When Eddy Ko Hung agreed to talk to a German journalist five years ago, he thought it would be a one-off meeting. Although he remains one of Hong Kong's most bankable and well-regarded actors, his career - which began in 1967 at the Shaw Brothers studio - had already slowed and he was being cast in more secondary roles.
But no sooner had the journalist left, he found himself talking to a French interviewer, who would eventually fashion their interview into a documentary for the French DVD release of the 1978 wuxia film Avenging Eagle, which Ko starred in. And then another French journalist came knocking, followed by a reporter from Italy.
While he was thrilled to be of interest to European journalists, Ko says those meetings served only to contrast the way actors of his generation are treated by the upstarts in the industry today. In his heyday, he starred in a string of wuxia epics in the 1970s and became a household name after playing an iconic Chinese literary hero Lam Chung in the prime-time TVB series The Unyielding Master Lim in 1986.
'These days, a lot of young people say, 'Could all of you has-beens please leave the stage, you're in our way',' he says. 'Well, in a way, they're right - show business is always about generational cycles. You first play sons, then fathers, then grandfathers, and then you fade away. I've always believed it's all about how much you attain before you drop off the radar, and that's what I tried to do - to shine a little more before I finally vanish from view.'
So rather than settling into obscurity after migrating to Vancouver, in Canada, with his family, Ko has found a new stage for himself in productions made outside Hong Kong.
Having signed to a Canadian agent, Ko's international career began in 1998 with a role as an illegal immigrant in Lethal Weapon 4 (which also stars Jet Li Lianjie). In addition to his frequent forays into Hong Kong cinema, his recent work has ranged from arthouse fare such as Night Corridor to mainstream films and soap operas. His performance as folk hero Huo Yuanjia in an ATV series in 1995 won him a large following on the mainland, he has also starred in an Italian film ('of debatable quality,' murmurs Ko) and played a fictional Chinese head of state in a Canadian television series.
His latest non-Chinese-language role is in French conspiracy thriller Largo Winch, in which he plays a tattooist who helps the film's titular hero (Tomer Sisley).
