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A Tale of Two Actresses
For movie-goers in the West, the two best-known female Chinese stars are most likely Gong Li and Zhang Ziyi. The former is featured in To Live, Raise the Red Lantern, ,Ju Dou, Farewell My Concubine, and Red Sorghum; the latter can be seen in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, The Road Home and Rush Hour II.
The two actresses share some common characteristics, most important of which is that both of them achieved their world-class fame while working with director Zhang Yimou.
Of the two ladies Gong Li was the first to cooperate with Zhang Yimou, the director who looked, and still looks, like a peasant from a remote Chinese village but is obviously quite talented and hard working. It wouldn’t be fair to say that Zhang Yimou created the movie star Gong Li because when the two collaborated, Zhang was not yet as well established as he later became. In any event, while Gong and Zhang worked together, the two became lovers. The relationship didn’t work out, and the word is that Gong Li wanted to be married but Zhang - who had divorced once before - told her that he was not ready to tie the knot again. Determined to have a family of her own, Gong Li broke up with Zhang, and, in a move that surprised many people, married a rich Hong Kong merchant who, by all accounts, seems to be devoid of any artistic attributes but is otherwise nice, dependable, and not old.
That was when, people say, that Zhang Yimou decided to find an actress who would look like Gong Li in appearance, only younger, and he would make the young lady a star as famous as Gong Li. He found his candidate in Zhang Ziyi, 15 years younger than Gong Li and 19-years-old at the time of meeting well known director. No one knows for sure if indeed there was a plot for revenge on the part of Zhang Yimou, and all that is known is that he succeeded splendidly in pushing Zhang Ziyi to stardom.
The question is: Do the two ladies look alike? Decide for yourself: Gongli 1 2 3 4 5 6
Zhang Ziyi 1 2 3 4 5 7
MereChina News & Notes
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