Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder — but so, it appears, is ugliness. A Chinese television company seemed to be striking a blow for the unsightly when it announced it would screen its own version of Ugly Betty.
But now Ugly Wudi faces a backlash, with newspapers and Internet users complaining that the star of the show is too good-looking for the role.
The story of a smart, kind but defiantly unattractive girl struggling through an appearance-obsessed world has proven international appeal. The Colombian telenovela quickly spawned remakes in Russia, Germany, India and the US.
Hunan Television’s version goes on air next week. The Oriental Morning Post reported that one of the cast had said that Ugly Wudi was so “extremely ugly” he did not have the words to describe it.
But when the show’s star appeared for her first press conference on Wednesday, “many thought she was in fact a beauty” behind her braces and frumpy clothes.
The Information Times added indignantly: “Lin Wudi is much less ugly than Betty.”
The actor — who is not revealing her name — claimed the show would speak for every unattractive woman, adding: “It is telling us you don’t need to worry for [even] a girl that is ugly can do it.”
But she undermined her own argument somewhat when she assured reporters that she looked worse on screen.
“I worried that in the show I was too ugly for you to accept, so I made up a little,” she said.
Her agent said she prepared for the role by putting on 10kg and sunbathing to get a tan. Pale skin is highly prized in China and skin whitening products are a huge industry.
Her efforts did not impress potential viewers. By early afternoon almost 3,300 comments on the show had been posted on the popular Baidu Web site — many suggesting that the actress was too attractive and even arguing the program should be renamed “Pretty Wudi.”
“The actress should be fatter,” one disgruntled comment said.
Another argued: “Isn’t that hypocritical to use pretty women to play ugly girls?”
But a third comment said the choice merely reflected society, adding: “If they really use an ugly girl to play her, who will give her a chance?”
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not