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In Memoriam
Leslie Cheung
1956-2003

Our Leslie, beautiful like a flower.
I love you today and always--
a part of my heart beats for you alone,
tonight and forever.

My blog

"He's a Woman, She's a Man" and Leslie Cheung discussed in new book

Friday, Nov 20, 2009 9:58AM / Standard Entry

Lisa Odham Stokes, Peter Ho-Sun Chan’s “He’s a Woman, She’s a Man”, Hong Kong University Press, Hong Kong, 2009.

Lisa Odham Stokes’ monograph study of the Hong Kong film “He’s a Woman, She’s a Man” is another volume in The New Hong Kong Cinema series published by Hong Kong University Press. This is a particularly attractive volume for the general reader, including fans of Hong Kong cinema and Leslie Cheung, but also touches on much that is of interest to specialist readers in film and gender studies.

This concise work is written primarily with the general reader in mind. The writing is clear, lucid and direct. While a key theme of the book is gender issues as they are represented in the film, and also life of the film’s star, Leslie Cheung, the book is mostly free of the type of specialist jargon that is almost totally unintelligible to a general reader. Nevertheless, in a nod to her academic colleagues, the author does summarize enough of these arguments (usually in the extensive footnotes) to orient her discussions for specialists without bogging down the main text, and many of the issues discussed in the notes may, in fact, be of considerable interest to the general reader.

This slender monograph is an easy read, yet it is densely packed with valuable information on formal and conceptual issues surrounding this film, its reception, the Hong Kong entertainment industry and its celebrities as reflected in the themes explored in this 1994 Hong Kong “dramedy”. The core of the book is Chapter 3, Cross-dressing, Gender-bending and Sexual Orientation. In it, Odham Stokes discusses these issues not only in the context of the film, but in the broader context of Hong Kong and China and examines how these issues played out in the real life of the film’s star, Leslie Cheung. This book has the most comprehensive treatment of Leslie Cheung in a Western language and includes invaluable discussions not otherwise accessible to those who do not read Chinese. The issues of gender identification, celebrity and sexual politics are given significant treatment in the main body of the text and further elaborated and expanded upon in the footnotes amounting to a significant contribution to studies of this film and of Leslie Cheung. This work stands, along with Helen Hok-Sze Leung’s Undercurrents: Queer Culture and Postcolonial Hong Kong, UBC Press, Vancouver, Toronto, 2008, as essential reading for an understanding of Leslie Cheung and how he embodied gender issues in 1990s Hong Kong, whether in his film roles, his stage performances or his private life.

Highly recommended.

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My Radio Interview--Discovering Leslie Cheung--Direct Link

Wednesday, Nov 18, 2009 7:09AM / Standard Entry

Here is a direct link to the audio file of my interview with Dick Gordon (a very well-known radio journalist who has hosted critically acclaimed interview programs on NPR for a number of years). I am the second person interviewed in the program, and come in around the 30 min mark. It is short, about 20 minutes, so I hope you will take a listen. I think they did a very nice job with the production, you get to hear Leslie's voice in films and singing, not just me talking.

http://thestory.org/archive/the_story_907_Delencia.mp3/view

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"I am what I am"--Leslie Cheung

Tuesday, Nov 17, 2009 7:15PM / Standard Entry

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSirijfZXdA

me – mandarin version

i am what i am

i will always love myself just the way i am

happiness is
there is not merely one way to happiness
the utmost honor is
every person is the creator’s glory
no need to dodge and hide
i live for the life of my liking
without cosmetic embellishment
i stand in the bright corner

* i am what i am
i am fumes and flames of different colors
in the vast expanse of the sky and ocean
i will be the strongest bubble
i like myself
let the climbing rose plant bear fruit
even in the lonely desert
blossoming in its nakedness *

i am so happy
to live joyfully in the glass house
telling the world
the meaning of living openly in the light

* repeat *

For Leslie’s Pillow – © 2001 TranceLoka Studio, San Francisco, California.

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Leslie Cheung and Me: Interview on The Story with Dick Gordon

Tuesday, Nov 17, 2009 7:13AM / Standard Entry

My interview about Leslie Cheung for “The Story with Dick Gordon”, a nationally syndicated program on National Public Radio, will be broadcast Tuesday, November 17th. It will be the second segment on the hour-long program. In the United States, check your local NPR listings for times the program may be broadcast in your area.

For those not in the United States, or whose local NPR station does not carry this program, it is also available as a podcast. Likewise, my interview will be available, once it has aired, through a link on the website: www.thestory.org. Check The Story's website for more information about signing up for podcasting.

You can also hear a web streamed version of the program through my local NPR station, WUNC, tomorrow at 1 p.m. EST and 8 p.m. EST. Go to www.wunc.org for information on live web streaming.

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Me, Leslie Cheung and "The Story with Dick Gordon"

Friday, Nov 6, 2009 10:01AM / Standard Entry

I just found out today that I am going to be interviewed for the nationally syndicated Public Radio International program, The Story with Dick Gordon". The topic, How Leslie Cheung Transformed My Life. I responded to an open invitation to share my story of how my encounter with an individual totally changed my life. That person for me was Leslie Cheung, even though by the time I discovered Leslie he had been dead for 4 years! So much of what I am involved in today, I owe to that transformative encounter with Hong Kong's favored son.

I'll post the broadcast date and how to access live streaming and the podcast when I know this info. The program should air within a few weeks. I have been a huge fan of Dick Gordan since his days at WGBH in Boston when he hosted The Connection. After WGBH foolishly canceled that program, Boston's loss became North Carolina's gain. Dick Gordon was invited by the local NPR station in central North Carolina to create a new radio program, which is The Story.

Stay Tuned!

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