Philip Ng's upcoming film, Birth of the Dragon, was attacked for whitewashing even before its release. The U.S.-China film collaboration premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) in mid-September, but this Bruce Lee biopic is told from the point of view of Steve McKee (played by Billy Magnussen). The McKie character is loosely based on Lee's Hollywood friendship with Steve McQueen, but the critics found the idea of having a Caucasian character be the center of a Bruce Lee story offensive. Whitewashing is a hot-button topic nowadays, especially in Hollywood where studios are grappling with the ever-increasing Chinese film market, predicted to overtake the U.S. as the largest sometime in 2017.

I interviewed Philip for the cover story of our November+December 2016 issue, prior to TIFF and the whitewashing deluge. Phil and I are old friends, so our conversation was much longer than the usual interview. This exclusive interview is the remainder of that conversation, what I couldn't fit into the cover story. I asked Phil if he wanted to add a comment about the controversy to this interview, but he declined, standing behind a comment he made on his facebook when the controversy first broke. He felt there was no need to add to that, and is moving on. At this writing, Birth of the Dragon has yet to be picked up for distribution.

 

GC: It's been a long road for you, hasn't it?

PN: People think, “Aw! Overnight success!” but it's actually been many years of work. I've been around in the industry for thirteen years, last time I could count. I started off with really minor roles, and then stunt work. I can't really say it was a break, but I can talk about how I got to where I am in the industry. And I can name specific points that were highlights to my road to this position that I am in now. For instance, when I first got in the industry, I didn't know anybody. I didn't know how the industry worked. I didn't really know any of that. I just came in and I had a few contacts and I talked to people.

GC: You've always come at it from a Kung Fu angle.

PN: I signed on as an actor, but kept on with the choreography. After a while, I went to places like Singapore and Malaysia and the Philippines to make TV shows and movies, where their filming technology isn't so good. Also their budget isn't so high. So I was able to train. It was my Shaolin, you know? I had to make a lot of footage – pretty decent fighting that I want to see – in a very short amount of time with a very limited budget. After that, I came back to Hong Kong and my good buddy Nicholas Tse introduced me to Wong Jing, my current boss on a movie set. We got to know each other and after meeting a few times, he wanted to sign me under his company – which is a very awesome opportunity because he brought up a lot of people when he produced hundreds of movies – God of Gamblers (1989), a lot of things that are famous that people still talk about. And he's still making funny blockbusters in China. So I'm like, “Yeah!” He says, “Right now, we're kind of lacking the department for younger guys. I would like to really help fill the void and I see that your Kung Fu is pretty good.” I was very flattered and went under his wing. He was true to his word. He started producing movies for me, big supporting roles to lead roles, to leads for a big movie. And that really kickstarted my career. My management beforehand, they're great. They gave me a chance and everything. But it was after I signed with Mr. Wong that my career really took off and I really have to thank him for that. To this day, he gives me advice.

I just recently co-produced a movie that I starred in and was action choreographer. I hired my buddies Andy On and Vanness Wu, a lot of surprise guests. Right now, the tentative title is Undercover Punch and Gun. It was a movie that we've been wanting to make for a long time. It wasn't the biggest budget, but everyone was treated fairly. I wish we had more time, but we got to film a lot of things that were reminiscent of the stuff that I love from the '80s and '90s. Even if it's only a taste of it, it's happy for me to see and very happy to have the chance to go do that movie. I remember like thirteen years ago, we were filming at the same location, and we sat on the roof of this location. There's a little balcony thing that overlooks the city. And we had little rice boxes. And all three of us were sitting up there talking, like, “Hey, where are we going to be ten years from now?” It was Vanness Wu's first movie, Andy's first movie where he won the Best New Actor Award. It was my first gig as a choreographer. So we're sitting there like, “Yo, what's going to happen?” And ten years later, or more, we're back in that one same location, making a movie together. It was kind of strange. It's a very special movie. It's tentatively going to be out later this year, but we'll see. We don't have an exact date yet, but we're in post-production now and Vanness Wu is doing the music for it. The whole movie, the cut, is locked, so the movie is finished basically when they add the CG and all that.

Right after I did that movie, on which I cracked one rib, broke one rib and I got a big cut on my eye that left stitches. I busted my knee. It was tough, a tough shoot. And I had the stomach flu at the end of it because it was so dirty on location. I just lost a lot of weight. But right after that, I had to go and do my TVB series, which is Fist Within Four Walls, which comes out August 1 on TVB. You can watch it if you have TVB in America.

I’m pretty happy about that. It was my first TVB series. I’ve done TV series before but it was my first TVB series. It was awesome. I had a great time. After that big stressful thing that I did – my labor of love – I needed to not have to be in any administrative part at all. Just act. So all I did was act, and the producer, his name is Jazz Boon, that dude is good. He came in to the office and talked to my boss, myself, my manager, told us the story and the character he wants me to play. TV series takes a lot of time from your schedule, right? It’s not necessarily the highest paying gig but it gets you a lot of exposure. So it’s a consideration because in that amount of time, I could have filmed two movies. But I loved the story so much and I loved the character so much. And having never filmed at TVB, I wanted that challenge. So I looked at my boss and said, "Yo, I really want to do it. It sounds really good.” Jazz is really good at selling the story and my boss is like, "Yeah, good job. We have a long history. Let’s do it." So lo and behold, after a few weeks, I went into TVB and did that show.

It was great walking into a TV set. It’s a little different than movies. I’ve been doing interviews all day. I’m repeating myself for the fifth, no eighth time, but it’s cool. I’ve done a lot of promotion for the show. It’s crazy, right? It’s project by project. Movies, you see a lot of the same people. But when you walk into TV it’s their own little circle of people and I have a lot of friends from the TV stations. But I’ve never actually worked in there other than like doing variety shows and interviews and stuff like that, right? So I’m in there, and it’s a different world, but they really embraced me quickly. I’m the outsider. I’m like the movie dude, you know? But everyone was cool. And Jazz, and I’m not just saying this stuff lightly because I know a lot of people in the industry, but the producer for the show, he knows what he’s doing. And he’s very fair. In such a politically-infused industry, he is someone who is very fair and very clear about everyone’s position around him. He makes you work double hard. He’s smart and he doesn’t have to, but he’s almost always there. I don’t know when he sleeps.

GC: So do you want to do more television?

PN: A lot of people are asking me, "Would you be willing to come back to do another show?" and I’m like, "Yeah! If the opportunity arises, I definitely would." I have to see what my boss has in store for me, but if the opportunity arose, I would definitely take that opportunity. I love working there. And not to sound corny or anything, but I like making money and I like living and eating. I love what I do. If I can make a product like this, even if the money is much less, it doesn’t matter to me. The worst thing that can happen to me is me looking at a film and regretting the choices I made because of something I could’ve controlled. If I was in pain, or I hurt myself, but I could’ve kept going. You fight through all that when you’re filming because I’ve seen stuff that I’ve done in the past and I’m like, "Aw!" You don’t want that to happen because it’s public record forever. It’s forever.

GC: Want to break Hollywood?

PN: Yeah, I was asked that today too.

GC: I’m sure you were.

PN: You know what? I think the way the world is now and how small the world is, I guess you do have a home base, but you can work anywhere, right? I really do quite enjoy being in Hong Kong because I built my career here. I learned my craft here. And I’m making a living from doing my craft here. And even though I do that, if you have Netflix, you’re able to watch my movies even though I make movies in Asia. I also have gotten offers in America already in regards to different things. But I think I’m going to continue to keep my base in Hong Kong. It doesn’t matter if it’s television, movies or what not, I would do something that I think the role is suited for me and the story is something I enjoy. And also it enables me to exhibit whatever abilities that I have. It doesn’t matter if it comes from America, if it comes from Germany, Hong Kong, China, Japan. It doesn’t matter as long as it fits those criteria for me. That will be the deciding factor of where I work.

GC: So true. Thanks to the internet, filmmaking is much more of a global market, right?

PN: It’s like Once Upon a Time in Shanghai didn’t get the highest numbers, right? But after it was available online, it got a lot of high numbers. It did well on Netflix and it did well on the China version of that. People really like that movie. When you have a product like that, you’re just happy. Even before that, I had a few that I was quite happy about it because my boss, who gave me that. I’m happy to work for him. I just finished two movies for him. I can’t really talk about them right now but they will be released next year. One is kind of a sexy romantic comedy with action. I was in charge of the action. One is crime drama with action – a very brutal fight. I’m pretty proud of what we shot. I’m going to start another project which I can’t talk about but I’m going to start that at the end of September probably.

GC: I really enjoyed Once Upon a Time in Shanghai.

PN: The director was f***ing awesome, Wong Ching-Po. My boss gave him a lot of freedom. He just went off and made it an artsy Kung Fu film. I went to Rotterdam for the Rotterdam Film Festival. I was like, "Woah." They were like, "Usually the director comes. How come the lead actor comes?" I was like, "Dude, I wanted to come to Rotterdam."

GC: Rotterdam. Vancouver. San Francisco. You're getting around.

PN: I’m a big nerd. I usually stay home and play videogames if I’m not at the gym. I play with my Kung Fu brothers in the States. They come to all my sets, man. They went to the Birth of the Dragon set. They were all filming and stuff and the Assistant Director went up to them and said, "I know you’re with Phil’s entourage, but you can’t film." (laughs) Guys! Come on! Don’t get me in trouble! It’s cool, man.

It was very touching for me because my mom, she never really shows it. She’s happy that I’m happy but she doesn’t really care about the people knowing me or whatever. But then when she came to the set in Vancouver, she went to my trailer, and saw how Hollywood was. She put her hand on my shoulder and said, "I’m proud of you, son."

Aw dude. Got the feels!

So I’m happy that things are working out the way they are. All my projects are coming out now. I hope everyone likes what we do. That’s all you can wish for, right?

For the rest of this interview, read part 2: Philip Ng on Working on Martial Arts Movies in Hong Kong.