This year, TVB will be utilizing a 'One Vote Per Person' method to select the winners for the TV King and Queen (aka Best Actor / Actress) as well as Best Series awards -- however, in order for the audiences to choose the winners, first there has to be a list of nominees to pick from.
Earlier there were reports that the highly acclaimed but low rated series When Heaven Burns《天與地》 , which received overwhelming support from netizens and has been dubbed as a 'godly' series, would not get any nominations at this year's awards ceremony. It was rumored that due to both the series' producer Jonathan Chik (戚其義) as well as scriptwriter Chow Yuk Ming (周旭明) leaving TVB, plus main female lead Charmaine Sheh (佘詩曼) is no longer TVB's 'biological daughter' [TN: she currently only has a per series contract with TVB], the series would not even get the chance to compete at all.
However, according to exclusive inside information received by our magazine [Mingpao], TVB executive personnel have already met several times to decide on the nominees and the 'Top Ten' in both the TV King / Queen as well as the other major categories have already been confirmed. Reportedly, the series When Heaven Burns has successfully garnered nominations in several categories, including a coveted spot atop the list for Best Series as well as a nomination for Charmaine Sheh in the TV Queen (Best Actress) category. As for the series' male lead Moses Chan (陳豪), he will actually be contending for the TV King (Best Actor) and Favorite Male Character awards with his performance in the more recently aired series The Last Steep Ascent《天梯》instead.
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TVB's Anniversary Awards ceremony will be held on December 17th this year – with less than a month to go, TVB will be holding a press conference next Wednesday (November 21st) to announce the official nominees for each of the major award categories. It is reported that after several days of meetings and discussions, the nominations lists have finally been confirmed. This will be the first awards ceremony that TVB's new director of production for non-drama programs Sandy Yu (余詠珊) will completely oversee with full support from TVB's new boss Charles Chan (陳國強) – after learning a lesson with the voting fiasco during this year's Miss Hong Kong pageant, TVB will once again attempt to use the 'One Vote Per Person' method in its upcoming Anniversary Awards show by having 100% audience votes determine the winners in 3 of the major award categories.
Since TVB is going the '100% audience vote' route, of course that means public opinion will need to take priority – therefore, in order to emphasize that the process will be fair and just, quite a few 'non-biological' sons and daughters were allowed to make it into Top Ten. On the TV King side, the Top Ten nominees include Joe Ma (馬德鐘), who had ended his management contract with TVB in the earlier part of the year and so is no longer a 'biological' son– he is nominated for his role in this year's popular and highly acclaimed hit series Tiger Cubs《飛虎》. In addition, 'non-biological' son Raymond Wong (黃浩然) also received a nomination in the TV King category. Towards his nomination for TV King, Joe Ma expressed that he is pleasantly surprised: "If I did make it into Top Ten, that's great. Prior to this, I didn't think I'd make it this far, so no matter win or lose, I'm already very happy."
As for this year's top 5 'hot favorites' for TV King – Wayne Lai (熱門), Moses Chan (陳豪), Kevin Cheng (鄭嘉穎), Raymond Lam (林峯), and Kenneth Ma (馬國明) – all of them made it onto the list. Amongst them, Moses Chan had the most series aired this year (4 series total), however instead of being nominated for the popular When Heaven Burns, he will be competing instead based on his performance in The Last Steep Ascent. Towards this, Moses expressed: "It really doesn't matter to me which series I get nominated for – just being able to participate and enjoy the process is enough. If you ask me, it's actually quite difficult for me to tell you which series I liked best, as each one gave me a different feeling."
Public opinion is one thing – when it comes to the artists who already 'jumped ship' to rival TV stations, TVB is not making any exceptions. For example, due to The Last Steep Ascent's female lead Maggie Cheung (張可頤) currently working for rival station CTI, she has no chance of getting nominated at all – instead, her 'first female lead' status in TLSA has been replaced by the series' second female lead Aimee Chan (陳茵媺), who will be competing in the TV Queen category this year with her performance in that series. To round out the TV Queen category, even 'non-biological' daughter Niki Chow (周麗淇) was nominated for her performance in the series Bottled Passion《我的如意狼君》, which had aired over a year ago. Looks like this year, audiences can't say that TVB is 'favoring' their biological children again!
Asked about this year's nominations list including so many 'non-biological' children as well as the largely 'neglected' series When Heaven Burns, TVB's variety program director Sandy Yu responded: "When Heaven Burns will get nominated for sure! The reason for doing the 'One Vote Per Person' thing this year is because we don't want to give people the feeling that this is just another closed door 'inner circle election'. In my eyes, there is no such thing as biological versus non-biological – we tried to put together the nominations from the audience's perspective and our goal is to have at least 2.5 million people vote."
With that said though, only the TV King, TV Queen, and Best Series categories will be 100% audience vote – the winners in the rest of the categories will be determined via a 'judging panel' consisting of TVB internal staff as well as TVB's top 9 management executives. With this setup, isn't there still a possibility that 'favoritism' by management could still exist? Sandy Yu responds: "We decided this way because we wanted to simplify the voting process. If our goal is to have all audiences vote, it's impossible to have all the awards done this way because if you think about it, there are more than a dozen awards – not everyone is going to have the patience to sit there and vote on every single award, so what happens in the situations where audiences only vote for half the categories? Do we consider all those votes null and void? After considering all the 'technical' issues that could arise, that's the decision we came up with."
As for the voting by the 'top 9 management executives', Sandy Yu expressed: "This year, we pulled Mark Lee (李寶安) [TVB's General Manager] in as well, so there are 9 executives total. Our plan for now is to have management vote count 50% -- the remaining 50% will consist of votes from TVB's 3000 employees, so the results will be quite fair." In terms of the rumored 'confirmed' nominations list for Favorite Female Character, Tavia Yeung (楊怡) supposedly has 2 nominations – towards this, Sandy Yu explained: "For the TV King and TV Queen categories, artists are only allowed to be nominated for 1 series – this is because we don't want to skew the votes; however, in the 'Favorite Character' categories, there is a possibility of having more than 1 nomination. As for the details of this year's nominations list, I don't quite remember."
'Most Improved' award becomes a 'battle' between the 2 parties Since the winners for the rest of the awards will be determined by the 9 TVB executives and 3000 TVB staff, the 'fight' for these awards has seemingly come down to a 'battle' between TVB's top 2 drama production heads Catherine Tsang (曾勵珍) and Tommy Leung (梁家樹). Take the 'Most Improved Male Artist' category for example – both Catherine's favorite Edwin Siu (蕭正楠) as well as Tommy's favorite Oscar Leung (梁烈唯) are most definitely in the top 5 – there's no way of knowing what will happen until the very end. On the 'Most Improved Female Artist' side, Mandy Wong (黃智雯) initially had the best chance of winning with her breakthrough role as 'Kwan Yee So' in the series L'Escargot《缺宅男女》which was aired earlier in the year, however the sudden popularity of 'goddesses' Eliza Sam (岑麗香) and Christine Kuo (苟芸慧) in the latter part of the year could change things significantly. The popularity of newbie Eliza Sam especially shouldn't be taken for granted, as it is obvious from this year's nominations lists alone that she is one of the actresses being heavily promoted by TVB -- Eliza has been nominated in 3 categories this year, including 'Most Improved Female Artist', 'Best Supporting Actress' and 'Favorite Female Character'. Interestingly, one of Eliza's co-star from the series Divas in Distress 《巴不得媽媽》—veteran actress Gigi Wong (黃淑儀) – was not nominated in any category, even though she is highly praised by the public for her strong acting skills.
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Nominations Lists [TN: Note that this is Mingpao's supposed 'confirmed' version – we will need to wait and see if this truly matches TVB's 'official' lists that will be revealed on November 21st]:
Best Actor (aka TV King) Wayne Lai -- The Confidant
Moses Chan – The Last Steep Ascent
Kevin Cheng – Gloves Come Off
Kenneth Ma – The Hippocratic Crush
Raymond Lam – Highs and Lows
Bosco Wong – Witness Insecurity
Damian Lau – Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles
Roger Kwok – Queen of Diamonds and Hearts
Joe Ma – Tiger Cubs
Raymond Wong – Gloves Come Off
Best Actress (aka TV Queen) Michelle Yim – The Confidant
Charmaine Sheh – When Heaven Burns
Myolie Wu – Ghetto Justice 2
Tavia Yeung -- Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles
Fala Chen -- Queen of Diamonds and Hearts
Linda Chung – Witness Insecurity
Kate Tsui – Highs and Lows
Aimee Chan – The Last Steep Ascent
Liza Wang – Divas in Distress
Niki Chow – Bottled Passion
Favorite Male Character Kevin Cheng -- Ghetto Justice 2
Moses Chan – The Last Steep Ascent
Wayne Lai -- The Confidant
Raymond Lam – Highs and Lows
Kenneth Ma – The Hippocratic Crush
Bosco Wong – Witness Insecurity
Bobby Au Yeung – House of Harmony and Vengeance
Michael Miu -- Highs and Lows
Raymond Wong -- The Confidant
Damian Lau – Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles
Favorite Female Character Michelle Yim – The Confidant
Charmaine Sheh – When Heaven Burns
Myolie Wu – Ghetto Justice 2
Kristal Tin – King Maker
Tavia Yeung -- Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles
Tavia Yeung -- The Hippocratic Crush
Kate Tsui – Highs and Lows
Fala Chen -- Queen of Diamonds and Hearts
Eliza Sam – Divas in Distress
Niki Chow – Bottled Passion
Best Supporting Actor Power Chan -- The Confidant
Koo Ming Wah -- Divas in Distress
Oscar Leung – L'Escargot
Elliot Ngok -- The Confidant
Vincent Wong -- Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles
Jazz Lam -- Ghetto Justice 2
Kenny Wong -- The Last Steep Ascent
Ram Tseung -- Witness Insecurity
Him Law -- The Hippocratic Crush
Edwin Siu – Daddy Good Deeds
Best Supporting Actress Mandy Wong -- L'Escargot
Rachel Kan – Master of Play
Mary Hon – Three Kingdoms RPG
Florence Kwok -- King Maker
Helena Law -- The Last Steep Ascent
Christine Kuo -- Ghetto Justice 2
Nancy Wu -- Gloves Come Off
Elena Kong -- Silver Spoons, Sterling Shackles
Eliza Sam -- Divas in Distress
Aimee Chan -- The Confidant
Most Improved Male Artist King Kong
Him Law
Edwin Siu
Oscar Leung
Vincent Wong
Most Improved Female Artist Mandy Wong
Eliza Sam
Christine Kuo
Katy Kung
Cilla Lok
Source: Mingpao Weekly, Issue 2297 Translated by: llwy12 @
AsianFanatics
