Those Old Movie Stars: Wang Danfeng
Wang Danfeng, born in 1925 and still living, is one of my favorite movie stars in Shanghai. She rose to fame from age 16 in Shanghai. She was a prolific super star in the 1940s. During the civil war she moved to Hong Kong, and returned to Shanghai in 1951 and joined Shanghai Film Studio. She currently runs a famous vegetarian restaurant Gong De Ling in Hong Kong. She is a great actress and a great woman. She is considered one of the greatest film actresses in Chinese history.
Those Old Movie Stars: Feng Zhe
Nobody exactly knows how many artists in China were killed or tortured to death during the Cultural Revolution from 1966 till 1976. Feng Zhe was one of those victims. He was a superstar in Shanghai in the 1940s. He moved to Hong Kong along with many other Shanghai filmmakers during the civil war in China between the Communists led by Mao and the Nationalists led by Chiang Kai-shek. In 1951, in order to devote himself to the film industry in the New China, he gave up his already established superstar status and high pay in Hong Kong and returned to Shanghai, working at the government-run Shanghai Film Studio. He acted in many communist propaganda movies, playing heroes, Party leaders and Communist secret agents.During the 1960s, he became the target of revolution by many of his counterparts in the film industry who were jealous of him. He was forced to leave Shanghai to join Emei Film Studio in Western China's impoverished Sichuan province, simply because he stalked a beautiful woman on the street in Shanghai, who happened to be a policewoman in plain clothes. In Sichuan, because he acted in the movie--The Peach Flower Fan, based on the Ming dynasty's classical Chinese tragedy, which was categorized as a counterrevolutionary movie for being suggestive of the Communist Party overthrowing the Nationalist government, he was insulated, tortured all day and all night till he was found dead. It was believed that he was murdered, but the people who tortured him faked a suicidal setting.
Churchill once said that he would lose India rather than Shakespeare. In the history of many great countries, either Britain, or France, or Russia, or USA, or ancient China, the Golden Ages of these countries were all the golden ages for the artists, when not only the economy was booming, but also art, literature and science were flourising. The future of a nation is largely decided by its cultural strength. I hope that China will treat its artists better with more freedom and rights.
My University
This is the university I attended--Nanjing Normal University. It has a classical Chinese campus, which used to be the rear garden of a wealthy family in the Song dynasty. Many of the buildings are centuries old. There are also several hills and a lake on the campus. During WWII, it served as an international refuge but the Japanese invaders still came here to kill refugees and rape women, despite international protest.In my department, the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature, we had quite many teachers from USA and Canada, but for some reasons we had no teachers from Britain. I became a Peking Opera star from here, mostly because our department's Communist Party secretary was a huge Peking Opera fan. She allowed me to spend a lot of time outside of the campus training with renowned artists at the provincial Peking Opera theatrical company. She also supported my shows at the art festivals. However, she didn't approve my application for Communist Party membership because, as she told me, all the girls in my class were for it and all the men were against it.
Regarding my graduation review, Professor Bob Sanford from Canada offered highly favorable comments. His wife said, "Trust Bob. If he thinks highly of you, then you must be real good." The Dean of the Department, who had an opposite opinion, died of heart attack in his apartment a few months later. His body had already rotted and smelled when he was found dead by his neighbors. Bob Sanford, totally retired now, is living a long, happy life in British Columbia in Canada. His address is--
Bob Sanford
Box 105 Gillies Bay
Texada Island BC
V0N 1WO Canada
This Is My Home Province--Jiangsu
I warmly invite you to visit my home province--Jiangsu in Eastern China. The capital of the province, Nanjing, used to be the capital city of China before the Communist time.
2008 Olympics: Is Beijing Ready?
The pictures show that the etiquette girls are practising very hard for the Olympic Games in Beijing in 2008. They are all exactly 170CM tall (5'7"), not too tall, not too short, and very slim and athletic.
I Love My Classmates
I have 28 cute and lovable classmates. Katy is a cute 19 year old Russian Jewish girl in my class. Her mother recently went to Beijing for the first time in her life, shopping there like crazy. She's made a pledge that she will go back there soon. She dressed up Katy with all the clothes and boots she bought in Beijing.I love my classmates. We've been together day by day for the past 9 months. The more I'm with them, the more I look at them, the cuter their faces become in my eyes. Sometimes my heart nearly bursts when I observe each and everyone of them, when they bump into me on the streets, calling my name excitedly and hugging me warmly. I'm certain I will "kidnap" some of them to go with me to Beijing next year.
2007: Miss World Goes to China
First Place: Miss China Second Place: Miss Angola
Third Place: Miss Mexico
Those Old Movie Stars: Zhu Hong
I find that both in Hollywood and in China, those old movie stars from the 1940s through the 1960s were more beautiful and more graceful than today's so-called "stars." Nowadays in Hollywood, one can hardly name any stars who have the charm, the grace, the beauty and even acting skills of Greta Garbo, Ingrid Bergman, Vivian Leigh, Lawrence Olivier, Marlon Brando, Gary Grant... In China, people miss those stars in Shanghai in the 1940s. After 1949, a lot of filmmakers moved from Shanghai to Hong Kong to start the film industry in Hong Kong.Zhu Hong, born in Yunnan in 1941, became a superstar in Hong Kong in the 1960s. She has always been one of my idols. She is considered to have classical Chinese beauty. She played an extremely beautiful ghost in the most scary horror movie in Chinese history (1965)--The Painted Skin. It was shown in theaters repeatedly when I was a child. Although I was almost scared to death, I still went to see it again and again. I simply couldn't stop. Many people died of heart attack in theater when they watched this movie. The copy is now kept at China Film Archive.
Going Back to Beijing...
I can't wait to go back to Beijing. I will once again behold the faces of my dear friends, who have been the greatest wealth in my life. I miss all those parties, salons, the pleasureable and uplifting times we spent together.
I love them so dearly. I'm counting my days to departure.
I love them so dearly. I'm counting my days to departure.
My Filmmaker Friend: Li Erwei
Li Erwei is one of my best friends in Beijing. We have been great friends since 2000.Born in 1964 in Hunan Province, Li Erwei is China’s nationally recognized film critic, producer, star agent and screenwriter. She was the editor-in-chief of the government-run China Screen. She has also participated in the production of numerous classic Chinese films such as Farewell My Concubine and In the Heat of the Sun. Her publications include Zhang Yimou Says, Jiang Wen, the Real Man, Gong Li, the Chinese Beauty, Facing Chen Kaige and Maggie Cheung’s Biography. Her acting agency has over 100 contracted movie stars including Chinese American Hollywood stars Joan Chen and Lisa Lu.
Li Erwei and her friend, international superstar--Gong Li.
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