{"id":69946,"date":"2026-07-19T14:06:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-19T06:06:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=69946"},"modified":"2026-07-19T14:06:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-19T06:06:11","slug":"profile-how-hong-kong-actress-maggie-cheung-went-from-commercial-film-eye-candy-to-art-house-legend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=69946","title":{"rendered":"Profile | How Hong Kong actress Maggie Cheung went from commercial film eye candy to art-house legend"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<div datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1xdhyk6 ec74h0k0\">Between 1984 and 2010, Hong Kong superstar <span data-qa=\"Component-Text\" class=\"css-0 ef9u0v00\">Maggie Cheung Man-yuk<\/span> appeared in 79 films \u2013 though, by her own admission, she disliked many of them. She often felt at odds with the city\u2019s commercially driven cinema industry, yearning instead for serious art-house projects.<\/div>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cI have nothing against commercial films, but if you\u2019re in a movie [and] you feel the script and everything else about it has no meaning \u2013 it\u2019s just another production that the boss can add to his list \u2013 I don\u2019t think you should do it,\u201d Cheung told the South China Morning Post in 2001.<\/p>\n<h3 type=\"h3\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"eh0yk8h0 css-17x7qa9 e1pqa4re1\">Finding her artistic voice<\/h3>\n<div datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1xdhyk6 ec74h0k0\">Cheung did find some artistically inclined films to work on in Hong Kong, notably for <span data-qa=\"Component-Text\" class=\"css-0 ef9u0v00\">Wong Kar-wai<\/span>. The 2000 classic <span data-qa=\"Component-Text\" class=\"css-0 ef9u0v00\"><em data-qa=\"ContentSchemaRender-defaultRenderMapFunctions-Component\" class=\"css-1mniedq ex3nmsa15\">In the Mood for Love<\/em><\/span> was one of her personal favourites, and she also had a cameo in its loose 2004 sequel, <span data-qa=\"Component-Text\" class=\"css-0 ef9u0v00\"><em data-qa=\"ContentSchemaRender-defaultRenderMapFunctions-Component\" class=\"css-1mniedq ex3nmsa15\">2046<\/em><\/span>.<\/div>\n<div datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1xdhyk6 ec74h0k0\">Cheung also starred in Wong\u2019s 1988 debut, <span data-qa=\"Component-Text\" class=\"css-0 ef9u0v00\"><em data-qa=\"ContentSchemaRender-defaultRenderMapFunctions-Component\" class=\"css-1mniedq ex3nmsa15\">As Tears Go By<\/em><\/span>, which she said was \u201cthe first [film] in which I can recognise myself as an actress\u201d. She also had a role in Wong\u2019s groundbreaking <em data-qa=\"ContentSchemaRender-defaultRenderMapFunctions-Component\" class=\"css-1mniedq ex3nmsa15\">Days of Being Wild<\/em> (1990), though she noted it is more of a director\u2019s film than an actor\u2019s \u2013 \u201cthe film is the star,\u201d she said.<\/div>\n<div class=\"image-inline-container e1a5rv550 css-1llrc1m e1yqhwb40\" data-qa=\"Component-renderMap-StyledDiv\">\n<div class=\"image-inline caption e1fvabeq0 css-19sk4h4 ea9pn0s0\" data-qa=\"Component-Container\">\n<figure class=\"image-inline caption ea9pn0s1 css-1qeofuq e1gf69pb0\" data-qa=\"ArticleImage-ArticleImageContainer\">\n<div data-qa=\"ArticleImage-handleRenderImage-ImageContainer\" class=\"css-bjn8wh e1gf69pb3\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Maggie Cheung and Andy Lau in a still from As Tears Go By (1988).\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/img.i-scmp.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto\/sites\/default\/files\/d8\/images\/canvas\/2026\/07\/16\/0f0e63f1-b6a5-4838-978b-484301f5fac1_a18f5966.jpg\" title=\"Maggie Cheung and Andy Lau in a still from As Tears Go By (1988).\"\/><\/div><figcaption data-qa=\"ArticleImage-DescriptionContainer\" class=\"css-1bj5zno e1gf69pb1\">Maggie Cheung and Andy Lau in a still from As Tears Go By (1988).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1xdhyk6 ec74h0k0\">But Cheung\u2019s most impressive turn came not for Wong, but for <span data-qa=\"Component-Text\" class=\"css-0 ef9u0v00\">Stanley Kwan Kam-pang<\/span>, when she portrayed the ill-fated 1930s Chinese film star Ruan Lingyu in the intelligent 1991 biopic <span data-qa=\"Component-Text\" class=\"css-0 ef9u0v00\"><em data-qa=\"ContentSchemaRender-defaultRenderMapFunctions-Component\" class=\"css-1mniedq ex3nmsa15\">Center Stage<\/em><\/span> (also known as <em data-qa=\"ContentSchemaRender-defaultRenderMapFunctions-Component\" class=\"css-1mniedq ex3nmsa15\">Actress<\/em>). Cheung\u2019s meticulous, well-researched performance won her the Silver Bear for best actress at the Berlin International Film Festival.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<center><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/lifestyle\/entertainment\/article\/3360793\/how-hong-kong-actress-maggie-cheung-went-commercial-film-eye-candy-art-house-legend?utm_source=rss_feed\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read Full Article At Source <\/a><br \/>\n<center\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Between 1984 and 2010, Hong Kong superstar Maggie Cheung Man-yuk appeared in 79 films \u2013 though, by her own admission, she disliked many of them&#8230;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":69947,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[430,26794,26793,1828,8885,7325,1900,3569,5231,1968,11036,4944],"class_list":["post-69946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bored-interesting","tag-actress","tag-arthouse","tag-candy","tag-cheung","tag-commercial","tag-eye","tag-film","tag-hong","tag-kong","tag-legend","tag-maggie","tag-profile","wpcat-33-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=69946"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69946\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/69947"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=69946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=69946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=69946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}