From the Moving Image Research Collections at the University of South Carolina comes an extraordinary piece of Chinese movie history: rare newsreel outtakes shot in January 1934 showing the production of a film at what is believed to be the Tianyi studio. Founded in Shanghai in 1925 by four brothers named Shaw (you may have heard of them), the Tianyi Film Company (天一影片公司) was a pillar of Chinese moviemaking during the 1920s and 30s (just like the family's Shaw Brothers studio some 30 years later). You can read more about the studio at The Chinese Mirror, my top one-stop shop for information about early Chinese cinema. But let me just point out that, as far as I know, none of the approximately 120 films made by Tianyi between 1925 and 1939 have survived, which makes this newsreel footage very precious indeed.
I've not had any luck in positively identifying the film or its stars. But I'm going to hazard a guess — even though I always fall on my ass whenever I go out on a limb — that the leading lady seen in the footage might be Fan Xuepeng (范雪朋), 1920s wuxia queen and star of Red Heroine / 红侠 (1929), one of the earliest surviving Chinese martial-arts movies. She worked at Tianyi from 1934 to 1937 and made a half-dozen or so films for the studio. One of them, Spring Dreams in the Dance Hall / 舞宫春梦 (1934), seems likes a possible match for the production shown in these outtakes.
Needless to say, I'm seeking the help of anyone who might be able to shed some light on this mystery film. Okay, enough talking. Click HERE to watch the clip.
Thanks again everybody for the huge outpouring of love and support! It's enough to make me feel all soft and chewy on the inside. Well, as fate would have it, my retro-buddy Dev Yang just posted a truly rare — and tasty — piece of Chinese movie history on his YouTube channel. It inspired me to come back on stage for an encore post. (And remember, good things come to those who click!)
The following clip is from On With the Show (万紫千红, also known as Myriad of Colors), a Chinese film made in Shanghai in 1943 during the period of total Japanese occupation. I talk a lot about lost films on this blog, but it is no exaggeration to say that On With the Show comes from the darkest of Chinese cinema's "lost continents". Those film workers who chose to remain and continue making movies in Shanghai during the occupation era (1941-45) were accused of treason by both the Communists and the Nationalists. Such was the shame and fear of retribution that many of them would never admit — even many years later — of ever taking part. I don't have the time right now to elaborate further, but for those who are interested, let me recommend Poshek Fu's Between Shanghai and Hong Kong: The Politics of Chinese Cinemas, a meticulously researched study that rescues this fascinating period from historical amnesia.
And now, On With the Show. This Hollywood-style musical was directed by Fang Peilin, who rose to fame with the box-office hit Girl in Disguise (1936), a cross-dressing gender-bender that spawned three sequels and can rightly be considered the spiritual ancestor of Hong Kong's He's a Woman, She's a Man (1994). And the leading lady of On With the Show is none other than the magnificent Li Lihua — only 19 years old at the time but already one of Shanghai's top stars.
As an extra treat, I've also transcribed a contemporaneous — and deliciously wry — review of the film written in English by renowned Chinese writer Eileen Chang for The XXth Century, a monthly journal published by the cosmopolitan Klaus Mehnert (and financed by the German Foreign Office) from 1941 to 1945.
Without further ado, here is Li Lihua performing "The Cake Song" with the Takarazuka dancers...
ON THE SCREEN
On With the Show. In the leading parts: Li Li-hwa, Yen Djuen, and Wang Tan-feng.
Much of the box-office appeal of On With the Show depends on its promises of sophisticated sensuality; yet the film is curiously naïve. Li Li-hwa (her photograph appeared in Vol. IV, p. 141, of this magazine) takes the part of a beautiful and oratorical waitress in a restaurant picturesquely old-fashioned in the European style. Making her first appearance on a cart loaded with hay and farm produce, Li Li-hwa sings and recklessly throws apples to street children. With her songs, her charms, and the aid of the Takarazuka dancers, she finally raises enough funds to found an orphanage.
Justifying the entertainment by the worthy cause of charity is one of those usual attempts to assuage the demand for an immediate purpose in art. However, On With the Show fails to please everybody all round. Mosquito papers, by far the most favored reading matter among certain urban sets, have contributors who suspect that they do not like On With the Show because of its moralizing. They cannot help complaining that Li Li-hwa shows her famous legs only once, and then half buried in furs.
In Chinese eyes, the Takarazuka dances are expressive only of the splendor of youth, health and intelligent discipline. To the average Chinese, the fascination of ballet lies chiefly in its difficulty. They also find the traditional Japanese dances hard to understand on the screen without the help of the symphonic colors of costumes and background. But on the other hand the audience laughs heartily at the practical jokes the hero and heroine play on each other — Li Li-hwa fries some bad eggs for her admirer and he sends her an empty cup of ice cream. Also well received are the Chinese Laurel and Hardy who mess about in the restaurant kitchen. On With the Show is a success with the public in spite of its banal situations, its structural weakness, and its apparent clashing of adult and infantile interests. The last-mentioned shortcoming may be disregarded, because modern Chinese of all ages are like children in their fondness for birthday cakes, with or without dancers swirling around one as in the charity performance in On With the Show. The whole picture is modeled on the Hollywood series of Gold Diggers and The Big Broadcast and is meant to "feed the eyes with ice cream and seat the heart in a sofa" [NOTE] — to quote the phrase a Chinese critic once applied to these American extravaganzas.
— Eileen Chang, from The XXth Century, Vol. V, No. 4 (October 1943). Original scan available here.
The Eileen Chang review is courtesy of the Hamilton Library, University of Hawaii at Manoa, which has generously scanned and made available on their website PDFs of the entire run of The XXth Century. Fans of Eileen Chang will want to root around the site for her other English-language essays and film reviews. A great big thanks to the Hamilton Library! Open access = cultural preservation.
I just discovered these fabulous vintage Shanghai fashion illustrations on eBay, my favorite hunting ground for ephemeral treasures. They're allegedly from a 1930 magazine. To see the illustrations on the backside of these prints or to buy them for yourself, click here and here.
I was flipping through the Encyclopaedia of Indian Cinema last night and spotted something unexpected in this still from director V. Shantaram's 1939 film Manoos. The glamorous beauty in the foreground is Marathi actress Shanta Hublikar, but look closer and you'll notice a qipao-clad calendar girl behind her. Those Shanghai ladies sure got around!
I'm quite remiss in not pointing this out sooner — since I first discovered it about a month ago — but better late than never. Launched in January this year, Antique Shanghai Pop Music is a wonderful new podcast devoted to the golden age of Mandarin pop, hosted with ardor and wit by the charming Ling. Whether you are a total stranger to these classic songs, an already avid but linguistically impaired fan, or a native-speaking aficionado, you will find Ling a most endearing and knowledgeable guide.
So far he has created five installments, starting with an overview of Shanghai-era shi dai qu (literally, "songs of the times") followed by episodes devoted to pairs of individual singers, such as Zhou Xuan & Yao Li and Li Xianglan & Bai Guang. Ling hopes to complete a dozen installments, after which he plans to enhance the contents of his site with singer and composer profiles and English lyrics for all of the songs featured in his podcasts.
This last feature, which he's already started, is a godsend for folks like me who love shi dai qu but haven't yet attempted the daunting task of learning Mandarin. Thanks to Ling's show I'm finally able to understand the words of some of my favorite songs. And let me tell you, it's like falling in love all over again.
So please check out Antique Shanghai Pop Music. It earns my highest recommendation. You can download the shows directly from Ling's site, as well as Apple's iTunes Store.
Born in St. Joseph, Missouri, Olive Young (杨爱立) went to Shanghai and became one of Chinese cinema's earliest film stars. She died in Bayonne, New Jersey, at the age of 37 after collapsing in the dressing room of the nightclub where she was performing as a blues singer. Stay tuned for my attempt to piece together her mysterious life.
"Comrades in arms! Tell me that you love your country. Those who love China, raise your hands!"
If you find yourself irresistibly following the command of patriotic charmer Wang Renmei — shown above in a memorable scene from her debut film, Wild Rose (1932) — stop reading right now and order a copy of the recently released DVD of this silent classic. If you still need a little convincing, then read on.
Written and directed by Sun Yu, Wild Rose is an early example of the left-wing film movement that arose in response to Japan's aggression against China during the 1930s. According to the memoirs of Wang Renmei, Sun wrote the script in response to the September 18th Incident (1931) and subsequent occupation of Manchuria. Filming started at the end of the year and finished just as the Japanese army launched its attack on Shanghai on January 28th.
Knowing about these events definitely adds to the viewing of Wild Rose, but the heart of the film — a simple story of love and friendship — has a universal appeal which requires no familiarity with that turbulent era.
Korean Chinese actor Jin Yan plays an idealistic rich-kid artist who finds his muse in sassy village girl Wang Renmei. After she loses her father in a fire, he takes her to Shanghai, where they end up living in a tenement with his two buddies. Their makeshift family is broken apart by the trials of poverty, but they are finally reunited during a demonstration to save China.
Prior to her debut in Wild Rose, Wang Renmei was a member of the famous Ming Yue Song & Dance Troupe (founded by Li Jin-hui, the father of Chinese pop music). In 1931 after the group signed a contract with the Lianhua Film Company, Wang caught the eye of Sun Yu, who'd been scouting the group for new actresses. Sun wrote the script for Wild Rose with Wang in mind, and by her own admission, she essentially played herself in the film.
While Wang's ingenuous charm is enough to make her eminently watchable, she more than proves her acting chops by gracefully handling the film's many shifts from comedy to romance to drama.
She even performs a little slapstick in one of Wild Rose's funniest scenes, in which Jin Yan dresses her up and takes her home to meet his father. Unaccustomed to wearing heels and stockings, Wang makes a hilariously disastrous first impression.
It's easy to see why Sun Yu chose Wang Renmei as his own muse. She's the perfect embodiment of the vitality and optimism that characterized his films.
Known in his heyday as the "Poet Director" (and recognized nowadays as Chinese cinema's first auteur), Sun was also a meticulous craftsman who strove to raise the technical quality of Chinese filmmmaking to Hollywood standards. Wild Rose features the first crane shots to appear in a Chinese film. Wang Renmei recalls that Sun commissioned the construction of a "steel-framed, hand-operated camera crane over 13 metres high" to help him portray the crowded spaces of Shanghai's tenement buildings.
"Those kind of people don't know anything about art. They have no idea what you've achieved!"
All of these elements combine to make Wild Rose an indisputable classic of Chinese cinema. Until now the film has only been available on a poor quality VCD with untranslated intertitles and no music. But thanks to the efforts of Richard Meyer (Board President Emeritus of The San Francisco Silent Film Festival), Wild Rose can finally be seen in the manner it deserves.
Expertly translated English intertitles are presented alongside the original Chinese titles, and the film is accompanied by a beautiful score composed by pianist Donald Sosin, who has worked his music magic on such films as Nosferatu and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Donald's playing exhibits an extraordinary sensitivity that's perfectly attuned to the nuances and depths of Sun Yu's lyrical cinema.
The Wild Rose DVD can be ordered directly from The San Francisco Silent Film Festival. It's a must-buy not only for Chinese movie fans but also for connoisseurs of world cinema.
What... you're still not convinced? Then take a look — and listen — at the following clip.
Note: Translated excerpts from Wang Renmei's memoirs were published in Griffithiana 60/61 (October, 1997), which also includes several articles by and about Sun Yu.
Check out these delightful caricatures by cartoonist P. L. Chang from the May 1934 issue of the Shanghai pictorial magazine Young Companion. For those of you who read Chinese, here are the captions. For those who can't (and that includes myself), I'll attempt to conjecture about some of the situations depicted.
Chen Yumei Remember Chen Yumei, who battled Hu Die for the title of China's movie queen? Supposedly when rising star Hu Die left the Tianyi Film Company in 1928 and signed on with rival Mingxing, Tianyi boss Runje Shaw (the eldest of the Shaw Brothers) decided to take Chen Yumei — one of his actresses — as his second wife and make her the studio's new top star. In this way, it was rumored, the notoriously stingy Shaw wouldn't have to pay a high salary to his leading lady. Poor Chen Yumei... all she could do was dream of getting that crown, while sleeping with rats on a patched mattress.
Wang Renmei "Wildcat" Wang Renmei had married Korean hunk (and Shanghai's "Emperor of Film") Jin Yan at the beginning of 1934. Jin Yan was an avid hunter and outdoorsman, and if this cartoon is accurate, then "Wildcat" Wang also shared his love of rifles and campfires.
Ai Xia This cartoon shows Death coming to claim the rebellious modern girl Ai Xia, who committed suicide during the Lunar New Year of 1934. She was China's second female scriptwriter and had written and starred in the film A Woman of Today (1933) before her death. In a traqic turn of events, director Cai Chusheng — who was rumored to have had an affair with Ai and who blamed the Shanghai paparazzi for her death — made a film about her life called New Woman (1935), starring Ruan Lingyu as her fictional stand-in. The press responded to Cai's attack by hounding Ruan Lingyu, who ended up taking her own life shortly thereafter on March 15, International Women's Day. It clearly wasn't easy being a "modern woman" in modern Shanghai.
Li Minghui A singer turned movie star, Li Minghui was the daughter of "Father of Mandopop" Li Jinhui. In 1934 she married one of China's most famous athletes, football star Lu Zhongen. To read more about Li Minghui, check out The Chinese Mirror, your one-stop shop for information (in English!) about early Chinese cinema.
Hu Die Here's Queen Hu Die looking a little uptight. I don't know what's going on in the cartoon, but I wonder if it's a reference to Hu Die's suit against her fiance for the annulment of their long-standing engagement. She also demanded monetary compensation for being taken out of the marriage market for such a long time (I believe they were engaged for three years). According to one American newspaper account, Hu Die was "never loath to use her affairs of the heart as stepping stones for her career" (Salt Lake Tribune, March 1, 1936).
Hu Ping All I can tell you about Hu Ping is that she played the mad woman in Song at Midnight (1937), an adaptation of The Phantom of the Opera that was later remade in Hong Kong during the 90s as The Phantom Lover, starring Leslie Cheung. I'm curious to know more about her, so please leave a comment if you have any information.
Xu Lai My buddy Oldflames helped me identify this one and was kind enough to translate the caption, in which Xu Lai says, "I couldn't live another day if I can't dance." I guess she was known for her terpsichorean passion. And to think, I only knew her as the first Chinese actress to do a bathtub scene.
Ruan Lingyu And last but not least is our beloved Ruan Lingyu, whose winning smile and lanky beauty is perfectly captured by cartoonist P. L. Chang.
Check out these wonderful postcards that went for auction on eBay recently. I'm not absolutely certain, but I think they're the work of cartoonist Friedrich Schiff, an Austrian Jew who lived in Shanghai during the 1930s and 40s.
Born in 1908 into an artistic family (his father was a painter, his mother an actress), Schiff studied at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna.
In 1930, at the invitation of his cousin, Schiff visited Shanghai and fell in love with the city and its people. He ended up living there for 14 years, until 1947 when he moved to Buenos Aires.
Schiff had worked as a newspaper cartoonist in Vienna and continued this line of work in Shanghai. Soon he became famous for his amusing caricatures of the city's inhabitants, from beggars and expats to sailors and sing-song girls.
In 1934, he began a fruitful collaboration with photojournalist Ellen Thorbecke (who was the wife of the Dutch ambassador to China). Like Schiff, Thorbecke was also a Sinophile. Together they created a series of illustrated travel books about China's major cities: Peking Studies (1934), Shanghai (1938), and Hong Kong (1938). From what I've read (see the link below), the books are quite charming. Unfortunately, I don't know if I'll ever get a chance to peruse them, since they apparently fetch a pretty steep price in the rare book marketplace.
However, there is a compilation of Schiff's Shanghai sketches called Vicissitude of Old Shanghai (老上海浮世绘), which I am dying to get my hands on. I found it for sale at a Chinese online bookseller only to discover, after I had successfully managed (with the help of Google Translate) to set up an account, that the book is currently out of stock. Boo-hoo for me... but I'll track it down. I don't give up easily once I'm on the hunt!
Further Reading
Images from Maskee: A Shanghai Sketchbook by Schiff (ca. 1938)
"Records of Hong Kong: Arthur Hacker profiles two out-of-the-box 1930s Hong Kong artists"
I just got back from Hong Kong a few days ago and will be reporting about my trip soon. But in the meantime, check out my new post over at the Asian Art Museum blog about Zhang Yimou's Shanghai Triad (1995) and Xie Jin's Two Stage Sisters (1964).
This photo of Anna May Wong in Shanghai, taken during her 1936 trip to China, was just auctioned on eBay. I love Anna May, but I don't even try to collect her memorabilia, since it usually ends up priced way beyond my wallet's comfort level. Nevertheless, I now wish I made a bid for this particular piece — especially after I figured out the movie featured in the background advertisements: Song of Everlasting Regret (長恨歌), a 1936 melodrama starring "Wildcat" Wang Renmei as a divorced housewife who aspires to become a singer but ends up an exploited sing-song girl driven to murder.
I suppose this post is but my own small song of regret...
Shanghai film star Wang Renmei Courtesy of the amazing Shanghai Memory website (only in Chinese)
The Asian Art Museum's Shanghai exhibit opened yesterday, and I dropped by a quick visit. It's a wonderful show. My only complaint is that I wish it were a little larger. Nevertheless, I think the curators did a fantastic job of showcasing the breadth of Shanghai art throughout the city's various incarnations.
I'll be writing more about the exhibition at the Museum's blog, but in the meantime here are a dozen of my favorite pieces:
Ladies, 1890 A series of twelve paintings (ink and color on silk) by Wu Youru, whose delicately rendered Shanghai beauties were the forerunners of the calendar girls of the 20s and 30s.
Boundary tablet of Hongkew (the American Settlement), post-1850 This piece of metal has a weight that palpably conjures Shanghai's colonial past.
Plum Blossoms under the Moon, 1933 I could sit for hours staring at this haunting and seductive hanging scroll by Tao Lengyue, who was given the name Lengyue, or "Cold Moon", because of the amazing moonlit scenes that were his specialty.
Huang Jinrong and Du Yuesheng, 1924 You gotta love this hanging scroll portraying "Big Ears" Du and "Pockmarked" Huang — the bad boys behind Shanghai's Green Gang — as genteel fellows relaxing in a tranquil garden of bamboo and pine trees.
Qipao, 1920s and 30s My favorites were those with the Art Deco patterns, but the one with the cut-velvet floral pattern was pretty cool too!
It Often Begins with a Smile, 1930s My favorite of the Shanghai lady posters on display, a delicious pinup that I'd love to hang on my wall. It was painted by Jin Meishing, one of the "Three Pillars of Calendar Posters". After the Revolution, he continued painting in the same vibrant and luminous style. But instead of portraying decadent bourgeois ladies, he depicted healthy proletarian lasses in such works as Vegetables Are Green, Melons Are Plump, Harvest Is Bountiful.
I wouldn't mind having this in my living room... Rug, 1920-1935 Wool with yin and yang pattern. Private collection.
Sanmao Follows the Army, 1946 Three pages of original artwork from Sanmao, the longest running comic strip in China. A delightfully gruesome piece of patriotic black humor.
Shanghai Number One Department Store, 1955 I was a little disappointed that this poster didn't make it into the catalog. The crowded scene of what seems like all of China, including its ethnic minorities, jammed inside this real-life department store is proof that even back then the Communists had an inkling that salvation lies in consumer capitalism.
This was an amazing installation that I fully intend to sit through in its entirety when I revisit the exhibit. Starting off completely darkened, the neon tubes light up one by one to the sound of the plucked strings of a Chinese zither. Landscape-Commemorating Huang Binhong-Scroll, 2007 By Shen Fan (b. 1952). Installation with lights and sound. Courtesy of the artist.
Forest, 2004 Li Huayi's mesmerizing hypnagogic landscape painting depicting an ancient cypress grove on the grounds of a temple outside Suzhou. Evidently, the Qianlong Emperor gave them the title Qingqi Guguai, meaning "elegant and strange".
Mawangdui, 2009 Liu Dahong's stunning embroidered silk banners, modeled after Western Han Dynasty funerary banners but updated with hyper-mythologized Maoist iconography.
If you can't make it to the show, do consider buying the handsome and hefty catalog, Shanghai: Art of the City — a steal at 49 bucks for the hardcover edition. You can order it directly from the Museum.
Moonlight over Huangpu River, 1930s. By Yuan Xiutang (dates unknown). Chromolithograph on paper. Collection of the Shanghai History Museum.
This lovely lady will be appearing in the Shanghai exhibit opening next Friday at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. I'll have more to say about the show once I see it, but before then let me make two announcements.
The Asian Art Museum will be giving away a pair of free tickets each week during the exhibit. The ticket giveaway is only open to California residents, so my condolences to all of you living outside the Golden State. But if you are lucky enough to live in the Bay Area, you should definitely enter. You only need to do it once to be eligible for all weekly giveaways.
Secondly, I will be a guest blogger at the Asian Art Museum Blog, starting in March on a monthly basis throughout the duration of the exhibition. I'll keep you posted here, but better if you subscribe to their RSS feed, so you don't miss out on anything. There promises to be lots of great stuff. In fact, just yesterday there was a post about the first Chinese animated feature, Princess Iron Fan (1941).
Here's a wonderful tribute to the recently deceased Wu Yingyin, one of the "Seven Great Singing Stars" of Old Shanghai. It's also a great way to ring in 2010, especially for Bay Area folks like myself who can look forward to Shanghai-related events and exhibits all year long.
The video starts off with Wu Yingyin's song "Drunk Night in Neon Light" accompanied by clips from Cosmetics Market (1933), featuring Shanghai movie queen Hu Die, and Orphan Island Paradise (1939), starring Li Lili. Following that is Wu Yingyin's song "Beautiful Spring Night" with clips from New Year's Coin (1937) and Scenes of City Life (1935).
Thanks to SHUESIK for the excellent video, and best wishes to all of my readers for a happy and healthy 2010!
Imagine my surprise when I saw this giant-sized cover of The Young Companion in a vacant San Francisco store front. What used to be a Diesel retail outlet is now cleverly being used as advertising space for Shanghai, an upcoming exhibition at the Asian Art Museum. Obviously I'm biased, since this is totally up my alley, but it promises to be the museum's coolest show since the amazing Tezuka: The Marvel of Manga exhibit from two years ago.
If you live in the Bay Area or happen to be in San Francisco next year between February 12th and September 5th, be sure to check it out. If not, then pick up the catalog, which — judging by these sample pages and cover — looks like it will be a must-have addition to the Soft Film Bookshelf.
To get you as excited about this as I am, here's a little something to set the mood...
"San Francisco" (1939) by Martha Soo with Don Jose & His Orchestra
Martha Soo won the first prize in an amateurs singing contest hosted by the Paramount Night Club, one of the biggest and poshest in Shanghai, and together with it a recording contract with Pathé Records (EMI). She recorded her prize-winning song, Jeanette Macdonald's San Francisco, not in the original English but in a translated Chinese version, and sang it in a jazz-influenced style which included bits of scat singing, imitating her favourite singer Ella Fitzgerald.
Lyrics card for Zhou Xuan's "Song of Four Seasons"
I'm very excited to tell you about Ambuscade from Ten Sides, a new blog that's sure to become a great English-language resource for Mandarin-impaired fans of classic Chinese pop like myself. So far, blogger Remorseful Prober has been focusing mainly on the legendary "Golden Voice", Zhou Xuan. Besides providing biographical information and translated lyrics for some of her songs (such as "Shanghai Nightlife", "Picking Betel Nuts", and "Lover's Knot"), he has also generously made available for download several out-of-print collections of her songs.
To celebrate this wonderful new blog, here is Zhou Xuan singing one of her signature hits, "Song of Four Seasons" from the 1937 film Street Angel. Okay everybody, let's learn Mandarin with Zhou Xuan!
Check out these two Shanghai mod girls, probably song-and-dance performers from the late 30s or early 40s. I love their style, which boldly combines traditional, yet updated, Chinese fashions — such as the du dou (halter top), wide-leg trousers, and woven bamboo hat — into an audacious ensemble. With the addition of Western two-tone tap shoes, the look is totally modern.
I always thought that Connie Chan's fans took first prize for extreme devotion, but after reading the following account about Nancy Chan's fans from A Movie Queen Chan Yunshang, I'm not so sure anymore.
Film fans got so frantic about Nancy Chan that whenever she appeared she would be mobbed by hundreds of people. She could hardly escape from the seige and sometimes she had to be escorted by the police.
One summer's day, the Zhangyuan Swimming Pool, which had been taken over by Zhang Shankun [the famous Shanghai movie producer], was opened officially. In order to make the ceremony more significant and to attract more clients, Mr. Zhang invited Nancy Chan to cut the ribbon.
Almost 100 baskets of flowers were displayed around the pool; tri-coloured ribbons were strung over the water, fluttering in the breezing. The platform was filled with people eager for Nancy Chan's appearance. The tension built up.
At 11 o'clock sharp, the smiling Nancy Chan appeared. Her red-flowered swimming costume and white leather shoes enhanced her youthful, healthy body. The crowd cheered and applauded.
In the boisterous atmosphere, Nancy Chan ascended the platform. Raising the silver scissors she cut the ribbon. As the six pieces of ribbon flew out in all directions, the whole audience rose with frantic applause.
When she was about to descend from the platform, wave upon wave of frenzied fans pushed towards her, a momentum that could not be resisted. Nancy Chan was weeping, unsure of how to escape. Although she was protected by three rows of people, the huge crowd was almost uncontrollable. Seeing this, Mr. Zhang asked the Swimming Pool staff to bring her to safety. But the situation was deteriorating. The crowd surrounded her tightly, shouting to her to jump from the platform.
Unable to get close to Yunshang, Mr. Zhang tried to reason with the crowd and explain why she could not jump. Nobody listened. Numerous fans charged the platform, insisting that she should jump. It was impossible. Both sides came to a halt. Nancy Chan was almost fainting. Mr. Zhang got an idea. He asked his staff to put a ladder out of the window of the Enquiry Office to make a way for Nancy Chan to escape. But the ladder was thrown aside by the crowds.
There seemed to be no way out. He ordered his bodyguards to fight a way through. When at last they managed to escape, Nancy Chan was on the point of collapse. She and Mr. Zhang jumped into the car and made off quickly.
In the car they both gave a long sigh of relief. "I was terribly worried about your safety", Zhang said, "the fans have lost all their rationality". He gently mopped her brow. "But, looking at it in another way, it shows how important you are in their minds. There is no doubt that you are the number one star in Shanghai".
The incident taught her to be more careful about her own safety. She had to accept the advice of the police and use a car that could give electric shocks when anyone touched it. Such cars were made especially for Heads of State. But it was necessary, in order to avoid over-turning by excited film fans. Of course, the car itself caused no injury.
Nevertheless, Nancy Chan Yunshang understood the over-enthusiastic action of her fans. "Without the fans, there would be no actors or actresses", she would say. "They please me, no matter what they do. But I do have to adopt some measures to avoid danger".
From then on, she refused to attend any ribbon-cutting ceremonies....
*A great big thanks to Oldflames for sharing the fabulous Nancy Chan magazine cover!
