Zhuang Xue Fang:Queen of Amoy Films

Zhuang Xue Fang in the April, 1959 issue of Southern Screen

I'm sure my buddy Ral never imagined I would end up in the obscure wilderness of late 1950s Amoy-dialect cinema when he introduced me to Hong Kong movies via Jet Li, Chow Yun Fat, and his legendary "girls with guns" clip videos more than ten years ago. But sometimes life takes us down unexpected paths, and so it is that I find myself very excited about Dev Yang's new post about Amoy movie queen Zhuang Xue Fang.

If you are like me, you probably thought that Chinese cinema was neatly divided into Cantonese and Mandarin, just like a VCD with the left audio channel devoted to one dialect and the right channel to the other. But for a brief period back in the late 1950s, films made in the Amoy dialect (which was the predominant dialect spoken by Chinese living in Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines) actually outnumbered Mandarin films being made in Hong Kong at the time.

Although the boom was short lived and the movies were often cheaply produced copies of popular Cantonese and Mandarin films, the Amoy industry did produce its own share of beloved and memorable screen stars. To give you a taste of the world of Amoy-dialect cinema and its movie queen Zhuang Xue Fang, here is an article from Southern Screen No. 14 (April, 1959) about her film Beauty and the Beasts (1959), plus a rare clip from Shrews from Afar (1958). Zhuang's costar in that film was another popular Amoy actress named Xiao Juan — who would go onto even greater fame later in the 60s after she signed on with Shaw Brothers and became known as Ivy Ling Po.


Zhuang Xue Fang and Xiao Juan (aka Ivy Ling Po) in Shrews from Afar (1958)

Further Reading

• "The Rise and Decline of Amoy Films" by Wong Ching Ho
• "From Transnationalism to Nativism: The Rise, Decline and Reinvention of a Regional Hokkien Entertainment Industry" by Jeremy E. Taylor

The Pretty Lady Behind the Ugly Face Is...

A big thanks to Dev for identifying the pretty lady behind the ugly face. It turns out that she is none other than Chang Lye Lye, older sister of Landi Chang. The multi-talented Chang sisters hailed from Singapore and came from a showbiz family. Their father was a pioneering circus performer, and their mother was allegedly the first ballerina in China. Leaving war-torn China, the family moved to Singapore in 1941 and joined the Shen Chang Fu Circus. Lye Lye and Landi grew up under the big top and learned singing, dancing, and acrobatics at a young age. They soon became the star performers of the troupe.

In 1954 the sisters traveled with the Shen Chang Fu Circus to Hong Kong. Around this time Chang Lye Lye's career as a singer took off, and she soon started appearing in films singing a song or two and sometimes in a featured role. Her name first shows up in the credits of Selamat Tinggal Kekasihku [Goodbye My Love], a 1955 Malay film made by the Cathay-Keris Company. She broke into Chinese movies shortly thereafter thanks to Lo Wei who asked her to play a role in his film Love River (1957) and who probably also arranged for her to appear with him in Lady Sings the Blues, a Jeanette Lin Tsui vehicle released later that year.


Lo Wei and Chang Lye Lye in Love River (1957)
Photo from The Age of Shanghainese Pops, 1930-1970

In 1959, Chang Lye Lye had a singing cameo playing herself in Miss Songbird, with Julie Yeh Feng taking the title role. Lye Lye finally got a chance to be leading lady when Shaw Brothers invited her to shoot two Amoy-dialect films, Storm in a Teacup and I Love That Young Man. Evidently, she also taught singing classes at the studio. Around or after this time, she decided to produce, direct, and star in her own film, My Love in Malaya. According to an interview she gave the National Archives of Singapore, it won Best Film at the Malay film awards.


Chang Lye Lye (left) and Landi Chang (right) in My Love in Malaya
Click here for the full flyer

I couldn't find much information about what Chang Lye Lye did in the 60s. The online synopsis of her National Archives of Singapore interview says that she became a dance teacher at Shaw Brothers on the recommendation of director Chun Kim (who was married to Jeannette Lin Tsui, whose brother Kenneth Tsang Kong was married to Lye Lye's sister Landi Chang by this time). So it's very possible that she taught Jenny Hu how to shake her thing for her debut in Till the End of Time (1966).

Chang Lye Lye's film career ends on an odd but definitely cool note: she appears in and sings the theme song for Golden Skeleton (1967), a Cantonese "Jane Bond" film starring Josephine Siao. I've got to see that one the next time I visit the Hong Kong Film Archive!

References and Other Links
The Age of Shanghainese Pops, 1930-1970 by Wong Kee Chee
Access to Archives Online Singapore (search for Chang Lye Lye)
Cool photos of Chang Lye Lye

More Treasures from the People's Repubic of YouTube

Here's a rare find: Xiao Juan (before she became famous at Shaw Brothers under the name Ivy Ling Po) singing a cover of Patti Page's "Changing Partners" in the Amoy-dialect Shrews from Afar (1958), directed by Wong Tin-lam.

The next two clips are courtesy of Dev Yang, who has recently launched a YouTube channel to accompany his blog The Golden Age of Chinese Cinema. I'm very eager to see what other rarities he can pull out of his sleeve!


The one and only Bai Guang in Blood Stained Begonia (1949). It's an absolute shame that none of her films are available on DVD.


I never thought I'd see this: the opening scene of Calendar Girl (1959), featuring the enviable Peter Chen Ho sandwiched between the fetching Helen Li Mei and Diana Chang Chung-wen. Calendar Girl has long been a "holy grail" film of mine. It's the movie that set the mold for the Eastmancolor Mandarin musicals of the 60s, from director Tao Qin's own subsequent efforts — like Les Belles (1961), Love Parade (1963), and The Dancing Millionairess (1964) — all the way to Inoue Umetsugu's Hong Kong Nocturne (1967) and Hong Kong Rhapsody (1968).