Leslie Cheung

Leslie Cheung
張國榮
A wax figure of Cheung
PronunciationCheung Kwok-wing[1]
Born
Cheung Fat-chung

(1956-09-12)12 September 1956
Died1 April 2003(2003-04-01) (aged 46)
Resting placePo Fook Hill, Sha Tin, New Territories
Citizenship
Alma materUniversity of Leeds
Occupations
  • Singer
  • actor
  • songwriter
Years active1977–2003
Height1.74 m (5 ft 8+12 in)[2][3]
PartnerDaffy Tong (1990–2003)
Musical career
Also known asElder Brother (Chinese: 哥哥)[4][5][6]
Genres
InstrumentVocals
Labels
Cheung Kwok-wing
Traditional Chinese
Simplified Chinese
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinZhāng Guóróng
Yue: Cantonese
JyutpingZoeng1 Gwok3-wing4
IPA[tsœŋ˥ kʷɔk̚˧wɪŋ˩]
Cheung Fat-chung
Traditional Chinese
Simplified Chinese
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinZhāng Fāzōng
Yue: Cantonese
JyutpingZoeng1 Faat3-zung1
Signature

Leslie Cheung Kwok-wing[A] (12 September 1956 – 1 April 2003), born Cheung Fat-chung, was a Hong Kong singer and actor. One of the most influential cultural icons in the Chinese world, Cheung was known for his debonair demeanor, flamboyant screen characters, and avant-garde, androgynous stage presence. Throughout his 26-year career, he released over 40 music albums and acted in 56 films.[7]

Born in Kowloon, British Hong Kong, Cheung studied in England since the age of 12 until he returned home in 1976. He garnered attention in 1977 when entering RTV's Asian Singing Contest and achieved popularity in 1984 with a hit single "Monica." Cheung is regarded as one of the founding fathers of Cantopop for defining the music genre in the 1980s.[8] He announced his "retirement" from music in 1989 and emigrated to Canada the following year, but returned to Hong Kong in 1994. His reemergence from the musical retirement in the late 1990s, particularly in his 1996 album Red, was marked by sonic experimentation and daring imagery.

In addition to music, Cheung achieved pan-Asian fame with such films as A Better Tomorrow (1986) and A Chinese Ghost Story (1987). He won the Best Actor at the 1991 Hong Kong Film Awards for his role in Days of Being Wild (1990), and became world-renowned for his performances in Farewell My Concubine (1993) and Happy Together (1997).

On 1 April 2003, Cheung, suffering from clinical depression, died by suicide by jumping off the 24th floor of the Mandarin Oriental hotel, Hong Kong. In 2010, he was voted third of CNN's most iconic musicians of all time, after Michael Jackson and The Beatles.[9]

  1. ^ "Leslie Cheung profile". Archived from the original on 18 November 2016. Retrieved 10 November 2016.
  2. ^ "Leslie Cheung". IMDb. Archived from the original on 26 July 2021. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  3. ^ "張國榮的愛情故事 (Leslie Cheung's Romance Story) - Cheung claimed he was 5 ft 8.5 in tall". Leslie Cheung Cyberworld. Retrieved 7 April 2023.
  4. ^ Lisa Oldham Stokes (2007). Historical Dictionary of Hong Kong Cinema. Scarecrow Press. p. xxvii. ISBN 978-0-8108-5520-5.
  5. ^ "Sina Entertainment News" (in Chinese). Xinhua News Agency. 3 April 2008. Archived from the original on 4 November 2015. Retrieved 28 March 2012.
  6. ^ "Sina Entertainment News". Sina Corp. Archived from the original on 20 June 2021. Retrieved 28 March 2012.
  7. ^ Leung 2008, p. 85.
  8. ^ 李雯蕊. "'Elder brother': Leslie Cheung remembered". www.chinadaily.com.cn. Retrieved 2 April 2024.
  9. ^ "Michael Jackson: Your number one music icon - CNN.com". www.cnn.com. Retrieved 4 April 2024.


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