TVB Anniversary Awards: Top 10 nominees for TV King and Queen revealed; “When Heaven Burns” in contention for Best Series

In the most recent issue of Mingpao Weekly (Issue # 2297), there was yet another very interesting article about this year’s TVB Anniversary Awards.  In this latest article (there have been plenty of articles about the awards in the past few months), Mingpao claims that they have obtained the ‘confirmed’ list of nominees in the major award categories from TVB and attempted to give their ‘interpretation’ of why certain artists were nominated and others were not. 

For the record…I normally don’t like to waste my time on these types of ‘lists’ from magazines, especially the ones from the tabloids where they clearly state that their lists are ‘pure speculation’ on their part.  So why did I bother with this Mingpao one?  Well, because I’m a long time reader of the magazine plus they’re usually more reputable than the other entertainment news and media sources out there (the key word here is “usually”).  Of course, just like with any other entertainment newsmagazine in HK, Mingpao does go the ‘tabloid’ route occasionally, plus there have been plenty of ‘inaccuracies’ that I’ve found with their articles over the years (especially with regard to dates and such) – however its track record over the decades has been decent and there have truly been some great articles that Mingpao has published throughout that time (I especially like their interviews).

With all that said however, I have to admit that I still have my doubts about Mingpao’s list and I question whether it’s truly the ‘confirmed’ version from TVB, as there are just way too many ‘oddball’ nominations and snubs in the published lists to be believable.  I listed a few of the obvious ‘oddities’ below (the ones that stuck out like a sore thumb to me), but of course, there were probably more that I didn’t even consider.

After looking at Mingpao’s ‘finalists’ lists, here’s my ‘two cents’:


In the Best Actor category….

.—Kevin Cheng got nominated for Gloves Come Off instead of Ghetto Justice 2?  Hmmm, that’s an interesting choice, especially given the fact that Kevin won last year for his ‘breakthrough’ role as ‘L.A. Law’ from the first Ghetto Justice installment.  Well, he’s definitely not going to win anyway cuz neither performance was much of a breakthrough, so I guess it doesn’t really matter which series he is nominated for.

.—I’m thrilled to see Raymond Wong get a nomination for Best Actor (as he’s become one of my favorite actors in the past few years), however WHY is he nominated for Gloves Come Off rather than Bottled Passion?  Especially since his co-star Niki Chow was nominated in the Best Actress category for BP?  Besides, if I recall correctly, Raymond wasn’t even considered ‘lead’ in GCO – the male lead in that series was Kevin Cheng – plus his role in that series was nowhere near as good as his role in BP (in which the storyline revolved mainly around him and Niki, so he was ‘truly’ the male lead in that series).  Hmmm….this makes me think that TVB just put Raymond  in this category as a ‘filler’ to prove a point (the whole thing about the biological children vs non biological children) – I highly doubt that TVB is anywhere near ‘sincere’ about giving Raymond a fair chance to win…otherwise, they would have  nominated him in BP rather than GCO.

.—I was actually a little surprised to see Roger Kwok in the top ten for this category, since there didn’t seem to be much hype about his role or his series (plus the ratings weren’t that high).  Not that I’m complaining though, since I love Roger and he’s always been one of my favorite actors since like back in the 80s – but it just didn’t really make sense to me.  In any case, if it’s true that he got into top ten, then I’m truly very happy for him.

.—In terms of ‘snubs’ in this category, a few very obvious ones (in my opinion) were:  Bowie Lam for When Heaven Burns (understandable of course, since he’s no longer with TVB), Kent Cheng for King Maker (this one I’m a bit surprised about cuz Kent was excellent in that series, plus he has a relatively good relationship with TVB), Michael Miu for either L’Escargot or Highs and Lows (also surprised with this one cuz Michael’s roles in both series were pretty well-received and his acting was quite praised).


In the Best Actress category…

.— The first thing I noticed (which I’m sure most others did as well) was Aimee Chan’s ‘undeserving’ nomination in this category.  When I saw her name in this category, my first reaction was:  WTH???? First of all, Aimee’s role in TLSA was pretty much ‘supporting’ – though I guess some people could argue that she was ‘second female lead’?   Regardless, her acting is still not up to par yet and up to this point, she has never been one of those actresses that most of us would consider as ‘lead actress’ level.  So how the heck did she secure a spot in this category?  I say take her out and put one of the other  truly ‘leading’ actresses in there!

.—Obvious snubs:  Sonjia Kwok for L’Escargot (her character and performance was pretty much the only one I liked in that entire series), Gigi Wong for Divas in Distress (Liza Wang got nominated, yet Gigi didn’t?  Hmmm….I wonder if this has anything to do with the comments that Gigi made earlier about TVB not respecting its veteran artists…), Maggie Cheung for The Last Steep Ascent (again understandable because she already signed with CTI), and Jessica Hsuan for Tiger Cubs (since Joe got nominated in the Best Actor category, I would think that Jessica would have gotten nominated too?).


In the Favorite Male / Female Character categories…

.—Once again, good to see Raymond Wong nominated in this category, but again, he’s nominated for the wrong series (um, did the TVB people who put together this list forget about Bottled Passion completely or what?).

.—Surprised to see Bobby nominated in this category.  I obviously didn’t think House of Harmony and Vengeance was worth watching (and apparently quite a few others thought the same thing) and I don’t recall hearing any ‘hype’ over his character or the series itself, so not sure what this nomination is about.  For the record, Bobby is another actor whom I love a lot, so it’s not that I have a problem with him being nominated – it’s just that the nomination doesn’t make sense to me (just like Roger’s nomination in the Best Actor category didn’t make sense to me).

.—Where are Ben Wong and  MC Jin?  Both of their characters were quite well-received in Highs and Lows, plus they were ‘critical’ to making that series close to ‘watchable’ for many of us, so it’s weird that they weren’t nominated.  Perhaps TVB used up all their HAL ‘quota’ for Raymond Lam and Michael Miu?

.—Another ‘surprise’ was not seeing anyone from Daddy Good Deeds nominated in either the Male or Female Character categories.  That series was one of the better ones from this year and given how popular Edwin Siu’s character ‘Ah Yap’ was, I thought for sure he would at least get a nomination in the Male Character category?  Guess not…

.—Most obvious snub in the Favorite Female Character category:  Linda Chung for Witness Insecurity!  This one was definitely a shocker for me because her character Hailey in the series was very very well-received – in fact, I actually liked Linda’s character in the series more than I liked her acting itself.  Not sure what TVB was thinking with this category…weird!

.—Oh, and the 20 million dollar question:  why was ‘So Gay’ (aka Koo Ming Wah) not nominated in the Favorite Male Character category?   I would think that he’d be a ‘shoo-in’ for this category given the popularity of the character and the role, no?  I mean, come on – how many people out there nowadays don’t know who ‘So Gay’ is???


In the Best Supporting Actor category…

.— Did I read the list wrong or was Ben Wong truly not nominated in this category for his awesome performance in Highs and Lows?  Wow, someone must not have their head screwed on right because Ben was one of the ‘hot favorites’ for the BSA award after HAL aired, plus he’s last year’s BSA winner, so he has some ‘status’ with that, yet not even a single nomination?  Huh? 

.— Other obvious snubs in this category: Pierre Ngo for King Maker (he was great in that series and was truly one of the ‘highlights’ that made that series worth watching – in fact, I had thought he would be nominated for sure since he was among the ‘favorites’ for this category in the various Media outlets for his performance), Raymond Cho for either Bottled Passion or The Confidant (he was awesome in both, so I would have been ok with a nomination for either one – poor guy…he never gets nominated for anything it seems….argh!).

.—Glad to see Ram Tseung nominated for Witness Insecurity!  Loved him in that series, plus he’s a hugely underrated actor who is usually ‘neglected’ by TVB when it comes to awards (not to mention he’s one of my favorite actors), so definitely thrilled to see him nominated (though of course I know that he won’t win, but hey, I can still enjoy the ‘nomination’ moment!  LOL!).

.—I can’t help but wonder why Jazz Lam is in this category when his role in Ghetto Justice 2 really wasn’t all that outstanding (but then again, nothing about the series was ‘outstanding’ in my opinion…the series definitely didn’t live up to the ‘hype’ of the first one!).  Maybe Sam Lee would have been nominated in this category instead of Jazz if he hadn’t already joined CTI?

.—An actor whom I feel has been hugely ‘neglected’ by TVB is Lee Sing Cheong – he was excellent in Divas in Distress (as well as all the other roles he takes on) and can be considered one of the ‘driving forces’ in that series (I know I watched that series partly because of him)…but of course, no nomination as usual.


In the Best Supporting Actress category…

.—All I’m going to say is that I feel the nominations for Christine Kuo, Eliza Sam, and Aimee Chan in this category are a complete joke!  I didn’t like any of their performances whatsoever and definitely don’t feel they deserve a spot in this category (just my personal opinion)!

.—As for ‘snubs’ in this category – well, for me, there were way too many to count (which is why it ticks me off even more that Christine, Eliza, and Aimee were nominated in this category when there were easily others who should have gotten a spot).  A few ‘snubs’ that come to mind off the top of my head:   Elaine Yiu, Claire Yiu, and Rebecca Chan for Bottled Passion, Selena Li for either Gloves Come Off or Wish and Switch, Mimi Chu for Divas in Distress, Gigi Wong for The Hippocratic Crush, Maggie Siu for When Heaven Burns or The Confidant , etc. etc.

.—On a positive note…glad to see Mary Hon nominated (though should have been for SSSS, not Three Kingdoms) as well as Florence Kwok and Helena Law, as these veterans usually don’t get much recognition.  Of course their chances of winning are pretty much ‘nil’, but still very happy for them.


And last but not least, the Most Improved Male / Female Artist categories…

.—I don’t really care too much about the Most Improved Female Artist category, so no comment on the nominations there (though of course, the most obvious choice to win this award is Mandy Wong).

.—As for the Male Artist category….I actually really wanted to see Benjamin Yuen, Eric Li, and Ronald Law nominated as well because they put in good performances this year and really are deserving of some recognition this year.  Anyone know why there are only top 5 for this category instead of top 10?  If there was top 10, then I would want these 3 to be included for sure.

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FINAL THOUGHTS

Despite the mini ‘analysis’ that I just did, I feel I have to say this…. before any of us (myself included) get too overly “worked up” over this supposed list of ‘confirmed’ finalists, my advice is to wait for the ‘official’ nominations lists from TVB (which are supposed to be revealed on November 21^st) and compare to see if Mingpao’s version holds any water.  If the lists end up being exactly the same (which I highly doubt), then we can ‘officially’ leash out our discontent at TVB’s ‘stupidity’ – otherwise, we might just end up getting ourselves all flustered for nothing!

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TVB Anniversary Awards:  Top 10 nominees for TV King and Queen revealed; “When Heaven Burns” in contention for Best Series

Source:  Mingpao Weekly, Issue 2297

 

Translation:  llwy12

 

 

This year, TVB will be utilizing a ‘One Vote Per Person’ method to select the winners for the TV King and Queen (aka Best Actor / Actress) as well as Best Series awards -- however, in order for the audiences to choose the winners, first there has to be a list of nominees to pick from.

 

Earlier there were reports that the highly acclaimed but low rated series When Heaven Burns《天與地》 , which received overwhelming support from netizens and has been dubbed as a ‘godly’ series, would not get any nominations at this year’s awards ceremony.  It was rumored that due to both the series’ producer Jonathan Chik (戚其義) as well as scriptwriter Chow Yuk Ming (周旭明) leaving TVB, plus main female lead Charmaine Sheh (佘詩曼) is no longer TVB’s ‘biological daughter’ [TN:  she currently only has a per series contract with TVB], the series would not even get the chance to compete at all. 

 

However, according to exclusive inside information received by our magazine [Mingpao], TVB executive personnel have already met several times to decide on the nominees and the ‘Top Ten’ in both the TV King / Queen as well as the other major categories have already been confirmed.  Reportedly, the series When Heaven Burns has successfully garnered nominations in several categories, including a coveted spot atop the list for Best Series as well as a nomination for Charmaine Sheh in the TV Queen (Best Actress) category.  As for the series’ male lead Moses Chan (陳豪), he will actually be contending for the TV King (Best Actor) and Favorite Male Character awards with his performance in the more recently aired series The Last Steep Ascent《天梯》instead.

 

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TVB’s Anniversary Awards ceremony will be held on December 17^th this year – with less than a month to go, TVB will be holding a press conference next Wednesday (November 21^st) to announce the official nominees for each of the major award categories.   It is reported that after several days of meetings and discussions, the nominations lists have finally been confirmed.   This will be the first awards ceremony that TVB’s new director of production for non-drama programs Sandy Yu (余詠珊) will completely oversee with full support from TVB’s new boss Charles Chan (陳國強) – after learning a lesson with the voting fiasco during this year’s Miss Hong Kong pageant, TVB will once again attempt to use the ‘One Vote Per Person’ method in its upcoming Anniversary Awards show by having 100% audience votes determine the winners in 3 of the major award categories.

 

Since TVB is going the ‘100% audience vote’ route, of course that means public opinion will need to take priority – therefore, in order to emphasize that the process will be fair and just, quite a few ‘non-biological’ sons and daughters were allowed to make it into Top Ten.   On the TV King side, the Top Ten nominees include Joe Ma (馬德鐘), who had ended his management contract with TVB in the earlier part of the year and so is no longer a ‘biological’ son– he is nominated for his role in this year’s popular and highly acclaimed hit series Tiger Cubs《飛虎》.  In addition, ‘non-biological’ son Raymond Wong (黃浩然) also received a nomination in the TV King category.  Towards his nomination for TV King, Joe Ma expressed that he is pleasantly surprised:  “If I did make it into Top Ten, that’s great.  Prior to this, I didn’t think I’d make it this far, so no matter win or lose, I’m already very happy.” 

 

As for this year’s top 5 ‘hot favorites’ for TV King – Wayne Lai (黎耀祥), Moses Chan (陳豪), Kevin Cheng (鄭嘉穎), Raymond Lam (林峯), and Kenneth Ma (馬國明) – all of them made it onto the list.  Amongst them, Moses Chan had the most series aired this year (4 series total), however instead of being nominated for the popular When Heaven Burns, he will be competing instead based on his performance in The Last Steep Ascent.  Towards this, Moses expressed:  “It really doesn’t matter to me which series I get nominated for – just being able to participate and enjoy the process is enough.  If you ask me, it’s actually quite difficult for me to tell you which series I liked best, as each one gave me a different feeling.”

 

Public opinion is one thing – when it comes to the artists who already ‘jumped ship’ to rival TV stations, TVB is not making any exceptions.  For example, due to The Last Steep Ascent’s female lead Maggie Cheung (張可頤) currently working for rival station CTI, she has no chance of getting nominated at all – instead, her ‘first female lead’ status in TLSA has been replaced by the series’ second female lead Aimee Chan (陳茵媺), who will be competing in the TV Queen category this year with her performance in that series.   To round out the TV Queen category, even ‘non-biological’ daughter Niki Chow (周麗淇) was nominated for her performance in the series Bottled Passion《我的如意狼君》, which had aired over a year ago.  Looks like this year, audiences can’t say that TVB is ‘favoring’ their biological children again!

 

Asked about this year’s nominations list including so many ‘non-biological’ children as well as the largely ‘neglected’ series When Heaven Burns, TVB’s variety program director Sandy Yu responded:  “When Heaven Burns will get nominated for sure!  The reason for doing the ‘One Vote Per Person’ thing this year is because we don’t want to give people the feeling that this is just another closed door ‘inner circle election’.  In my eyes, there is no such thing as biological versus non-biological – we tried to put together the nominations from the audience’s perspective and our goal is to have at least 2.5 million people vote.”

 

With that said though, only the TV King, TV Queen, and Best Series categories will be 100% audience vote – the winners in the rest of the categories will be determined via a ‘judging panel’ consisting of TVB internal staff as well as TVB’s top 9 management executives.   With this setup, isn’t there still a possibility that ‘favoritism’ by management could still exist?  Sandy Yu responds:  “We decided this way because we wanted to simplify the voting process.  If our goal is to have all audiences vote, it’s impossible to have all the awards done this way because if you think about it, there are more than a dozen awards – not everyone is going to have the patience to sit there and vote on every single award, so what happens in the situations where audiences only vote for half the categories?  Do we consider all those votes null and void?  After considering all the ‘technical’ issues that could arise, that’s the decision we came up with.”

 

As for the voting by the ‘top 9 management executives’, Sandy Yu expressed:  “This year, we pulled Mark Lee (李寶安) [TVB’s General Manager] in as well, so there are 9 executives total.   Our plan for now is to have management vote count 50%  -- the remaining 50% will consist of votes from TVB’s 3000 employees, so the results will be quite fair.”  In terms of the rumored ‘confirmed’ nominations list for Favorite Female Character, Tavia Yeung (楊怡) supposedly has 2 nominations – towards this, Sandy Yu explained:  “For the TV King and TV Queen categories, artists are only allowed to be nominated for 1 series – this is because we don’t want to skew the votes; however, in the ‘Favorite Character’ categories, there is a possibility of having more than 1 nomination.  As for the details of this year’s nominations list, I don’t quite remember.”

 

 

‘Most Improved’ award becomes a ‘battle’ between the 2 parties

 

Since the winners for the rest of the awards will be determined by the 9 TVB executives and 3000 TVB staff, the ‘fight’ for these awards has seemingly come down to a ‘battle’ between TVB’s top 2 drama production heads Catherine Tsang (曾勵珍) and Tommy Leung (梁家樹).  Take the ‘Most Improved Male Artist’ category for example – both Catherine’s favorite Edwin Siu (蕭正楠) as well as Tommy’s favorite Oscar Leung (梁烈唯) are most definitely in the top 5 – there’s no way of knowing what will happen until the very end.  On the ‘Most Improved Female Artist’ side, Mandy Wong (黃智雯) initially had the best chance of winning with her breakthrough role as ‘Kwan Yee So’ in the series L’Escargot《缺宅男女》which was aired earlier in the year, however the sudden popularity of ‘goddesses’ Eliza Sam (岑麗香) and Christine Kuo (苟芸慧) in the latter part of the year could change things significantly.  The popularity of newbie Eliza Sam especially shouldn’t be taken for granted, as it is obvious from this year’s nominations lists alone that she is one of the actresses being heavily promoted by TVB -- Eliza has been nominated in 3 categories this year, including ‘Most Improved Female Artist’, ‘Best Supporting Actress’ and ‘Favorite Female Character’.  Interestingly, one of Eliza’s co-star from the series Divas in Distress 《巴不得媽媽》—veteran actress Gigi Wong (黃淑儀) – was not nominated in any category, even though she is highly praised by the public for her strong acting skills.

 

 

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Nominations Lists [TN:  Note that this is Mingpao’s supposed ‘confirmed’ version – we will need to wait and see if this truly matches TVB’s ‘official’ lists that will be revealed on November 21^st]:

 

Best Actor (aka TV King)

Wayne Lai -- The Confidant

Moses Chan – The Last Steep Ascent

Kevin Cheng – Gloves Come Off

Kenneth Ma – The Hippocratic Crush

Raymond Lam – Highs and Lows

Bosco Wong – Witness Insecurity

Damian Lau – Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles

Roger Kwok – Queen of Diamonds and Hearts

Joe Ma – Tiger Cubs

Raymond Wong – Gloves Come Off

 

 

Best Actress (aka TV Queen)

Michelle Yim – The Confidant

Charmaine Sheh – When Heaven Burns

Myolie Wu – Ghetto Justice 2

Tavia Yeung -- Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles

Fala Chen -- Queen of Diamonds and Hearts

Linda Chung – Witness Insecurity

Kate Tsui – Highs and Lows

Aimee Chan – The Last Steep Ascent

Liza Wang – Divas in Distress

Niki Chow – Bottled Passion

 

 

Favorite Male Character

Kevin Cheng -- Ghetto Justice 2

Moses Chan – The Last Steep Ascent

Wayne Lai -- The Confidant

Raymond Lam – Highs and Lows

Kenneth Ma – The Hippocratic Crush

Bosco Wong – Witness Insecurity

Bobby Au Yeung – House of Harmony and Vengeance

Michael Miu -- Highs and Lows

Raymond Wong -- The Confidant

Damian Lau – Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles

 

 

Favorite Female Character

Michelle Yim – The Confidant

Charmaine Sheh – When Heaven Burns

Myolie Wu – Ghetto Justice 2

Kristal Tin – King Maker

Tavia Yeung -- Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles

Tavia Yeung -- The Hippocratic Crush

Kate Tsui – Highs and Lows

Fala Chen -- Queen of Diamonds and Hearts

Eliza Sam – Divas in Distress

Niki Chow – Bottled Passion

 

Best Supporting Actor

Power Chan -- The Confidant

Koo Ming Wah -- Divas in Distress

Oscar Leung – L’Escargot

Elliot Ngok -- The Confidant

Vincent Wong -- Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles

Jazz Lam -- Ghetto Justice 2

Kenny Wong -- The Last Steep Ascent

Ram Tseung -- Witness Insecurity

Him Law -- The Hippocratic Crush

Edwin Siu – Daddy Good Deeds

 

 

Best Supporting Actress

Mandy Wong -- L’Escargot

Rachel Kan – Master of Play

Mary Hon – Three Kingdoms RPG

Florence Kwok -- King Maker

Helena Law -- The Last Steep Ascent

Christine Kuo -- Ghetto Justice 2

Nancy Wu -- Gloves Come Off

Elena Kong -- Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles

Eliza Sam -- Divas in Distress

Aimee Chan -- The Confidant

 

 

Most Improved Male Artist

King Kong

Him Law

Edwin Siu

Oscar Leung

Vincent Wong

 

 

Most Improved Female Artist

Mandy Wong

Eliza Sam

Christine Kuo

Katy Kung

Cilla Lok