The media furor that has enveloped Cecilia Cheung (張柏芝) and Nicholas Tse (謝霆鋒) since the former’s in-flight chat with her infamous ex-lover Edison Chen (陳冠希) continues unabated.
Pop Stop readers (and anyone who has not been in a media blackout for the past two weeks) will remember that Cheung and Chen sat next to each other on a flight back to Hong Kong from Taiwan, where they were both guests at the wedding of singer Christine Fan (范瑋琪) and TV personality Charles “Blackie” Chen (陳建州). Nearby passengers reported that the two chatted happily and took snaps together with their mobile phones. The latter detail is somewhat ironic because Cheung publicly lambasted Chen after his naked photos of her were leaked three years ago. She also accused her ex of neglecting to offer a direct apology.
Though Cheung has apparently decided to forgive Chen, the “airplane incident” (機上事件), as it has been dubbed by gossip reporters, reportedly enraged Tse. According to Hong Kong media, the actor was about to sign over some investments to his wife before Cheung’s reunion with her erstwhile partner in amateur erotica prompted a change of heart. This put a damper on Cheung’s plans to buy a luxury apartment and she threatened to call a divorce lawyer in retaliation. Her threat apparently did not bother Tse too much, because he still refused to cough up the dough.
Photo: Taipei Times
Cheung, who is currently shooting a movie in Guangdong, has been spotted looking anxious, her wedding ring missing from her left hand. Her husband, on the other hand, seems to be channeling his frustration into his work. The Apple Daily (蘋果日報) published paparazzi shots of Tse filming a gunfight scene in Kuala Lumpur, his face contorted in rage as he screamed lines of dialogue. After the scene wrapped, Tse was quickly surrounded by an entourage of 20 assistants and security guards who tried unsuccessfully to keep photographers at bay.
If the couple stays together, Cheung might still get enough money to buy her new apartment. Hong Kong TV host Eileen Cha (查小欣) claimed that every time the pair has a big blow-up, Tse begs his wife’s forgiveness by putting the deed on one of his properties in her name. The Apple Daily reported that Cha made her revelation after being prompted by Tse’s mother Deborah Lee (狄波拉), who is allegedly upset at her daughter-in-law’s spendthrift ways.
Though the Cheung-Tse breakup rumors started two weeks ago, the Liberty Times (自由時報), our sister paper, reported that there has been evidence of marital discord in the Hong Kong press over the past four months. At a press conference, Cheung blurted out, “I don’t want my son to be Nicholas Tse.” During a magazine interview, Cheung confided, “my husband isn’t in Hong Kong a lot, the amount of time he spends with our son is very small, really small, extremely small.”
In less meaty but more upbeat celebrity news, PETA Asia Pacific announced last week that newlywed actress Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛) and Hong Kong singer, actor and songwriter Louis Cheung (張繼聰) are in the lead for its annual sexiest vegetarian celebrity poll. Other contenders include Faye Wong (王菲), Maggie Q (李美琪), Jane Zhang (張靚穎), Khalil Fong (方大同) and Gao Yuanyuan (高圓圓).
Hsu, who was the poll’s 2009 winner, announced through PETA that she could never eat meat because “animals are like my brothers and sisters, my friends and family.” The poll runs through June 23.
Under pressure, President William Lai (賴清德) has enacted his first cabinet reshuffle. Whether it will be enough to staunch the bleeding remains to be seen. Cabinet members in the Executive Yuan almost always end up as sacrificial lambs, especially those appointed early in a president’s term. When presidents are under pressure, the cabinet is reshuffled. This is not unique to any party or president; this is the custom. This is the case in many democracies, especially parliamentary ones. In Taiwan, constitutionally the president presides over the heads of the five branches of government, each of which is confusingly translated as “president”
By 1971, heroin and opium use among US troops fighting in Vietnam had reached epidemic proportions, with 42 percent of American servicemen saying they’d tried opioids at least once and around 20 percent claiming some level of addiction, according to the US Department of Defense. Though heroin use by US troops has been little discussed in the context of Taiwan, these and other drugs — produced in part by rogue Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) armies then in Thailand and Myanmar — also spread to US military bases on the island, where soldiers were often stoned or high. American military policeman
An attempt to promote friendship between Japan and countries in Africa has transformed into a xenophobic row about migration after inaccurate media reports suggested the scheme would lead to a “flood of immigrants.” The controversy erupted after the Japan International Cooperation Agency, or JICA, said this month it had designated four Japanese cities as “Africa hometowns” for partner countries in Africa: Mozambique, Nigeria, Ghana and Tanzania. The program, announced at the end of an international conference on African development in Yokohama, will involve personnel exchanges and events to foster closer ties between the four regional Japanese cities — Imabari, Kisarazu, Sanjo and
The Venice Film Festival kicked off with the world premiere of Paolo Sorrentino’s La Grazia Wednesday night on the Lido. The opening ceremony of the festival also saw Francis Ford Coppola presenting filmmaker Werner Herzog with a lifetime achievement prize. The 82nd edition of the glamorous international film festival is playing host to many Hollywood stars, including George Clooney, Julia Roberts and Dwayne Johnson, and famed auteurs, from Guillermo del Toro to Kathryn Bigelow, who all have films debuting over the next 10 days. The conflict in Gaza has also already been an everpresent topic both outside the festival’s walls, where
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