – looking back at that interview, I felt as though the woman being described was in fact Chu Yan Ping!).
It’s really too bad that Nnadia is no longer active in the HK TV industry – she is one of the few naturally talented actresses out there and it’s definitely the industry’s loss.
Timmy Ho (Yu Chi Fung) – Timmy’s character is a ‘young master’ of sorts from a well-to-do family in the village. His family owns the restaurant where Ah Bien’s dad works and for years, the family has run the establishment with an iron first. Timmy’s character in the series is actually quite stereotypical, as he is extremely smart and talented, highly educated (college grad who studied abroad overseas), and excels at pretty much everything he does – however he has a very compassionate personality and despite his status, he is very down to earth. He’s very independent and doesn’t let societal norms govern his life – also, he has no problems speaking out against injustice and rebelling against his overbearing, bossy, unreasonable mother (played by So Hang Suen) whenever her actions would get out of hand. For example, he ends up falling in love with Nnadia’s character Ah Bien and marries her against his mother’s wishes; then when his mother is mean to Ah Bien and her family, he is fiercely protective of her and even moves out with her to prevent her from being treated badly by his mother. With that said though, no matter how much he disapproves of his mother’s actions, he is ultimately still a filial son -- this will be an important fact later on, as it is precisely because of this filialness that he ends up going to jail for 2 years, which changes his life completely and also strains his marriage as well as his relationship with his family later on in the series.
Those who followed TVB’s series in the 90s will probably be familiar with Timmy Ho, as he was in quite a few series in the mid-90s (he was most active at TVB from 1995 to 1998 – in those 4 years alone, he participated in close to 15 series, with important roles in majority of those series). Timmy is actually from a very well-to-do family in real life, as his father is a rich bank tycoon with a net worth in the millions. His father was a skilled businessman who passed on his keen business acumen to his son – therefore, when Timmy returned to HK after studying abroad in Canada, he started his own business (in a completely unrelated field) and without any help from his father, was able to become extremely successful. He actually entered the entertainment industry by chance, as he was out singing with some friends and because he had good singing skills, he was ‘discovered’ and signed by a record company. When he joined TVB in the early 90s, he actually wasn’t part of the drama department – he had hosting talent, so he was chosen to host various variety shows as well as entertainment news show such as 娛樂新聞眼 (yes, the same entertainment news show that Leo Ku started in as well). It wasn’t until a few years later that he was chosen to participate in drama series and eventually in movies as well – it sounded like TVB had high hopes for him, as he was very heavily promoted in the mid-90s, with involvement in all three disciplines of music, television, and movies. I’ve actually never heard Timmy sing, so I can’t pass judgement on that piece, but I have seen quite a few of his series and must admit that he definitely had a lot of potential in terms of acting – plus he also had the advantage of being tall and relatively good-looking, so I think that if he had stayed in the industry, he probably would have been able to have a decent career.
So where is Timmy Ho now? Well, some time in the late 90s, he started studying Buddhism and became fascinated with the religion. I had read that prior to Timmy finding the religion, he was actually a bit of a spoiled rich kid (though not as extreme as some others in his same position) with a very bad habit – gambling; but after he started studying Buddhism, his personality changed completely, becoming more low-key and foregoing a lot of the excesses that were once a part of his world (for example, he moved out of the luxury hilltop mansion he had lived in for years and instead moved into a small rented apartment in the city). Timmy once said in an interview that he really felt a great affinity with Buddhism and really wanted to pursue it more in-depth – based on this, I guess it was really not a surprise then that he chose to enter the monastery and become a monk in 2005. Interestingly, he was very low-key about it – to the point that a lot of people (including the Media) did not know that he became a monk until 2 or 3 years ago.
Wayne Lai (Teng Nai Keung) – Wayne’s character Ah Nai is the other childhood friend that Nnadia’s character Ah Bien grows up with – in their childhood, he and Ah Bien along with Chi Fung were very close and had a ‘Three Musketeers’-like friendship. Ah Nai is actually a very interesting character: his father and grandfather were both the head of the village when they were alive, so naturally, he inherited the position after his father died (he was only in his twenties, yet he was already in such a highly respected position overseeing the entire village) – however he was not the typical village head, as he was neither stern nor strict nor did he put on airs or act self-important. Instead, he had a very ‘happy-go-lucky’ personality and was pretty much a kid at heart – he always took an optimistic and cheerful approach to things, no matter how difficult or tragic the situation was. He loved to hang out with the local kids and play video games, or hang out with his friends or help the villagers solve problems / disputes (the scenes where he went around looking for problems to resolve because he was so bored out of his wits – to the point that he had to resort to talking to the floor in his living room and imitating a sitting Buddha statue – were SO HILARIOUS, I was practically on the floor laughing!). Even with his playful personality though, he understood his responsibilities as village head and always made sure things that needed to get done were done. Despite having a crush on Ah Bien since childhood, he was genuinely happy for her when she married Chi Fung, as he knew that Chi Fung was better than him in many ways (talent, education, smarts, etc.) and was a better match for Ah Bien than himself. And throughout the entire series, no matter what situations occurred or what challenges arose, the 3 of them remained very close – their friendship never got affected. Later on, Ah Nai ends up falling in love with Chi Fung’s sister Ah Huo (played by Joyce Chan) and they eventually get married.
Ah Nai was definitely my favorite character in this series. He provided a lot of comic relief in an otherwise tragic story – in my opinion, his character really kept the series lighthearted and uplifting and actually really complemented the theme of the series quite well. For example, even when Ah Nai is diagnosed with a terminal illness (brain tumor) and knows that he doesn’t have long to live, he still remains true to his personality by remaining upbeat and spending whatever days he had left living life to the fullest. I love how the character was able to balance the comedic and tragic so perfectly, to the point that all of the scenes with him in it were thoroughly enjoyable. This was true even up until the end, when Ah Nai eventually dies from his illness – this part of the story was handled extremely well, as it wasn’t overly tragic yet still effectively got the point across.
To be honest, I don’t know who I should give credit to for the great job with the character of Ah Nai – I’m sure some of the credit goes to the writers for the well-written character, but in my opinion, a lot of the credit should also go to Wayne for his brilliant portrayal of the character (and I’m not just saying this because Wayne is one of my favorite actors). Just like with Nnadia’s character, no one else could have portrayed Wayne’s character better than him….which of course brings me back to the point that even back then, Wayne’s great acting skills were apparent and I really feel that once again, he ‘stole the show’ (that seems to be a pattern with many of the series where he is in the supporting role – even with series where I like the main leads, I still thoroughly enjoy Wayne’s role way more). Wayne is definitely ‘the best of the best’ when it comes to acting and so far, with all the series that I’ve seen of his (there are still some out there I have yet to watch), I have never been disappointed by his performance! (And once again, shame on TVB for taking more than 20 years to recognize him for his brilliant acting skills!).
So Hang Suen (Chi Fung’s mother Mrs. Yu) – So Han Suen’s character Mrs. Yu is one of those characters that we as audiences love to hate. For the first half of the series, she is pretty much the typical overbearing mother – bossy, unreasonable, constantly yelling at people for no good reason and never lets them get a word in edgewise, doesn’t trust anyone, etc. – pretty much, her attitude is that everything has to go her way no matter what. I would have to say that her character was downright annoying. Of course, in the second half of the series, after her family loses everything (their restaurant business and all their money), her son goes to jail because of her, and her older daughter betrays her, she becomes humbled and changes her tyrannical ways. She moves in with her daughter-in-law Ah Bien (Nnadia’s character) and after awhile, she realizes how wrongly she had treated Ah Bien in the past. Even though Mrs. Yu still has somewhat of a fiesty personality in the second half of the series, she actually becomes more likable due to her transformation from an overbearing tyrant to a reasonable mother who finally realizes how much her family means to her.
So Hang Suen is one of my favorite veteran female actresses. I pretty much grew up watching her series and to me, her acting always comes across so natural. Throughout her career, she has played numerous ‘mother’ characters – from the ‘benevolent’ type to the ‘overbearing’ type – and each time, her portrayal is very convincing. I mean, who can forget So Hang Suen’s many ‘classic’ mother characters: Kwok Jing’s (Felix Wong) mother Lee Ping in 1983’s “Legend of the Condor Heroes”, Cheung Wah Kit’s (Tony Leung) mother in all 3 installments of “Police Cadet”, Ding Yau Kin’s (Felix Wong) and Ding Yau Hong’s (Deric Wan) adoptive mother Auntie Wan in 1989’s “Looking Back in Anger”, etc. (just to name a few). If I were asked to give a list of actresses who do the best ‘mother’ roles, So Hang Suen would definitely be number one on my list!
So Hang Suen is retired from the industry now, but she does participate in the occasional series or two when she feels like it (primarily ATV series though). The latest I read was that last year, she and a group of fellow veteran ‘green leaf’ artists opened up an Acting School and she currently teaches there.
Joyce Chan (Ah Huo) – Joyce’s character Ah Huo is the younger sister of Yu Chi Fung. As the youngest daughter in the family, it was expected that she would be the most loved or spoiled, but actually, things were quite opposite for her – even though her dad and brother were good to her and treated her well, her mother always seem to be annoyed with her and yelled at her no matter what she did. She later finds out the reason why her mother treats her this way is because she is actually not her biological daughter – her father had an affair many years ago and she was the ‘result’ of that affair. When she finds out, she becomes depressed and runs away from home – not surprisingly, Ah Nai (Wayne) talks to her and eventually helps her get back on track, which is how they end up becoming a couple.
To me, Joyce’s role in the series wasn’t tremendously important, as it seemed that her function was mainly as a love interest for Wayne’s character. This could be why the writers didn’t spend a whole lot of time developing the storyline involving her.
As far as Joyce’s acting is concerned – well, I pretty much don’t have an opinion either way. I’ve always been neutral towards Joyce, as I don’t watch enough of her series to really be able to formulate an opinion. If you were to ask me what her ‘representative work’ is, I would have to say “Virtues of Harmony”, but that’s only because that series was on for close to 4 years, so it’s hard not to remember that series somewhat. I had read that at one point in the 90s, TVB was planning on heavily promoting her – but I’m actually not sure if they did or not because most of the series that I’ve seen of hers, she only had minor or supporting roles….even when she left TVB (to go to ATV), I really don’t feel she had any type of breakthrough role (maybe that’s why TVB gave up on her?).
Angie Cheong (Cheng Si Nga) – Angie’s role is a supporting one, as she plays Timmy Ho’s ex-girlfriend (coincidentally also named Angie) who breaks up with him, but then regrets it later because she still has feelings for him – but it’s too late because he had already married Nnadia. Even though on the surface, she appears to have gotten over it and even becomes good friends with the couple, she is actually deeply jealous of them on the inside and ‘predictably’ spends most of the series trying to sabotage the couple. (Ok, to put it bluntly, she is once again the ‘bxxch’ in this series). Needless to say, she doesn’t succeed in the end, since Timmy and Nnadia remain together.
Honestly, I really didn’t see the point in having Angie’s character there. Sure, they tried to make the storyline more interesting by putting in the ‘third wheel’ element to the relationship and such, but I feel they could have still gotten the same effect without her character – or perhaps still keep her character, but reduce her screentime (not that she had a lot of screentime to begin with). Some of the draggy scenes in the series were actually between her and Timmy and honestly, they really weren’t necessary to further the plot – I mean, how many scenes do we need to tell us that she still has feelings for Timmy and wants to get back with him, despite him no longer loving her? Not a whole lot, to be honest – they should have just cut out a lot of those ‘filler’ scenes instead of boring the audiences with them.
Those of you who watched “A Kindred Spirit” (which ran from 1995 to 1999) should be VERY familiar with Angie. In fact, for me, that was the first series of hers that I saw – prior to that, I had no clue who she was. Not surprisingly, she came out of a beauty pageant (Miss Asia International?) and actually did not participate in a whole lot of series if you really think about it. I’m actually neutral towards Angie because I honestly can’t tell whether she has acting potential or not – yes, she did well in “A Kindred Spirit”, but in that series as well as almost every other series she did, she had pretty much been typecasted as a ‘sex symbol’ actress (probably because of her good looks and figure) who is always ‘second fiddle’ to the main female leads…all her roles are actually pretty similar.
Honorable Mentions
.—Veteran actress Lai Suen (actress Gigi Lai’s aunt) played the role of Wayne’s grandmother in the series. Not surprisingly, her portrayal was excellent, but what I loved most though was actually her chemistry with Wayne – the two of them portrayed the grandmother / grandson relationship so well that if you were to tell me they were really related, I would probably believe it (of course, we know they aren’t related in real life though). I must say that whoever did the casting for the 2 characters did a great job!
.—Veteran actor Wong Ching played the role of Nnadia’s dad. His character was loud and obnoxious at times and had a big temper, but at the end of the day, he truly did love his children – it’s just that he wasn’t good at expressing it (or, more likely, he didn’t have time to, since he pretty much worked nonstop day and night in order to put food on the table). I enjoyed Wong Ching’s portrayal of the dad – he was funny at times (though he didn’t mean to be funny) but still did all the serious scenes quite well.
.—A very young Ruco Chan was also in this series (I’ve started to notice him in a lot of the older series that I’ve been watching lately). He played one of Nnadia’s younger brothers in the series. I will tell you that I definitely didn’t recognize him at first, as he looked so tremendously different back then. His role was actually a minor one and he didn’t have a whole lot of screen time – but I felt that he still did a good job nonetheless.
Concluding Thoughts
Overall, this series wasn’t bad in my opinion…BUT because of the genre and the message that it tries to get across, this series may not necessarily suit the tastes of all audiences. This is definitely one of those series where there is a big focus on ‘inner emotion acting’ (內心戲), which means that the series is a bit slower pace than most audiences would like (especially the second half, which was very draggy). I would still recommend this series (Nnadia and Wayne’s performances alone are absolutely worth watching) to those interested in the genre – BUT just make sure that you have plenty of patience to sit through the second half.
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