Liza Wang Ming-chuen
Veteran actress and Cantonese opera performer Liza “Big Sister” Wang Ming-chuen is the chair of the Chinese Artists Association of Hong Kong and a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. She tells Yannie Chan about playing female bosses, her “weak voice” and her political career.
I was born in Shanghai. My father had come to Hong Kong to work first. My mother, sister, brother and I followed.
I came from rural Shanghai. I was really a village girl who knew nothing. I was raised by my grandparents before I came to Hong Kong. Not only was I in a strange new environment, but I also had to live with my family, who were basically strangers to me.
They were supposed to be my family, and yet they felt distant to me. I wondered all the time if my parents sent me to my grandparents because they didn’t like me.
I told myself that I had to be successful so they would like me.
Rediffusion Television [now ATV] was recruiting and I was accepted. More than 1,000 other people were accepted into the training class as well. Only nine people would secure a contract in the end. I was one of them.
My face looked best in period dramas, so at first I mostly did Huangmei and Shanghai opera.
