Jackie Chan’s English Biography, “Never Grow Up”, Exposes Bad Behaviors
On December 4, Jackie Chan (成龍) will release the English version of his biography, Never Grow Up. Based on his Chinese biography, Jackie Chan: Got Old Before Growing Up <成龍：還沒長大就老了>, which was released in 2015, the English version includes a number of changes.
When compared to the Chinese version, the English version uses more vulgar language and exposes Jackie’s bad behaviors as a result of his insecurity and immaturity.
Mistreated Women
Although Jackie had a number of prolific relationships with a number of women including Teresa Teng (鄧麗君), Elaine Ng (吳綺莉), and current wife, Joan Lin (林鳳嬌), Jackie treated the women poorly. Jackie admitted to sleeping with a dozen prostitutes and even had an affair with Elaine, while he was married to Joan. In response to his infidelity, Jackie stated, “I made mistakes that men around the world make.”
In his English biography, Jackie also called himself a “bastard.” Despite Jackie making a vow to change his behaviors, the biography failed to mention his 19-year-old estranged daughter, Etta Ng (吳卓林), who was conceived from his affair with Elaine.
Flaunted Wealth
As an international celebrity, Jackie was able to amass a fortune, yet he lived life precariously. According to Jackie, he would wear his gold chains and often drove while drunk. One time, he crashed his Porsche in the morning and then crashed his Mercedes Benz later at night.
However, even with his wealth, Jackie is illiterate and can’t sign his name on the back of his credit card.
The release of Jackie’s English biography breaks language barriers and gives a wider audience an insight into Jackie’s life. In addition, tabloid newspaper, Daily Mail, published an article in reference to Jackie’s biography and focused on his bad behaviors. It is unknown how the biography will impact Jackie’s image.
Source: HK01
This article is written by Sammi for JayneStars.com.
“He can’t write his name”…..seriously?
@msxie0714
He sounds like one of my annoying distant aunts who is also not a good person and cannot write not only her own name but also cannot write numbers. She once asked for a phone number but said that she will have my uncle(her husband) write it down. I was very shocked that she cannot even write numbers.
@hetieshou If someone is absolutely illiterate it is not a shock.
@msxie0714 It is true. Famously he felt very ashamed he couldn’t write his own name, back then. But I didn’t quite understand about the need to write his name at the back of the credit card. All he needs to do is to sign. Any sign. How did he sign contracts?
Anyway the longer version is here
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6439921/Jackie-Chan-admits-total-jerk-women-throwing-son-room-baby.html
Quite an interesting read especially the part about Jaycee and his wife. I suppose he wants to vent his demons, his way of atoning for his past by admitting. He certainly didn’t need the money. Yes absolutely no mention of Etta or Elaine. I don’t suppose why he should. He wrote them off from his memory.
@funnlim He probably used a stamp for his signature (or his manager signed for him….back in those days, his manager Willie Chan was like family and basically stopped managing everyone else’s careers to focus exclusively on his). Nowadays, with everything being paperless and whatnot, it’s even less of a problem, as he can always get an electronic signature.
@msxie0714 It’s true…it’s been a known fact for a long time. He can’t read or write….all his so-called “autobiographies” were ghostwritten by others. Every interview, every speech, is scripted by others and he just memorizes the content right beforehand. He doesn’t need to know how to read and write when he’s got people who make all the arrangements for him. That’s why I always say the people around him (his manager for instance and also Raymond Chow and Golden Harvest, which helped turn him into a martial arts superstar) deserve a lot of the credit for his success — without them, he would still just be a poor illiterate stunt man….
He is an illiterate person whose enjoyed good fortune due to the loyal guidance he was blessed with.
Yet it is a pity that he wasn’t humble nor a good role model for he has a large following!
Shameful that he did not make effort to successfully educate himself! His drive was primarily to make tonnes of money, abuse the power that comes with his wealth to abuse women, over indulge in bad behaviours and self-importance.
I have no respect for him as a person and I’m sure Joan Lin is still by his side because of his mega wealth that she controls. Good move Joan! You are the ultimate winner.
Jackie wouldn’t dare acknowledge his love child Etta! What kind of man is he? Just a piece of wealthy dung
@llwy12
Yes Raymond Chow and Golden Harvest, as well as Willie Chan who shaped the ” poor illiterate stunt man….” … and seemingly a person without much gratitude either.
Willie Chan and him – while they used to be like twin brothers – their relationship also soured towards the end, as Jackie went international.
Regardless of how HK regards him as a 大哥 big brother (fame and $ does a lot) = he does NOT earn any respect from me.
As compared to say enigmatic Mr Chow, who holds his own so well, even when on Jay Leno.
And in comparison, Jackie Chan who comes across like a performing monkey. 丟價 to the Chinese.
It’s not hard to see how Etta would naturally prefer a female, over a male partner. If her dad is anything to go by.
@nomad822 Well-said! It’s sad what he did to Willie Chan, who gave up his own lucrative career as “golden manager” to the industry’s biggest names to focus his efforts entirely on him, only to be tossed aside once he gained international prominence (despite the fact that if it weren’t for Willie, Jackie would not have been able to break into Hollywood in the first place).
He pretty much lost all respect from me ages ago. I also see him as nothing more than a monkey act. The only reason that Golden Harvest took him in was because they saw an opportunity to “harvest” another martial arts star after Bruce Lee died at the height of his career (by the way, speaking of biographies, there is a new Bruce Lee biography that came out over the summer which I read and highly recommend — it’s 600+ pages but well worth the effort).
Yea, every time I saw Jackie on one of those American talk shows, it makes me want to throw up how ridiculous he comes across — he makes us Hong Kongers look bad!
He is so terrible. I regret finding him humorous and charming in films and previous interviews. He was reckless driving drunk and could have killed people. He treated the people he was supposed to love horribly. He was unfaithful with women. Abused his toddler son. Neglected his daughter.
This memoir is not about expressing remorse for past misdeeds, it’s about seeking books. I don’t sense any atonement. To give him any more attention is condoning this behavior.
@potatochip sorry, I meant “selling books”
i think he could be the one who had raped yammy lam if he can do such things like sleeping with dozen of prostitutes and have many affaires. onscreen hero but offscreen bastard.
@kolo
NEVER found him an on-screen hero either. In fact other than the early Shaolin ones … I stayed away from most of his other stuff, esp the blockbuster action ones.
Not Hero to me, even onscreen – bec it’s slapstick humour and all brawn no brain kinda ‘acting’
And he came across like a performing monkey. on Jay Leno.
Maybe I am weird – I don’t particularly enjoy Stephen Chow Xing-Qi either.
Is he illiterate in English or Chinese? So he pays for everything in cash?
@sas318 Both. He can’t read or write period. To be the kind of actor he was (martial arts + slapstick comedy), it wasn’t necessary for him to learn to read or write (whether Chinese or English) – he has even said himself in previous interviews that audiences don’t watch Jackie Chan movies for the plot or dialogue, they watch to see him fight…so basically, all he has to do is supplement all those fight scenes with a few memorized “funny” lines and he’s got it made….
By the way – one of the reasons the late Willie Chan stopped managing everyone else to focus only on him back then was because of the reading and writing thing…..until he got dumped by Jackie, he had worked really closely with him on every single script, speech, etc. to make sure he got it right…which is why in recent years, without Willie by his side, Jackie gets into trouble every time he opens his mouth (look at how many times over the past decade or so where his public comments have caused controversy). In one of his last interviews before he died, Willie actually revealed that the infamous “speech” Jackie gave back in 1999 when the whole Elaine thing erupted actually did not follow the “script” that he was originally given – that was one of the few times when Jackie deviated from the agreed to script back then and of course, it ended up a disaster….
As for whether he pays everything with cash — probably not because technically he can still use his credit cards in certain instances even without signature….though more often than not, it’s likely someone in his “entourage” (i.e. his assistant or manager or someone of that sort) pays for him. He has said multiple times in the past that he has no clue how much money he makes or how much money he has – all he knows is that he has money available whenever he needs to spend it. He has said before that sometimes when he goes out to dinner or whatnot, he just eats and the bill somehow gets paid (which I interpret to mean those around him take care of the bill for him).
@llwy12, that sounds about right… I remember reading about it or in the few interviews he’s done… It was public knowledge that it was all handled for him that way…
Here’s a more updated article from Variety…not as detailed as the Daily Mail one but this one does give better insight into how the book came to be: https://variety.com/2018/film/news/jackie-chan-memoir-never-grow-up-english-version-1203078161/
@llwy12
You know, I used to feel damn sorry for Lin Fong-jiao as a modern woman/mother myself. Esp as someone who grew up as a kid watching Alan Tang-Chen Chen, Chin Han, Lin Ching-hsia, Lin Fong-jiao movies.
Like how hard is it to be manning the fort with a dude who doesn’t even know whether his son is in Elem or High school? Poor mom and child.
Then when I learned Jaon Lin was the chief CFO of his finances And prob put up with all his infidelity escapades (including s’times affairs with actresses he favoured on set) as long as his affairs didn’t meet public eye like Etta … the empathy stopped.
Jackie Chan led me to Martial Arts and the Chinese Culture. This includes…the fantastic music. I will always love Jackie even if he isn’t perfect! Also being illiterate does not mean he is stupid. He has so many talents.