Cheung, Leslie

(né Cheung Kwok Wing; Zhong Guorong)

b. 12 September 1956, Hong Kong; d. 2003

Pop singer/film actor

Leslie Cheung has enjoyed more than two decades of popularity as a singer-actor with audiences in and outside Hong Kong. Unlike his rival Alan Tam, with his ever-increasing commercial tone, Leslie Cheung was a pop idol who transformed himself into an artistic icon. After graduating from Leeds University, Cheung returned to Hong Kong, his place of birth, and emerged as the first runner-up at the Second Asian Song Contest. Despite joining the local television channel Rediffusion as early as 1976, Leslie was practically unknown until his first solo album The Wind Blows On (1981, released in 1983), catapulted him into an enduring career as one of Hong Kong’s most popular singers. He was recognized as a top star after the overwhelming success of his single ‘Monica’ in 1984, and soon became Alan Tam’s only competitor. His 1989 farewell concert resulted in an even more prolific comeback.

As an amphibious figure, he was also actively involved in film acting. From 1978, when he debuted in Erotic Dreams of the Red Chamber (Honglou chun shang chun), he acted in some sixty films. He worked with such directors as: John Woo in A Better Tomorrow (Yingxiong bense); Stanley Kwan in Yanzhi ko (Rouge); Tsui Hark (Xu Ke) in A Chinese Ghost Story (Qiannu youhun); Wong Kar-wai in Days of Being Wild (A Fei zhengzhuan, for which Cheung won ‘best actor’ from the Hong Kong Film Academy in 1990) and Happy Together (Chunguang zhaxie); Chen Kaige in Bawang bieji (Farewell My Concubine, which made Cheung’s international reputation after the movie won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1993); and Ronny Yu in The Bride with White Hair (Baifa monü zhuan) and Phantom Lover (Yeban gesheng). Taking advantage of his musical talent, he composed and sang the theme songs of some of these films. His directorial debut came in 2000 with From Ashes to Ashes (Yanfei yanmie). His recent films were Sword Master (San shaoye de jian) and The Unicorn Hunt. Other than films, he also acted in sixteen TV mini-series and three music dramas. Cheung’s film roles established his public image as a sentimental romantic lover, which simultaneously contradicts and complements his feminized singing persona. Leslie eventually returned to the music world in the mid 1990s, but with his open acknowledgement of being a bisexual, his singing style—like that of Red (Hong, 1996)—turned to unconventionality, too. Yet despite moving into his forties, none of Leslie’s transformations to the artistic lobby distanced him from his massive worldwide fans, who were shocked by his suicide in 2003.

See also: pop music in Hong Kong

Further reading

www.lesliecheung.com

WANG YIMAN AND SIMON SHEN