By Kwok Kar Peng
After almost a decade, Mediacorp has returned to Tuas TV World to shoot the new Channel 8 drama Joys Of Life.
Once the jewel in our local dramas, TV World, about the size of four football fields, was the backdrop for memorable shows like Tofu Street, The Price Of Peace and Wok Of Life.
It was created to look like a bustling town of the 1950s and has three main streets that lead to a three-storey cinema, a railway station, a fire station, a city hall, a church, several mansions and rows of Chinese shophouses.
About 10 years ago, the company gave up the area, which is next to the Tuas checkpoint.
Then last month, MediaCorp returned to TV World to film Channel 8’s 30th anniversary period drama, Joys of Life. The series, which stars Chen Liping, Zheng Geping, Rui En, Huang Wenyong, Chew Chor Meng and Taiwanese artistes Alien Huang and Cynthia Wang, will start airing in June.
Costly
So it became financially unwise and costly to maintain TV World.
Since then, some scenes in period dramas were also filmed in MediaCorp’s own backyard in Caldecott, where busy streets were recreated.
Younger artistes like Rui En, 31, have never filmed in TV World before, but her friends remember the place and told her about it.
“My first impression of the place is that it’s very, very cute. I didn’t know it existed until I was told we were to film here,” she told The New Paper.
“I didn’t grow up in this era (1950s), and it’s very foreign (to me). It’s very nice to have a location to help you with the acting.”
Her friends have also shared stories of how the place is haunted, but Rui En said she has never felt uneasy there, even at night.
She plays a tragic character who is forced to marry a stranger to pay off her adoptive father’s debt.
Joys of Life èŠ±æ ·äººé—´ debuts 26 June 2012 9pm on Channel 8.
Source: The New Paper, Asiaone
Categorised in asiaone.com, EN, Joys of Life èŠ±æ ·äººé—´, The New Paper.
Unriddle 2
Channel 8, 9pm
In the second season of the local police drama, the fearless duo of female cop Xiaoman and her snitch Zhengyi take on a mysterious criminal linked to the yakuza. Starring Rui En, Chen Liping.
Source: The New Paper
Categorised in EN, The New Paper, Unriddle 2 最ç«ææ¡£ 2.
Reports: Tan kee Yun and Kwok Kar Peng
Exposed and vulnerable.
These aren’t words that you’d usually hear from MediaCorp artiste Rui En.
She has often projected an unflappable and icy-cool demeanour, both on- and off-camera.
But filming high-octane cop drama Unriddle II left the 31-year-old emotionally wrought – even till today, two months after the show wrapped its shoot.
“I’ve been acting for a while, but this is the first time I have no idea how my scenes will actually turn out on television,” she told The New Paper at the press conference for the show on Tuesday.
“Just thinking about it, it’s nerve-racking. It’s like being in a relationship where you give a lot, and vulnerability is all you can feel.”
The 20-episode series, a sequel to 2010’s popular Unriddle, premieres on Channel 8 at 9pm next Monday.
It reunites original cast members like Rui En, Chen Liping and Tay Ping Hui as elite members of the Criminal Investigation Department.
New additions like Elvin Ng as Rui En’s competitive teammate and Rebecca Lim as a mysterious psychiatrist.
Replete with twists and turns, Unriddle II sees the tanned, lean Rui En delving into darker and more hard-hitting territory.
Viewers who have caught the trailer on YouTube would have noticed the changes in her character, Xiaoman.
In one scene, she stumbles around, dazed and bleary-eyed, while in another, she points a gun at herself.
“We had several scenes that were really sad and emotionally draining,” Rui En recalled, declining to provide more details as it might give the plot away.
“When it comes to acting, I’ve always been very particular about timing and control; I tend to hold back so that I don’t overact…
But for this one, I felt I just had to let loose. It got to the extent that I started cursing a lot on set (like dropping the F-bomb), which shocked my co-stars and the crew. They certainly didn’t see that coming.”
Aside from sprouting profanities, Rui En revealed during the initial stages of filming, the sheer intensity of the scenes made her feel so “low and depressed” that she felt “suicidal” at one point.
“The thought did cross my mind,” she said. “If I hadn’t snapped out of it, I figure I would have gone crazy.”
Thanks to co-star Chen, she eventually managed to purge the negativity.
“I had a chat with her and she told me, ‘You just have to let it go.’ I’m very thankful for that,” said Rui En.
“Of course, her laughter also helped…Liping tends to burst into laughter after every serious, emotional scene – I have no idea why, but it’s infectious and makes me laugh along.”
The 46-year-old veteran actress and mother of one told The New Paper in a seperate interview she became concerned that Rui En was not stepping out of her character even after the directors had shouted “cut”.
‘I was worried for her’
“Those two nights that we filmed the finale, I was worried for her…She told me she felt very negative, which was something I could understand as I felt that same way too at one point during filming.
I told her she had to let the character go for a while.”
Chen recounted the day she, Rui En and Tay filmed from 8am to midnight.
The scenes involved Tay’s character, Zhang Yuze, becoming wheelchair-bound and later falling to his death – which Tay readily revealed at the press conference.
Rui En and Chen had tedious crying scenes from day to night.
“We were already feeling emotional from reading the script. In order to wrap up filming faster, we held on to these emotions so we could feel the sadness on set,” said Chen.
Catch #Unriddle 2 最ç«ææ¡£ II from 5 March 2012 9pm on Channel 8.
Source: The New Paper
Categorised in EN, The New Paper, Unriddle 2 最ç«ææ¡£ 2.
By Charlene Chua
No dates as Valentine’s Day comes up?
These star-struck fans got one in a lucky draw.
Miss Tan Fang Rong not only got to meet her idol, TV star Ian Fang, he even bought her a gift.
Miss Tan was curious about how filming worked, so Fang related what went on behind the camera.
The cheeky Fang also asked Miss Tan who her favourite local celebrity was, angling for his name.
He burst out laughing when the guileless Miss Tan replied it was local actress Rui En.
Source: The New Paper, Asiaone
Categorised in asiaone.com, The New Paper.
Reports: Tan Kee Yun
A massive hit in East Asia, but not so much on our shores?
If initial numbers are an indicator, Chinese palace drama Scarlet Heart, which has garnered buzz for reviving the career of former pop idol Nick Wu and making stars out of unknowns such as Cecilia Liu Shishi, isn’t really local audiences’ cup of tea.
Figures from international market research firm Taylor Nelson Sofres show that the first nine episodes of the show attracted an average of just 349,000 viewers.
That figure is substantially lower than what the two MediaCorp series, Code of Honour and Kampong Ties – that preceded Scarlet Heart in the same timeslot – attracted in their respective first nine episodes.
Kampong Ties attracted an average of 566,000 viewers and Code of Honour snagged 469,000 viewers.
Source: The New Paper
Categorised in Code of Honour æ£ä¹‰æ¦é¦†, EN, Ratings 节目收视率, The New Paper.
Report: Slyvia Toh Paik Choo
Bette Midler did not recognise celeb couple US designer Michael Kors and his long-time partner Lance Lepere. So good were their Halloween costumes.
The duo were in Singapore for the launch of the Michael Kors label – brought in by Valiram the high-end retail group – at Scotts Square on Tuesday night.
Shoppers and socialites invited to the cocktail accosted Kors at every step for a snap, and the lovely guy obliged, flashing his pearlies like a real-life Smiley.
Kors later traipsed to the after party at Reflections at Keppel, where he was surrounded by local female stars like Joanne Peh, Michelle Chia and Rui En.
Source: The New Paper
Categorised in EN, The New Paper.
Source: The New Paper
Categorised in EN, On The Fringe 边缘父å, The New Paper.
Pages 20 – 21
With local fans going gaga over foreign talent, have local stars lost their lustre?
Reported by: Maureen Koh
Has the sizzle gone out of local fanfare?
Definitely not, said those who spoke to The New Paper on Sunday.
Among the stars who have their own fan clubs are Jeanette Aw, Rui En, Dai Yang Tian and Elvin Ng.
RBKD, a fan club for actress Rui En, manages an official website, a blog, a forum and actively promotes gee shows across various platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Facebook.
The 105-member club is in the process of registering itself as a society.
The President of RBKD said: “I acknowledge that K-pop especially has overshadowed our local entertainment industry, but these (local) artistes are the ones unique to us.
“Sometimes if we give them a chance and keep an open mind, we would realize that the grass is not always greener on the other side.”
Mr Paul Chan said: “Whatever it is, we must recognize that fans are an integral part of a star’s success.
“But the absence of physical presence does not mean there is a lack of support.”
Source: The New Paper
Categorised in Code of Honour æ£ä¹‰æ¦é¦†, EN, RBKD, The New Paper.
Source: The New Paper
Categorised in EN, Star Awards, Star Awards 2011, The New Paper, With You æˆ‘åœ¨ä½ å·¦å³.
