Classic Movies and Comedy Shows

While some may consider the Movement Control Order (MCO) an inconvenience, I have no complaints because I’m already working from home.

Screenshot of nurses appealing to the public to Stay Home

This indefinite break from the usual busyness, however, gave me no further excuse to put off long-delayed home improvement projects, not only in starting them but also completing them well.

Besides working on various projects, I also found more leisure time to enjoy some good television shows.

In the first week of the MCO, the mood was understandably rather tense.

When the second week rolled around, the cable TV programming division felt the need to “educate” viewers because two popular movies that were screened, portrayed situations that reflected our current global situation.

Yet after watching Contagion (Matt Damon) and Outbreak (Dustin Hoffman), I couldn’t help dissecting the movies and criticizing the (unbelievable!) parts where the screenwriters employed cinematic license to ensure the storyline flowed smoothly to a satisfactory end.

These two movies, however, gave us a glimpse of the real situation that our brave healthcare frontliners, scientists and authorities are doing to control the virus spread and to save lives.

I’m also watching a good dose of world news so when the scenes in hospitals and cities that are severely affected by the pandemic are compared to the exciting scenarios portrayed in medical TV shows like The Resident, New Amsterdam and The Good Doctor, they appear rather tame.

There are so many news channels to watch – CNN, BBC, Fox, Al Jezeera, Awani, Sky and CNA – just to name a few, but too much information can be overwhelming and depressing.

So I try to strike a balance between watching current affairs programmes with lighter content.

I’m not into Netflix for movies and popular TV serials but prefer a taste of nostalgia with movies and shows that were big in a bygone era.

A scene from The Sound of Music featuring the
Von Trapp children singing, So Long, Farewell

One of my all-time favourite cinema shows – I must have watched it 11 times when I was a child – was the musical that featured children singing in, The Sound of Music.

I’m so familiar with the lyrics to their songs that I could even sing along as I enjoyed the show again on the Hits Movies channel.

I could better appreciate the story now more than ever, and I also learnt that the Von Trapp family singers were a real-life family in Austria and this musical was a movie based on their lives.

Then I received videos of parodies of familiar songs from The Sound of Music with lyrics replaced by creative words and phrases that matched with the current global pandemic.

I was impressed and tickled by the writers’ creativity in changing the lyrics in the Do-Re-Mi song and My Fav0urite Things by Julie Andrews and the children.

While the Hits Movies channel screened movies with brief commercial breaks, it was still good to refresh my memory with old movies like Sister Act, Terms of Endearment, Romancing the Stone, Jewel of the Nile, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, I Know What You Did Last Summer and Nine Months.

These shows that featured familiar actors like Whoopi Goldberg, Jack Nicholson, Shirley Maclaine, Michael Douglas, Danny DeVito, Audrey Hepburn and Hugh Grant, were both entertaining and simply fun to watch.

A scene from The Lucy Show with main character,
Lucy [Center] with Vivian [Left] and Mr Mooney

Another favourite channel is the Hits channel that played reruns of popular TV series like The Nanny and Who’s The Boss? and other comedy shows that reminded me of happier times.

Dad was a true fan of The Lucy Show (1960s) and he introduced us to the crazy antics of Lucille Ball through an earlier Black-and-White TV series, I Love Lucy (1950s) that featured Lucy and Desi Arnaz, her husband.

In The Lucy Show, the main character, also named Lucy and her sidekick, Vivian, were always up to some mischief that constantly annoyed Mr Mooney.

Lucy was indeed a comedienne in a class of her own and I’ve been hooked on comedy ever since.

A scene from Friends, [Seated L to R] Monica, Phoebe
and Rachel, [Standing L to R] Joey and Chandler at
the Central Perk cafe; Ross is not in this scene.

While flipping channels, I discovered Friends, another all-time popular television sit-com which brought back fond memories of this super successful TV series.

I was glued to the television, reminiscing about an era when the friendship among these six friends captivated the hearts of generations of sit-com fans.

While following this series, Monica and Chandler, Rachel with her lovely hairstyle that all the girls wanted to imitate, Joey, the not-so-bright Phoebe, and of course, Ross, were like our friends too.

When it was my mother’s turn to watch some TV, I turned to the Wah Lai Toi channel for modern Cantonese TV series that featured popular TVB actors.

By watching Cantonese shows such as these, I’m refreshing and refining my vocabulary, particularly in the flowery words and descriptive phrases that we don’t normally use in everyday conversations.

For example, in investigations, the characters will declare that they will do everything possible to uncover the truth: This phrase, “char tow soi lok siek chot,” literally means, to investigate until the waters receded and the rocks were revealed!

The Black-and-White television at 154,
Aunty Sylvia [Left] and Aunty Polly

My limited knowledge of Cantonese sayings and proverbs were in fact, garnered from growing up in grandfather’s house… when grandmother nagged us.

Grandmother were among the fortunate few girls who enjoyed an education so she could read and write in Chinese and use high-flying Cantonese phrases to scold us.

So when I heard picturesque phrases in the context of these Cantonese shows, it threw new light and meaning to the phrases that grandmother used to nag at us.

Now I understand that they were aptly used on us, naughty kids.

Speaking of grandmother, she was also the one who introduced me to Cantonese actors who were popular in classic Cantonese movies.

In the early years of television when grandfather acquired a TV at 154, it was a Black-and-White model encased within a wooden cabinet with double doors that would slide back and forth.

Nobody should touch the TV except grandfather so in the evenings after dinner, it was grandmother’s turn to sit down for her shows and he would turn to the Chinese channel for her to watch Cantonese movies.

A scene from a classic Cantonese movie that featured
Tham Nan Heng [Left] and Leong Seng Poh

With the invention of television, live shows staged for Chinese opera were recorded in films with actors dressed in opera costumes and full make-up, who presented the dramatized story complete with classic Cantonese dialogue and poetry in song.

I did not particularly enjoy Cantonese opera presented with classic language that I couldn’t understand but I was also put off by the high-pitched singing. 

"Ai-yah-yah!" a lament followed by percussion music, "Tok-tok-chiang..."

I realise that the Black-and-White TV did not do justice to these dramatic shows because when I watched Chinese opera now – live or in films – I could still enjoy the colourful costumes even though I may not understand their dialogue nor appreciate their traditional style of singing.

As the movie industry evolved, Chinese opera actors transitioned to musicals where they dressed in Western outfits and sang Cantonese lyrics to modern music.

It was quite funny because sometimes they set their lyrics to popular tunes from Western movies. Imagine Cantonese lyrics to the marching beat of, Bridge On The River Kwai…

And how do I know this?

Wong Man Lai was often cast as an evil mother-in-law!

It was because back in 154, I used to (sneak downstairs!) and watch these Chinese movies while grandmother was watching them on TV.

Back then, the Chinese TV show time often coincided with our school homework and study time. And on weekdays, we were to go to bed when our schoolwork was done.

But the lure of the Chinese movie could sometimes be so strong that our cousin, my siblings and I, would creep down to the top few steps of the wooden staircase to peek at the TV in the sitting room downstairs.

The TV screen faced the staircase and the show could sometimes be so engaging that we would bravely venture lower down the steps for a better view.

Sometimes grandfather or grandmother noticed us watching from the stairs and they would immediately send us up to bed because it was a school day the next day.

On the other hand, if they did not voice any objection, we would then boldly slip lower down the stairs and finally find a comfortable spot on the carpet to sit in front of their armchairs!

Young female actor, Siew Fong Fong, in a musical
classic Cantonese movie where she would sing and dance

This was how I managed to watch Cantonese movies and got to know the names of the actors (grandmother told us their names!) who were popular in that era.

Recently when our hairdressers mentioned that these classic Cantonese movies are now available on cable TV, I did not hesitate to subscribe to this channel so that we can review these old movies and have a good laugh.

So during the MCO, this Classic Chinese Movie channel provided yet another avenue to reminisce about a bygone era of simple story plots, predictable storylines and living happily ever after, often with the entire cast lined up in a row at the end.

In a movie about a pair of identical twins played by popular child star, Fung Poh Poh – one person in a double role – in a story similar with romantic comedy, Parent Trap, it was amusing to see the camera-tricks they employed to portray the twins in the film.

I was rather surprised that I could recognise (and remember their names!) most of the male actors like Leong Seng Poh, Lum Kah Seng, Loh Kim Long and Cheong Yeng, a male lead whose roles typically ended with him being sickly and coughing up blood before he tragically died.

It was funny how female actors were mostly stereotyped by their roles.

For instance, Tham Nan Heng and Wong Man Lai were often cast as the evil mothers-in-law while Nam Hong and Pak Yin, usually played the role of sad (must cry!) and misunderstood daughters-in-law.

Musicals were popular too because they featured young and pretty actors like Chan Poh Chee, Siew Fong Fong and Nancy Sit Kah Yin, who would sing and dance off-beat cha-cha, the twist and high energy go-go steps!

Popular male lead, Patrick Tse Yin [Left] was once
the only Chinese actor who had kissing scenes!

One of the classic Cantonese actors whom I easily recognised was Patrick Tse Yin better known as Chay Yin, a male heartthrob from way back when he was a popular male lead in movie dramas.

In fact, he was so hot in his heydays that a Eurasian classmate (even she knew him!) dubbed him the kissing man because back then, he was the Chinese actor who was brave enough to have kissing scenes!

The quality of classic movies on TV is quite good probably because they have been remastered but some of the older classic Chinese movies are just too grainy to watch.

It is often said that movies portrayed real life so I guess even fictional stories in the movies would have been inspired by real incidents.

Then I was more than pleased to catch La Bamba, a biographical film on the rise to success of Ritchie Valens, a true story with a tragic ending. It was more entertaining because lead actor, Lou Diamond Phillips, did his own singing of Ritchie Valens’ songs in this movie.

As you can see, I could go on and on about classic movies and comedy shows but by now, I’m sure you are ready to turn to old movies and comedies to relive your precious memories and keep yourselves entertained through this difficult time.

Note: Screenshots of movies captured from Astro channels.