** The below opinion piece was written by director Patrick Kong in his weekly column entitled 'Movie Fan Deep Feelings' (影迷情琛) [the 琛 represents the character in Patrick's Chinese name]. The column is published every Friday on Patrick Kong's personal blog site as well as in HK Headline Newspaper.**
"Uncle Choi"
Coincidentally, this post is being published on the same day that "The Greatness of a Hero" 《盛世人傑》is airing its finale episode.
"The Greatness of a Hero" was filmed 4 years ago, however the airing date was continually delayed – the series finally aired this year, though it was placed in the 'cannon fodder' timeslot going up against the Easter holiday. Therefore, practically the entire world did not have high hopes for the ratings to do well – yet, since the series started airing, it has maintained high ratings that continued to increase steadily every week and successfully exceeded everyone's expectations. Hard work truly does pay off!
The producer for "The Greatness of a Hero" is Leung Choi Yuen, who is affectionately known in the industry as 'Uncle Choi'. He is an experienced television producer who has countless TV series to his credit – in the 80s and 90s, some of his most popular works include "The Final Verdict" 《誓不低頭》, "Rain in the Heart"《成功路上》, "Cherished Moments"《回到未嫁時》, etc. In the 90s, Uncle Choi left TVB to try his luck elsewhere and returned in the year 2000. In the past decade or so since his return, Uncle Choi is one of the producers who has produced the most series, though none were ever pegged for the anniversary series timeslot or considered 'grand production' material – yet almost all of Uncle Choi's series are high quality as well as ratings guarantees. Recent examples from the past few years include "A Watchdog's Tale" 《老友狗狗》, "When Lanes Merge"《情越雙白線》, "Ghostwriter" 《蒲松齡》, "The Life and Times of a Sentinel" 《紫禁驚雷》, etc., all of which created impressive ratings records at one point.
Taking "The Greatness of a Hero" for example – the series was able to do so well in the ratings department primarily due to 2 essential factors that have made Uncle Choi's series so successful in the past few years: 'good actors' and 'good script'.
Let's first look at the 'good actor' piece – Uncle Choi usually likes to utilize an experienced veteran senior actor paired with a newer generation artist: for example, Lau Dan (劉丹) and Kevin Cheng (鄭嘉穎) in "Trimming Success"《飛短留長父子兵》, Elliot Ngok (岳華) and Steven Ma (馬俊偉) in "Ghostwriter", Kent Cheng (鄭則士) and Raymond Wong (黃浩然) in "When Lanes Merge". In all of Uncle Choi's works, there is an insistence that between the 'good actors', there should always exist certain 'sparks' that are only achievable through both actors 'learning by interaction'. Acting is a very interesting thing – when the person you're acting against does a superior job, it naturally becomes a 'stimulant' for one's own acting and pushes one's acting to a different level. In "The Greatness of a Hero", with the rare opportunity of having 2 of the industry's 'finest' actors, Kent Cheng (鄭則士) and Wayne Lai (黎耀祥) , come together for the first time and giving it everything they've got – it's impossible for the series not to be good!
In addition, in most of Uncle Choi's works, he very rarely departs from 'traditional' themes when it comes to choosing his material. Perhaps some may say that he is too conservative, but yet within this 'traditional' framework, Uncle Choi is able to successfully unearth the 'drama-worthy' elements to formulate his storylines. If we were to look for a common 'main' theme amongst all of Uncle Choi's works, it would likely be 'family love' (親情), especially that between father and son. In the series "A Journey Called Life"《金石良緣》, "Ghostwriter", as well as "When Lanes Merge", the father / son relationships are meticulously written – the relationships start off as mutually defiant and slowly become harmonious, utilizing the age-old concept 'blood is thicker than water' to prove that 'family love' cannot be bought even with all the money in the world. Lastly, in most of Uncle Choi's [recent] works, the 'forever father' image is usually portrayed by actors Elliot Ngok or Kent Cheng – goes to show how much Uncle Choi cherishes old friendships.
Written by: Patrick Kong (葉念琛)
Source: HK Channel (Original Source: HK Headline News)
Translated by: llwy12 @ AsianFanatics
