Lin Chi-ling (林志玲) has been maligned for her attempts at acting and singing, but the supermodel may have finally established herself as a bona fide thespian by appearing in a theatrical adaptation of Red Cliff (赤壁) in Tokyo.
Reprising the role of Xiao Qiao (小喬), which Lin previously performed in John Woo’s (吳宇森) two-part film version of the classic Chinese story, Lin spoke her lines in fluent Japanese and managed to lower her much-criticized baby voice thanks to extensive vocal training. Even the toughest critics were appeased.
“Real tears splashed on the stage. Her emotions were sincere,” the Apple Daily swooned.
Photo: Taipei Times
The United Daily News reported that Lin had finally smashed her reputation for being a “flower vase” (花瓶), or just another pretty face.
Lin’s manager Fan Ching-mei (范清美) said that the entire run of Red Cliffs — Love (赤壁─愛) in Ginza sold out. As one of the main characters, Lin was onstage for most of the two-and-a-half-hour performance.
Lin appeared with Akira (real name Ryohei Kurosawa), a member of Japanese boy band Exile, who played General Zhou Yu (周瑜), Xiao Qiao’s love interest. According to Fan, Lin arrived in Japan a month ago to start dress rehearsals and had to overcome stage fright every night. “Before each time she went on the stage, she would high five Akira for good luck,” Fan said.
Lin follows in the footsteps of A-mei (阿妹, real name Chang Hui-mei, 張惠妹), who appeared in a Japanese-language production of Turandot in Tokyo three years ago. The pop star had originally hoped to catch one of Lin’s performances, but celebrated her 39th birthday in Taiwan instead. Celebrities who managed to make it to the shows included Taiwanese-Japanese pop singer Ouyang Fei-fei (歐陽菲菲) and Taiwanese celebrity stylist and “fashion guru” Iven Hong (洪偉明).
Pop Stop readers will remember that Cecilia Cheung (張柏芝) and Nicholas Tse (謝霆鋒) recently celebrated their son’s fourth birthday with a party and a 12-hour-long divorce mediation. The Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) said the protracted negotiations resembled a “bad, overlong soap opera.”
Hong Kong gossip pages reported that Cheung had a change of heart at the “very last minute” of the discussion. Just as the estranged couple was moving toward an agreement over several key issues, Cheung suddenly insisted that she wanted sole custody of their children. Tse, however, wants to co-parent the two small boys. The feuding duo plan to enter yet another round of divorce negotiations soon, according to reports.
In happier marital news, Taiwanese singer Rene Liu (劉若英), also known by her nickname “Milk Tea” (奶茶), surprised fans when she announced on her Web site that she got married last week in Beijing to financier Zhong Shi (鐘石, nickname Zhong Xiaojiang, 鍾小江). As the United Daily put it, Liu’s nuptials mean the 41-year-old can now shake off the troubling moniker of “golden leftover” (黃金剩女), which describes a woman who has been so focused on career success that she has forsaken love.
Instead, Liu has taken on yet another nickname: “The Second Big S.” As Pop Stop readers will recall, Big S (real name Barbie Hsu, 徐熙媛) secretly wed Wang Xiaofei (汪小菲) last November. Both Liu and Big S are Taiwanese pop stars now married to wealthy Chinese businessmen — in fact, newspapers reported that Zhong and Wang move in the same moneyed circles and are good friends.
Liu and Zhong have struggled to keep a low profile and ward off the paparazzi in Beijing since announcing their union. While the news came as a surprise to the media, friends say the couple had been planning to wed for several months. Liu’s mentor, singer Sylvia Chang (張艾嘉), told reporters that she had met Chung and found him to be “very honest.”
“I’m sure that he will take good care of Milk Tea,” Chang said.
If you are a Western and especially a white foreign resident of Taiwan, you’ve undoubtedly had the experience of Taiwanese assuming you to be an English teacher. There are cultural and economic reasons for this, but one of the greatest determinants is the narrow range of work permit categories that exist for Taiwan’s foreign residents, which has in turn created an unofficial caste system for foreigners. Until recently, laowai (老外) — the Mandarin term for “foreigners,” which also implies citizenship in a rich, Western country and distinguishable from brown-skinned, southeast Asian migrant laborers, or wailao (外勞) — could only ever
Sept. 23 to Sept. 29 The construction of the Babao Irrigation Canal (八堡圳) was not going well. Large-scale irrigation structures were almost unheard of in Taiwan in 1709, but Shih Shih-pang (施世榜) was determined to divert water from the Jhuoshuei River (濁水溪) to the Changhua plain, where he owned land, to promote wet rice cultivation. According to legend, a mysterious old man only known as Mr. Lin (林先生) appeared and taught Shih how to use woven conical baskets filled with rocks called shigou (石笱) to control water diversion, as well as other techniques such as surveying terrain by observing shadows during
In recent weeks news outlets have been reporting on rising rents. Last year they hit a 27 year high. It seems only a matter of time before they become a serious political issue. Fortunately, there is a whole political party that is laser focused on this issue, the Taiwan Statebuilding Party (TSP). They could have had a seat or two in the legislature, or at least, be large enough to attract media attention to the rent issue from time to time. Unfortunately, in the last election, Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) acted as a vote sink for
This is a film about two “fools,” according to the official synopsis. But admirable ones. In his late thirties, A-jen quits his high-paying tech job and buys a plot of land in the countryside, hoping to use municipal trash to revitalize the soil that has been contaminated by decades of pesticide and chemical fertilizer use. Brother An-ho, in his 60s, on the other hand, began using organic methods to revive the dead soil on his land 30 years ago despite the ridicule of his peers, methodically picking each pest off his produce by hand without killing them out of respect