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[POP STOP]

A-mei put the proverbial foot down earlier this week. PHOTO: TAIPEI TIMES

The love triangle between Mando pop diva A-mei (張惠妹), basketball player Sam Ho (何守正) and airline hostess/wannabe star Lin Pei-yao (林佩瑤) died a death this week as Taiwan's leading superstar quickly saw off her rival after members of the paparazzi caught Ho having a secret tryst with Lin last week.

Currently in Tokyo playing the role of Princess Turandot in a Japanese production of Turandot, A-mei publicly acknowledged her relationship with Ho for the first time by admitting that they had daily phone calls after the gossip gristmill went into overdrive.

Contrary to celebrity watchers' portrayal of Ho as a rake who sought warmth in the bosom of a maid while his belle is away, the basketball player is, in the diva's understanding, a hard-working lad who takes his profession seriously. As for the suspicious date in the park, A-mei brushed off the press pack's eager questions by proclaiming everybody has the "right to make friends."

Stephanie Hsiao can slum it, too, you know. PHOTO: TAIPEI TIMES

One Million Star alumnus Aska Yang (楊宗緯) has found out the hard way that there is such a thing as bad publicity. The unlikely star, who built his entire career on a reasonable voice, unverifiable rumors and a slew of publicity stunts, has been put under the microscope. While appearing on the TV variety show Temple of the Spicy Queen (麻辣天后宮), hosted by transsexual celebrity Li Jing (利菁), two nightclub employees insinuated that Yang took a drunken girl to a love motel after a night of clubbing, Yang reportedly faces the loss of several product endorsements.

The crybaby crooner's agent promptly issued threats to take the matter to court. The two so-called witnesses subsequently apologized, and the TV station promised to edit out the whole sorry scenario.

Hostess Li, however, decided to play dumb by saying that she failed to remember anything due to the brain surgery she had underwent earlier this year.

Taiwan's veteran beauty Stephanie Hsiao (蕭薔) was spotted entertaining two Japanese distributors along with local director Alice Wang (王毓雅) last week at a Cash Box KTV (錢櫃) in Taipei's East District (東區). The gathering further makes Hsiao a favored candidate to star in Wang's latest film project tentatively titled The Story of Taiwanese Presidents (台灣總統的故事) as the nation's first lady-to-be Chow Mei-ching (周美青).

Presenting her credentials to the press, Hsia, a spokesperson for luxury and extravagance, said she had worn the same pair of white sneakers for eight years. The implication, supposedly is that makes her the perfect character to play Chow, a down-to-earth, makeup-free first lady.

In the aftermath of Edison Chen's (陳冠希) sex-photo scandal, Hong Kong actor and singer Nicolas Tse (謝霆鋒), now better known as the ill-fated husband of Cecilia Cheung (張柏芝), is being depicted by paparazzi as a husband and father sent mad by the affair and running up and down on the streets of Hong Kong like a lunatic.

Clearly, Hong Kong's observant reporters decipher a daily jog as aberrant human behavior. Watch out president-elect Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九).

As for the now best known and most admired fellatio "artiste" in the Chinese-speaking, Chen is keeping his promise to leave the entertainment business in Hong Kong indefinitely by starting his career afresh somewhere else.

The star has been reportedly offered several new movie projects, his agent said this week. One of them is a romance flick co-starring Shu Qi (舒淇) with funding from Singapore and the US.

If everything goes well, women and gay audiences will soon be able to fantasize about the star again on the big screen.
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