RIP Mona Fong

[GeneChing]

If you know Shaw Brothers (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?36995-Shaw-Brothers-Celestial-Film-Library), you know Mona Fong. Her name appears in the opening credits of almost every classic film in their library.


Hong Kong film and television producer Mona Fong dies, aged 83 (http://www.straitstimes.com/lifestyle/entertainment/hong-kong-film-and-television-producer-mona-fong-dies-aged-83)

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Movie mogul Sir Run Run Shaw with second wife Mona Fong.PHOTO: APPLE DAILY
PUBLISHED 6 HOURS AGO

HONG KONG - Hong Kong film and television producer Mona Fong has died aged 83 due to illness on Wednesday (Nov 22), reported Apple Daily HK.

The tabloid cited the Hong Kong Sanatorium and Hospital, which also said details on her wake will be announced separately.

Fong, whose real name is Li Menglan, was born in Shanghai in 1931. She was the second wife of Hong Kong entertainment mogul and philanthropist Sir Run Run Shaw, who died in 2014.


Fong joined Shaw Brothers in 1969, and was later appointed a non-executive director at TVB Ltd in 1988. She resigned from TVB in 2012 and has since led a semi-retired life, Apple Daily said.

According to Wen Wei Po, Fong achieved fame as one of the most popular nightclub singers and recording artists in Singapore and Hong Kong in the 1950s.

[GeneChing]

https://cdn2.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/styles/700x400/public/images/methode/2017/11/23/2247e882-cf72-11e7-986f-48a2e310a482_1280x720_000907.jpg?itok=07bJ1oiT
Mona Fong-Shaw (right) married Sir Run Run Shaw in 1997. Photo: Handout
COMMUNITY

Mona Fong, widow of Hong Kong movie mogul Sir Run Run Shaw, dies aged 83 (http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/community/article/2121124/mona-fong-widow-hong-kong-movie-mogul-sir-run-run-shaw-dies?amp=1)
Singer and television producer ran broadcaster TVB with husband until 2012
Oliver Chou Danny Mok
UPDATED : Thursday, 23 Nov 2017, 12:09AM

Mona Fong Yat-wah, the singer, show business executive and widow of revered Hong Kong movie mogul Sir Run Run Shaw, died on Tuesday aged 83.

She died peacefully at 5.28pm at Hong Kong Sanatorium and Hospital with family by her side, according to a statement from broadcaster TVB, which Fong used to manage.

It did not specify a cause of death.

Fong had been a TVB director since 1988, assisting Shaw with the operation of the company and the Shaw Brothers studio. She continued to be part of the management until her retirement at the end of March 2012, and was a non-executive director until her death.

Born Lee Mong-lan in Shanghai in 1934, she owed her singing career to her mother, surnamed Fong and a nightclub performer on the Bund. Having settled in Hong Kong in the late 1940s with her mother, the younger Fong turned professional as a stage singer without finishing high school.

She performed on stages as far-flung as Malaysia and Singapore during 1950s, and joined the record label EMI, producing several popular albums in Chinese and English, including the big hit The Wedding.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=lTGCQdfnhZ4

“I remember her well as a very caring person, and admired her deep and soulful voice,” veteran RTHK DJ “Uncle Ray” Cordeiro, who worked with Fong at the cable radio station Rediffusion in the 1950s, said.

Anders Nelsson, a pop singer in the 1960s, recalled Fong was at the height of her singing career before she quit for the movie industry in 1969, a switch that Cordeiro called “a plan of God”.

“She was one of the few who could sing Chinese and English songs in the old Shanghai style,” Nelsson said.

He said Fong’s death signified “a step closer to the end of an era of those bygone Shanghainese songs sung in full-range jazzy sophistication”.

continued next post

[GeneChing]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXpGiQWohNg

Rebecca Pan Di-hua, another singer who arrived in Hong Kong from Shanghai in the 1950s, recalled the popularity of Fong’s English songs, sung both in nightclubs and theatres.

“We both sang at the Empire Theatre in North Point in 1957, then the top venue in town, and she made HK$1,000 per song and mine was just HK$400,” the 87-year-old diva said.

It was Fong’s Shanghai-style singing that drew Shaw’s attention during a performance in Singapore in 1952. But it was not until 1997 that they tied the knot in Las Vegas, when Fong became Shaw’s second wife. His first wife Lily Wong Mee-chun died in 1987.

In 1969, Fong joined the film production company founded by Shaw and his brother. She became Shaw Brothers’ managing director in 1996 and oversaw its day-to-day operations.

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Fong performs back in 1969. Photo: SCMP

She was instrumental in setting up the Shaw Prize, an annual award her husband founded in 2002 to honour researchers in astronomy, life sciences and medicine, and maths.

Shaw died in 2014, aged 106.

It was at the prize’s 14th annual ceremony last September that Fong was last seen in public.

“Ms Mona Fong-Shaw will be sadly missed by all at TVB and Shaw Brothers who offer their heartfelt condolences to her family,” the statement read.

Details of the funeral service would be released later, the statement added.

Here's our RIP to Sir Run Run Shaw (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?67136-Rest-in-peace-Run-Run-Shaw!), as well as another thread devoted to him (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?48306-Sir-Run-Run-Shaw). This marks the end of a Golden Era for Kung Fu films. :(

[GeneChing]

http://shawbrothersuniverse.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/mona_fong2.jpg

24 NOV CELESTIAL PICTURES EXPRESSES DEEPEST CONDOLENCES ON THE PASSING OF LADY MONA FONG-SHAW (http://shawbrothersuniverse.com/celestial-pictures-expresses-deepest-condolences-on-the-passing-of-lady-mona-fong-shaw/)
Posted at 14:30h in News by Celestial Pictures

[23 November 2017 – Hong Kong] Celestial Pictures expresses our deepest condolences on the passing of Lady Mona Fong-Shaw on 22 November 2017, a leading Hong Kong film and television producer.

Celestial Pictures owns the Celestial Shaw Library, which consists of 760 well-known and award-winning Chinese-language feature films. Of this precious gem, there are over 200 notable films, ranging from martial arts to musical drama, with Lady Mona Fong-Shaw credited either as executive producer or producer. To name a few are THE FIVE DEADLY VENOMS, THE AVENGING EAGLE, HEX, THE 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN, THE EIGHT DIAGRAM POLE FIGHTER, DIRTY HO, CRIPPLED AVENGERS, MAD MONKEY KUNG FU, THE BLUE AND THE BLACK and THE DREAM OF THE RED CHAMBER.

“We share the grief with the family of Lady Mona Fong-Shaw. We will honor the legacies of Sir Run Run Shaw and Lady Mona Fong-Shaw through extending the intellectual property of the Celestial Shaw Library across entertainment media formats internationally featuring Chinese-language and English-language content offerings on traditional and new media,” commented Kristen Tong, Chief Operating Officer of Celestial Pictures.

Sir Run Run Shaw and Lady Mona Fong-Shaw are both legends of Asian film and television history and will always be remembered by all of us.

天映娛樂對邵方逸華女士逝世表示沈重哀悼

[2017年11月23日－香港] 天映娛樂對香港著名電影及電視製作人邵方逸華女士於2017年11月22日的逝世，表示深感哀悼，並向邵方 逸華家人致深切慰問。

天映娛樂擁有邵氏片庫，網羅760部著名及獲獎無數的華語電影。在這珍貴的寶庫中，有逾200部廣受傳頌的 影片，由邵方逸華女士親自監製及製作，當中包括不少經典武俠片及歌舞片如《五毒》、《冷血十三鷹》、《大醉 俠》、《邪》、《少林三十六房》、《五郎八卦棍》、《爛頭何》、《殘缺》、《瘋猴》、《藍與黑》和《金玉良 緣紅樓夢》。

天映娛樂營運總監唐靖貽表示：「我們對邵方逸華的家人表示深切慰問。我們將秉承邵逸夫伉儷力求完美、不屈不 撓的精神，將天映邵氏片庫的明星IP，全面佈局互動娛樂產業，分別以華語及英語版本，透過傳統及數碼平台擴 展至全世界。」

亞洲電影及電視史上的永恆傳奇 — 邵逸夫伉儷，永遠銘記於我們心中。

Her name graces the opening credits of all the great classics. :(

[Jimbo]

This marks the end of a Golden Era for Kung Fu films. :(

Sadly, Gene, I think that era ended a LONG time ago. Sure, there are a few from that era who are still active in films to varying degrees (JC, Sammo, Donnie, Leung Kar-Yan, etc.), but it's not the same, is it? The Golden Era of kung fu films, just like the Golden Era of popular music, was a magical time that those of us who enjoyed while they were happening can look back on and appreciate. And they can never be replicated.

[GeneChing]

HK stars bid 'Sister Fong' a fond farewell (http://www.straitstimes.com/lifestyle/entertainment/hk-stars-bid-sister-fong-a-fond-farewell)

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Actresses Susan Shaw (above) and Carol Cheng were among the many Hong Kong entertainers who turned up at a memorial service at Shaw Studios on Tuesday to pay their last respects to entertainment executive Mona Fong. PHOTO: APPLE DAILY

PUBLISHED DEC 14, 2017, 5:00 AM SGT

HONG KONG • Hundreds of stars including Jackie Chan, Eric Tsang and Liza Wang, as well as former Hong Kong chief executives Donald Tsang and Leung Chun Ying, paid their last respects to entertainment executive Mona Fong at a memorial service at Shaw Studios on Tuesday.

Fong, the widow of media mogul Run Run Shaw, died last month at age 83. A former singer, she had helped run his studio and also served variously as director, deputy chairman and managing director of broadcaster TVB.

Former Shaw stars Chen Chen and Hu Chin flew in from Taiwan for the service, said Ming Pao Daily News. Both were in tears, as was their contemporary, actress Susan Shaw.

Fong's two sisters received the guests in the hall, where a huge portrait of her was placed above a sea of orchids and peonies - her favourite flowers - which had been flown in from the Netherlands.

Actress Hsu Feng, radio host Pamela Peck, actor David Chiang, former TVB general manager Stephen Chan, actor Paul Chun, film-maker Alfred Cheung, actress Candice Yu and movie-producing couple Tiffany Chen and Charles Heung, among others, also attended the ceremony. So did TVB stars including Wang, Carol Cheng, Woo Fung, Joyce Cheng, Tavia Yeung, Kenneth Ma and Nancy Sit.

Actor Jackie Chan stayed for an hour at the service, but did not speak to reporters, said Ming Pao.

Chen Chen said she had known Fong for 50 years. "Sister Fong took great care of us and doted on us. I don't know how to express in adjectives how good she was to me," she said.


In 1972, Sister Fong brought me to Hong Kong from Taiwan. You could say she changed my life.

ACTRESS HU CHIN, on the late Mona Fong, widow of media mogul Run Run Shaw

Hu said: "In 1972, Sister Fong brought me to Hong Kong from Taiwan. You could say she changed my life."

She recalled director Li Han-hsiang was hoping to cast her in his 1972 comedy, The Warlord, and Fong did not understand why, when Shaw had so many actresses.

So out of curiosity, Fong "made a special trip to Taiwan to interview and sign me", Hu said.

Fong was a professional who had "work, work and work" in her heart and Hu said she learnt a lot from her, as an actress and later as a producer.

Wang said she had been with TVB for 47 years and her bosses - "Sir and Miss Fong", as she called them - were kind to her. "They were like family. They cherished us, they were polite to staff," she told Ming Pao.

A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on December 14, 2017, with the headline 'HK stars bid 'Sister Fong' a fond farewell'.

Truly the end of an era