Almost two decades after her untimely death, pop icon and movie star Anita Mui Yim-fong continues to enjoy cult status in Hong Kong. In the lead-up to the release of a new Mui biopic, Mathew Scott caught up with film director Longman Leung and lead actress Louise Wong Dan-nei.
Filmmaker Longman Leung remembers the moment when he knew he had found the right person to take on the role of Anita Mui Yim-fong — the iconic Hong Kong Cantopop singer and actress, lost all too soon to cancer in 2003. Piecing together a biopic on the life of a much-beloved star, whose premature passing is still mourned by fans in her home city of Hong Kong, was no mean task. Anita — finally due for release on Nov 12 — was in pre-production for years. Leung and his production team auditioned about 3,000 hopefuls for the title role. Those who went through the rigorous selection process were asked to sing a number that helped make Mui famous.
Then the moment came.
“The song we were doing was The Song of Sunset,” the director said. “I was watching her sing on the monitors and thought ‘OK, this is the face.’ When I turned back, everyone in the crew was crying. That’s why we were so inspired.”
The actor clinching the role is former model Louise Wong Dan-nei. Making her film debut at 31, Wong has taken on what can only be described as the role — and the challenge — of a lifetime.
Louise Wong Dan-nei makes her screen debut in Anita, playing the role of the much-beloved Cantopop singer and actress. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
She never left
There has never been a Hong Kong star quite like Mui. Her death, at age 40 on Dec 30, 2003, was made all the more heartbreaking because it was the proverbial last straw, coming as it did at the end of what had been Hong Kong’s annus horribilis — a year that saw the city wracked by the SARS epidemic, and the loss of Mui’s great friend and fellow pop icon Leslie Cheung Kwok-wing by suicide.
Mui’s rise — from singing at amusement parks, followed by clubs, and on to filling stadiums and producing a string of hits — was a quintessential “Hong Kong story”. She was an inspiration to people from all walks of life. On her passing, tears were openly shed in just about every home in Hong Kong.
Wong had heard the songs immortalized by Mui while growing up, although she didn’t know the full story of the pop icon. She said she was aware of the importance of approaching the role with sensitivity and respect from the outset.
Louis Koo Tin-lok plays Eddie Lau Pui-Kei, friend and mentor to the popstar Anita Mui Yim-fong in the Longman Leung-directed biopic Anita. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
“I was able to talk to colleagues and friends of Anita Mui and the makeup artists I worked with for this film had worked with Anita in real life,” Wong said. “So while I was shooting, we talked about how Anita was like. Listening to all those stories really helped me perform the role.”
Likewise, Leung sought out those who knew Mui for insights into her personality, and advice on how they thought she should be portrayed. In the end, he said, the production team — led by the veteran hitmaker producer Bill Kong Chi-keung (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) — set out with three distinct goals.
For one, it was important to not upset Mui’s older generation of fans in any way. The second was to inspire those familiar with Mui’s story to want to revisit her works. And the third was to encourage the young generation to discover Mui’s works.
“You know while I was developing this story, I interviewed many close friends of ours and strangely there was something common — they were not sorry. Every time we talked about Anita, they said that Anita never left us,” Leung said.
Anita boasts a star-studded cast, including Fish Liew Chi-yu who plays Anita Mui’s older sister, Ann. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
Embodying a spirit
The world premiere of Anita was held at the Busan International Film Festival on Oct 15. Both Leung and Wong were Zoomed into the festival, which had a limited number of international visitors this year because of COVID-19 travel and quarantine restrictions. For about an hour, the pair shared their insights into Mui’s life and works and their takeaways from the experience of bringing Mui’s life to the big screen.
The film also stars Terrance Lau Chun-him, Fish Liew Chi-yu, Louis Koo Tin-lok, Gordon Lam Ka-tung and Miriam Yeung Chin-wah. It charts Mui’s life from the days when she sang in parks, touching on milestones such as her winning the 1982 talent contest that launched her career, encapsulating her journey through fame and fortune up until her final battle with cervical cancer.
Anita stars Terrance Lau Chun-him as Cantopop legend Leslie Cheung Kwok-wing, who was a close friend of Anita Mui’s. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
“She accomplished so much as an actor as well as a musician. But in Hong Kong, she was viewed as a singer first,” Leung said, explaining the emphasis on Mui’s stage career in the film.
Stanley Kwan Kam-pang, who gave Mui her first stellar role in Rouge (1988), visited the sets during the filming of Anita. In Rouge, Mui played the ghost of a courtesan who finds love with a living human being and then loses it — an idea that seemed to mirror the series of failed relationships in Mui’s own life. Mui was named best actress at both the Hong Kong Film Awards and Golden Horse Awards for the role.
“He (Kwan) told me a lot of stories,” Wong said. “And one thing I remember the most was that he told me: ‘Don’t imitate Anita. Just feel her when you act.’”
From left: Filmmaker Stanley Kwan Kam-pang, lead actress Louise Wong Dan-nei and Anita director Longman Leung on the set of the film. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
A star is born
Anita features songs such as Debts of the Heart, Lady and The Song of Sunset, which were hits in their day, and have, ever since Mui’s passing, become karaoke staples.
Wong said performing these numbers has a special resonance for her, now that she is around the same age as when Mui was at the peak of her powers.
“I think now I am coming of age, (transitioning) from girl to woman. So my favorite songs are about a woman’s desires,” she said. She has a soft spot for The Song of Sunset as it dwells on “how to cherish the now.”
The line between fiction and reality would constantly get blurred on the set of Anita. Fellow cast members and the crew had started addressing Wong as Anita. The day she shot her last scene with Lau who plays Cheung in the film, “I felt I was saying goodbye to him in real life. So after the shoot, I held hands with him and cried.”
Wong said such was her immersion in the role that when the shooting of Anita was over, she had to learn how to be herself all over again.
“But I feel very lucky to have been able to play this role, and through the help of everyone who taught me how to act, sing and perform I was able to train myself and really become Anita,” she adds.
