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When I was growing up, Yau Ma Tei was my world. At the time, Tsim Sha Tsui hadn’t even developed yet.
	I remember queuing for margarine rations. The American soldiers gave them out to the poor. We ate margarine with rice and soy sauce—it was actually very good.
	I went to England to study. I enrolled in evening acting classes, and then started acting in movies there.
	I loved films. I had a huge passion for it. In London’s Leicester Square, where a lot of cinemas are, I could watch three in a day.
	When I’m watching a film, I enter into a very different world. I become tense and start analyzing it. I pay a lot of attention to the acting.
	Shakespeare is a waste of time. So much of theater training is based on Shakespeare. It was historically done a certain way and that’s expected to be the standard. But our world and Shakespeare’s world are completely different.
	In 1970, I felt England was boring and I had come to a stop. I thought: why not come back to Hong Kong and see how it goes?
	The first thing I did was take over an old school Shanghainese hair salon. I overheard the owners saying they wanted to sell it.
	Becoming an actor in Hong Kong was almost accidental. One of the clients at the hair salon was [politician] Selina Chow. She was working at TVB as a producer at the time.
	She asked me, “You look so westernized. What the hell are you all about?” I told her I had just come back from England, where I was acting. She then asked if I wanted to be a part of a show she was doing.
	I started working behind the scenes. I was writing the gags and jokes. Occasionally I acted—sometimes Michael and Sam Hui required extra roles alongside them for certain gags.
	Working for TVB will never make you money. I was working there because it was fun.
	I invested to make my own film. I lost money. I felt unsatisfied—so I made a second one. I played the lead role, a comic. The feedback was good and I made some money. I did a third one after that.
	By this time, Golden Harvest and Shaw Brothers Studio started noticing me. Indie filmmakers were rare then. The two studios controlled everything—from production to distribution. The release dates for my films weren’t ideal, because the studios blocked off the best slots.
	But then, they wanted me to be involved with them. They offered me a lot of money.
	I went to Shaw to meet Mona Fong, who said she was “giving me an opportunity.” I thought, “You’re giving me an opportunity?” I worked hard. I thought I had made it. I couldn’t handle this one sentence.
	It was a different scenario when I went to Golden Harvest. They called it a “collaboration.” It went down a lot better.
	I feel lucky to be part of the “Golden Era” in Hong Kong cinema. I used to know nothing, but I’ve worked in every aspect of filmmaking. Not a day went to waste.
	There is only one genre of film that is widely accepted by all audiences, and that’s comedy.
	In real life, I have my own sense of humor. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.
	I’m very close to my wife. We have been through so many challenges in life together—even in our relationship itself. It’s been 48 years. But there was never any question that I would face them without her.
	I told Carl that, as an actor, the worst thing you can do is to expect things to happen. He wasn’t as lucky as me—he didn’t work in the times that I did. Every day I woke up to doing something that made me the happiest I could be.
	Carl filmed a boxing scene with Chrissie Chau, who was of course showing a lot of skin.
	Was it the opportunity of a century? As an actor, you might see it as an insult—to be in a film that was made purely to see this woman’s boobs spill out. But it’s still an opportunity.
	Having lived to my age, I’m living closer to the other end.
	I don’t have to care anymore. I’m successful and I’m not going to starve to death.
	Let go and don’t be stubborn. They’re the same thing—one applies to the past and one to the present.
	If there is something that upsets you, you have to put it in the past.
	If you are too stubborn, you will miss opportunities in life and it will stop you from achieving goals.

	Richard Ng is an ambassador for the Hong Kong Cancer Fund who’s raising awareness of prostate health. Find out more at www.cancer-fund.org/prostate.


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Richard Ng 

Magazines

Veteran actor Richard Ng is a household name thanks to his prolific work, chiefly in comedies. The 73-year-old has had a hand in hundreds of films, both on-screen and behind the scenes, and is the father of actor and model Carl Ng. He tells Andrea Lo about how he became an actor by accident, and what it was like to work in Hong Kong cinema’s golden years.
