Monday, August 10, 2009

1963 Shaw Brothers Calendar part 1

I have been inspired by the truly magnificent blog Soft Film: Vintage Chinese Cinema to scan in my 1963 Shaw Brothers calendar for your viewing pleasure. I've split the calendar into two parts so you'll have to wait for July-December in my next post.
1963 was the year that The Love Eterne (The Butterfly Lovers) was made by Shaw and 3 of its stars appear in this calendar, though very much in modern attire and not in the period opera-style costume as in the movie. In these pictures the hair styles are big, the eye liner is heavy and the eyebrows are exquisitely plucked! Enjoy.

January - Lin Dai
Slightly weird eyebrows but love the rose motif. Lin Dai starred in many films, (listed here)but tragically committed suicide a year after this calendar came out in 1964.


February - Ting Ning
Aka Grace Ding Ning, had small role in Love Eterne


March - Ting Hung
My personal favourite, amazing beehive style hairdo. Known as Pat to her friends, she can be seen in the 1962 Shaw film adaptation of another classic Chinese tale The Dream of the Red Chamber.


April - Betty Loh Ti
Star of Love Eterne and award winning Shaw actress. Beautiful and yet tragically unhappy in her life. In 1968 Loh Ti also took her own life.


May - Shih Yen
I cannot find any information on this actress, perhaps she only starred in one or two films, please let me know if you have any info.


June - Yeh Feng
The Kim Novak of the East. (Wonder if she knew Sammy Davis Jr too?)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wonderful! Thanks for posting these. :D

I love the picture of Julie Shih Yen. She was a singer before becoming an actress, but she never became a big star. Her biggest role at Shaw Brothers was in the Lin Dai musical Love Parade. BTW, you may be familiar with her son, actor/director Stephen Fung.

Anonymous said...

lovely photos, thanks for sharing!

marc lim said...

Julie Yeh Feng was an actress first with MP&GI (Cathay). She acted in numerous movies along side Ge Lan, Lin Tsui, Yu Ming. Movies such as "Sun, Moon, Star", "Air Stewardess", "Our Sister Hedy", and many more as the leading actress, check it out in other related websites. Her personal life is just as colourful, having married 4 times, 2nd husband was fellow actor from MP&GI - Chang Yang and 3rd husband was Shaw actor - Ling Yun. Her 4th husband was believed to be her old friend (secret admirer). She joined Shaw Brothers in 1963, landing lead roles in all the movies made. It was in the early late 50s & 60s that she recorded some albums, some of which for her movies in MP&GI. When at Shaw, all her singing voices were dubbed by famous Wang Mei Tiao singer Jin Ting (most famous was Love Eterne with Ivy Ling Po).