Gloria Yip

Gloria Yip Wan-Yee (Chinese: 葉蘊儀, born January 13, 1973) is a Hong Kong actress and singer, best known for her four films with director Lam Ngai Kai, and to Western audiences, her "special appearance" in Lam's Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky and principal supporting role in the cult classic^[1] Saviour of the Soul. Among her more frequent collaborators are Yuen Biao, Lai Kai Ming, and Wong Jing. Her early roles were primarily cute and comedic, while her more recent, post-divorce roles, have primarily been dramatic.

She was born in Hong Kong, the elder of two sisters and daughter of prominent businessman Yip Shao, and was discovered as a teenager by a Japanese talent scout. Like many movie stars in Hong Kong, she has also pursued a career as a singer, touring in Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea, and she has released more than half a dozen CDs.^[2]

In her homeland, she retains a reputation for wholesomeness, a childlike face described as "forever 19 years old,"^[3] and the philandering of her husband, leading to a divorce in 2000, caused a media stir. While she was married, she went into semi-retirement, enjoyed being a mother, and pursued interests in arts and crafts, primarily embroidery and clay sculpture. She graduated from Hong Kong Art School in 2008.

She is fluent in Cantonese, Japanese, Mandarin, and English and is a fan of Jackie Chan (with whom she has worked), Tom Cruise, Rie Miyazawa, and Madonna.^[4] Her roles in Mark Six Comedy and Boxer's Story include brief passages of English dialogue.