Many Hong Kongers will scoff when they read my heading. One will say, "You haven't seen my boss at the Chinese New Year banquet when he takes the microphone and sings off key."
Another will cry, "That's nothing. My boss does a complete set – Cantonese song, Mandarin song, English song, and, his pièce de résistance, My Way in Spanish – and he's tone deaf."
"You've got it lucky," a third will interject. "Mine made us all buy his desecration of Se vuol ballare from Mozart's Marriage of Figaro that he paid a fortune to the Hong Kong Phil to record."
I acknowledge there are many pretenders to the throne of King of Overacting, but two factors combine to make the claim of Wu Fung as unshakable and indisputable as China's claim to Tibet or the Dalai Lama's claim to being the world's canniest exile.
First, there is the sheer number of films Wu has appeared in. Movie databases lost count years ago, but by the end of the 1960s, when he was still in his 30s, he had already appeared in more than 200 films, 30 in one year alone. In recent years, he has kept popping up like a security guard in a car park on Hong Kong's televisual equivalent of the comic, the soap opera. Unlike its American, Australian or English counterparts, which tend to run and run, the local variety typically spawns no more than a dozen or so episodes before the patience and attention span of viewers become strained to breaking point and a new one takes its place.
Since the story line is always the same – the actors too – no one really notices, as pouting ex Miss Hong Kong, third runner-up, argues with rich lawyer boyfriend because she saw him glance at ex Miss Asia, second runner-up, while every viewer knows that he really has the hots for ex Miss Chinese International, the one from Calgary whose bra keeps slipping unaccountably when she makes public appearances in front of the cameras.
Second, there is the range of Wu's overacting to consider. He runs the gamut of emotions from angry (see above) through bored
Another will cry, "That's nothing. My boss does a complete set – Cantonese song, Mandarin song, English song, and, his pièce de résistance, My Way in Spanish – and he's tone deaf."
"You've got it lucky," a third will interject. "Mine made us all buy his desecration of Se vuol ballare from Mozart's Marriage of Figaro that he paid a fortune to the Hong Kong Phil to record."
I acknowledge there are many pretenders to the throne of King of Overacting, but two factors combine to make the claim of Wu Fung as unshakable and indisputable as China's claim to Tibet or the Dalai Lama's claim to being the world's canniest exile.
First, there is the sheer number of films Wu has appeared in. Movie databases lost count years ago, but by the end of the 1960s, when he was still in his 30s, he had already appeared in more than 200 films, 30 in one year alone. In recent years, he has kept popping up like a security guard in a car park on Hong Kong's televisual equivalent of the comic, the soap opera. Unlike its American, Australian or English counterparts, which tend to run and run, the local variety typically spawns no more than a dozen or so episodes before the patience and attention span of viewers become strained to breaking point and a new one takes its place.
Since the story line is always the same – the actors too – no one really notices, as pouting ex Miss Hong Kong, third runner-up, argues with rich lawyer boyfriend because she saw him glance at ex Miss Asia, second runner-up, while every viewer knows that he really has the hots for ex Miss Chinese International, the one from Calgary whose bra keeps slipping unaccountably when she makes public appearances in front of the cameras.
Second, there is the range of Wu's overacting to consider. He runs the gamut of emotions from angry (see above) through bored
and madcap 
to scared. 
Such is his versatility that he's equally at home in a silly hat (in which case he concentrates so hard on making sure it doesn't topple off that he restricts the acting, Roger Moore-style, to the eyebrows)
Such is his versatility that he's equally at home in a silly hat (in which case he concentrates so hard on making sure it doesn't topple off that he restricts the acting, Roger Moore-style, to the eyebrows)
or doing his Michael Crawford impression (while admiring it in a 70s re-make of Kind Hearts and Coronets, in which he plays every role).
Wu Fung, who adopted the English name Bowie in homage to someone who can make himself look even scarier than he can, is currently appearing in TVB Jade's Enjoy Yourself Tonight – the brainchild of fumie's mate Robert Chua – which, judging by the rubbish being dished up, is unlikely to make it to November 20, the 40th anniversary of the show's first broadcast.
6 comments:
What a fine post, Mr. U, by which I mean one that I thoroughly agree with. Every time this has-been appears on the TV screen, shouts resound in the fumie household of "Not that old bugger again". He appears on just about every game show or extravaganza - why? Is he sleeping with Run Run?
It might have something to do with the non-threatening nature of mediocrity. Or, again, Run Run swings both ways.
Met him on a Monday and my heart stood still. Da do Run Run run, da do Run Run?
His son looks a bit like him (used to work in the IT business - his son, that is).
And his son was always ashamed of his father (the has-been character in question). I knew him (his son) in the 90s. Don't know where he is now. Probably committed suicide or something (just a wild guess).
Tough life (for his son), eh?
Ciao!
I'd like to think you're kidding when you write of individuals in Hong Kong who pay the Philharmonic to accompany them in their renditions of opera classics, but I have this niggling feeling that you're not.
Pleased you enjoyed the Cela. He's best known for The Hive, which is pretty weird, but might be your cup of tea.
A rather extreme solution to the problem, no, Ron? And since murder-suicides are all the rage in Hong Kong, the continuing presence of Overacting Man on our screens suggests filial piety has prevailed.
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