Wayne Lai, Kent Cheng, Pierre Ngo, and Lai Lok Yi on Filming “King Maker”
TVB’s new historical fiction drama, King Maker <造王者> premiered on August 13th to positive reviews. With 90 percent of the drama’s cast and crew coming from The Greatness of a Hero <盛世人傑>, King Maker also stars award-winning actors, Kent Cheng (鄭則士) and Wayne Lai (黎耀祥), as two powerful court officials vying for political power.
Kent reportedly turned down a mainland Chinese drama, which offered to pay him over $2 million RMB in total, in order to film King Maker.
Kent Cheng and Wayne Lai on their Characters
Kent said, “What made me decide to film this drama was Uncle Choi (producer Leung Choi Yuen 梁材遠). I am accustomed to working with him. When I heard that Wayne will also be in this drama, I became even more interested. It was my first time working with Wayne since he won TV King. Although I have collaborated with him four times before, this drama is the one where we have the most screen time together.
A battle between good and evil was featured in The Greatness of a Hero, in which Wayne portrayed Wu Zetian’s evil nephew, Wu Chengsi, who harbors intentions to claim the throne. However, his attempts are rebuffed by Wu Zetian’s loyal chancellor, Di Renjie, portrayed by Kent. However, in King Maker, the two areas are grayed, as both Kent and Wayne’s characters compete to have their favored prince to win the throne of China.
Wayne replied, “The good and evil in The Greatness of a Hero was very obvious; my character was obviously very evil. Our characters are more ambiguous this time around. It is difficult to point out who is a good person and who is not. We all have our own reasons to do what we do. There has never been a right or wrong when it comes to fighting for power.”
Kent joked that their characters are like legislative council members. “We all have our own positions! It’s hard to say who the bad guy is.”
Kent revealed that he spent a lot of time crafting out his “evil” role in King Maker, “An evil role does not necessarily mean a challenging role. Any role can be fun to portray; it just depends on how you see it. If you want to develop your own charisma, you cannot have your role control you. Once the role is in your hands, you should have your own ways to act it out.”
Pierre Ngo and Lai Lok Yi on Their Characters
Pierre Ngo (敖嘉年) and Lai Lok Yi (黎諾懿) portray two princes fighting for their father’s throne. Lai Lok Yi portrays the young and immature second prince Chiu Kwai Wo, who indirectly led to the imprisonment of his older half-brother Chiu Kwai Sing, portrayed by Pierre. Kwai Sing spent ten years as a hostage in the Jurchen Empire. When he was released back to the Song Empire, he lived in the streets as a beggar. The struggles he endured in the Jurchen Empire left a lasting effect on him – he could not walk or talk anymore, and behaved like an animal.
“It was really hard,” said Pierre. “I could not use dialogue to communicate with the other actors. I can only use my body language, so during those days, I observed a lot of cats and dogs, and learned their body movements.”
Pierre continued, “And then Wayne’s character would have to teach me how to walk and talk again. There was one touching scene where I began to recognize my mother (Kingdom Yuen 苑瓊丹), and called out to her. It was an emotional scene for all of us.”
Ecstatic to work with Wayne and Kent again, Pierre thanked his two seniors for looking after him during the long hours of filming King Maker. Lok Yi also praised the veteran actors, “Kent Gor is not only an actor, but also a good director and scriptwriter. He will teach us how to use different perspectives to view our roles. When Kent Gor’s character is not involved in our scenes, he will still stay in to watch us and give us pointers on our acting. He really spends a lot of time teaching us.”
Harsh Filming Experiences
Pierre recalled his gruesome filming experience, “We filmed those scenes in August, the hottest time of the year. I had to have my face smothered with mud. My sweat turned brown!”
Wayne said, “We filmed this during the hottest and coldest times of the year, and I almost fainted from a heat stroke several times! When it was cold, we had to do scenes where he fell in the water! That scene involved Jack Wu (胡諾言) and I running away from the palace guards – it was around 8 to 10 degrees at the time, and we had to swim! We also had to do a lot of hiking. I finally knows how it feels to be exiled!”
Source: TVB Weekly # 790
This article is written by Addy for JayneStars.com.
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“Kwai Sing spent ten years as a hostage in the Jurchen Empire. ”
WHAT?! NOOOO!! Poor 1st prince!!
My take on Kent is he is “infernal affairs” as he is Tony Leung, a spy in an evil setting. I can’t believe he will abandon 1st prince just like that. I think if 10 years has passed, it would mean he played teacher to 2nd prince so as to preserve the seat for 1st prince when he returns.
Yeah and ok, Lai Lok Yi improved a lot. But still a boring guy. No wonder Pierre got 1st prince role, not because he became emperor but because it is a whole lot harder.
I think Lai Lok Yi has worked hard in speaking his dialogues with less lazy tones. I haven’t watched this drama series yet, and I hope he had improved a lot in his pronunciation of words, and then acting as well.
I’ve watched the first episode. Lai Lok Yi improved his speech a lot. Then again, he speaks with a lisp, so I don’t think his lazy accent will ever leave him.
His acting also improved. It’s noticeable.
Yes improved a lot but still weakest amongst the ones in this series except for the ladies. Maybe this series will force upon him more improvement. So far I find his portrayal as somewhat rather the usual.
It is rather hard to stand out among those veteran artistes, such as Kent Cheng, Wayne Lai and even Pierre Ngo. I hope Lai Lok Yi had learned how to act better from those guys.
Lok Yi is boring as good guy but he got potential portraying a spoilt brat lol,. He managed to get my blood boiling watching his character LOL
I was a bit iffy with seeing Lai Lok Yi in this drama, but he did surprisingly well from what I’ve seen so far.
The casting in this drama is so much better than 3K RPG! But I find it hilarious that Elaine Yiu and Wayne are a couple in here. I’m guessing Elaine’s character will eventually die. Also, Natalie Tong and Patrick Tang’s characters still haven’t grown up yet. (from what I’ve seen so far)
Very plausible indeed and this is one of the more unpredictable in terms of who is “evil” 🙂
BUT Wayne doesn’t know so he blames our poor dude.
And they fight each other to the grand TVB ending, hehe.
Sometimes I cannot stop laughing at LKL aka “Yeung Chi-San” he is suppose to be evil but sometimes his expression, LOL
LKL is playing the “evil royal uncle” role again… maybe he was too influenced by his character from Virtues of Harmony 😛
I kept thinking Lau Bei actually. He is a versatile actor. He is one smirk away from evil or good.
LKL’s evil laugh “bwahahahaha” is priceless 😀
Since Tung Chiu became 2nd prince’s tutor for 10 years, I wonder if he succeeds in making 2nd prince into a better person.
@Kidd,
You make a good point there, Lok yee may turn good after 10 years with Kent being his tutor while the 1st prince will turn evil looking at how he got tortured etc betrayed by his brother and is prolly plotting revenge on his brother with the help of Wayne later.
Hopefully so but my suspicion is he mentors 2nd prince to hold onto the throne seat. BUT then if the stupid emperor died before our 1st prince comes back, most certainly 2nd prince is emperor. Frankly this series can go many ways, but my feeling is Tung Chiu is a good guy misunderstood.
or Tung Chiu turned into being real evil after 10 years, LOL
NO WAY!! NO WAYYYYYY!!!! This is infernal affairs! A mole in a mole’s mole?
Prolly not since TVB can handle complicated plots.
The crown prince has all the reason in the world to turn into a evil being. Could also work.
Veejay, I don’t think and I hope that is not the direction of this series. Since it is king maker I assume it is a well rounded series where
1. concubines fighting for their sons to be emperor
2. tutors and ministers fighting to get the one they support to be emperor
3. princes fighting one another to be emperor
The revenge part may or may not be true, turning evil probably not because I believe his suffering will show him braver and builds character which in the end wins him the throne.
I still stand by my prediction of Kent being Infernal Affairs to bring down that evil chancellor. I am disappointed Eric Li is back to his bad character performances although I hope he also changes for the better. If Wiki is to be believed, Pierre’s emperor refers to the one who was useless emperor. Of course series will show he makes glorious empire, etc unless he drops dead and Lai Lok Yee takes over as good emperor. Could happen.
But seriously, between pierre and lai lok yee, who is more famous? Then that person is the winning character.
@Funn,
Well i hope Pierre will be the good guy from beginning till end cuz I prefer Pierre over the wooden Lok Yi but with such a dramatic and good script, Lok Yi may changed into a guy good with Kent by his side while Wayne which already mentioned above that his character is supposed to be evil so I m thinking maybe Wayne will plot his way to help pierre to win back his throne by evil schemes etc ..I’m sure..but an easy plot which is easy detectable is boring hehe.. add a bit of twist and turn in will definitely appeal more audience to watch till the last episode.
Sorry meant to say I’m not sure not “im sure”
Wow, Ngo Ka Nin’s role is so challenging. Makes me more determine to continue watching just to see how he acted this part out.
Ngo Ka Nin is a pretty good actor, especially in his dialogues. He worked for radio stations some years ago. He speaks really well.
He speaks very clearly, diction is clear, like Kent Cheng and Ruco Chan and Kong Wah (miss him!). These actors are meant for those historical dramas because olden days people seems to speak clearer I suppose. But Kent also speaks very fast but I can hear him clearly.
I also like artistes speaking dialogues with good articulation. Unfortunately, there are fewer and fewer artistes these days speaking with good articulation.
By episode 3 I think you will see that challenge. Poor guy. But I was very irritated with his response but then it is the making of a prince so I suppose all these builds character. BUT 10 years?! So for most of the series he will be away from the main characters? Like how our Wayne can climb back up?
But everything like bullet train. And too dramatic sometimes with the ever shifting camera angle. But I am glad I did not do episodic thoughts for this. The dialogue itself will result in 10 pages of written notes. They all speak so much and so fast. Compared to 3 kingdoms which is kiddie’s book, this one is a 3 part trilogy novel.
Nope. 10 years will pass in the blink of an eye. I read episode 5 synopsis today. The end of episode 5 will be 10 years later.
WHAT? So like bullet train again? And then we have 20 episodes of 2 years period?!?!?
Seeing Ngo Ka Nin play a prince again reminds me of ‘Love is Beautiful’.
The achievement of the actors who played the 2 princes in LIB is so different. David To Tai Wai is still languishing in small roles while Ngo Ka Nin is already playing major supporting roles.
The 2 princes in LIB
http://www.lifetv.com.my/files/2010/02/18/Love%20is%20Beautiful%203b.JPG
http://i1.web.vip.hk1.tvb.com/tvcity.tvb.com/drama/love_is_beautiful/scene/img/ori/sences_15.jpg
Ka Nin still looks the same. Doesn’t age much.
Yeah, Ngo Ka Nin has not aged much over the years.
I am proud to say since that time I already zoomed into him.
I’ve liked Ngo Ka Nin since LIB too. 🙂
Has it been so many years? Wow.
What about the other guy? Where is he? I think I asked you this before. A bit of deja vu.
And he’s not pierre right? Better call him kanin.
@ Funn
The other actor, David To, is still with TVB, but, playing minor roles. Poor guy.
He was in Love is Beautiful? I do not remember since it has been awhile… Did he play a prince in there?
Yes. He played a prince in LIB. He only appear near the end. He played Marrianne’s biological son who was switched at birth with Anne’s son. So, he ended up being brought up by Anne and became a spoiled brat.
YES, reminds me of LIB too. Really good show actually, miss Marianne. I started to like Pierre since LIB so I actually think it took him a long time to rise in the ranks.
Poor Lai Lok Yi! He is not listed as one of the top characters in “King Maker”. Vivien Chen is listed as No. 10. I could not find Lai Lok Yi’s name in the Character Descriptions of “King Maker”.
is ths show good… wanna watch it during weeknd. am afraid it wll disappoint
This show is great so far. The acting is solid, especially by the veterans.
This is much better than Greatness of a Hero. Been waiting so long for TVB to show a quality ancient drama. It’s only been 5 episodes but I already enjoy the twists and turns and I’m really wondering how Wayne and Kent will turn on each other.
Haven’t had time to watch even 1 episode yet…catching up on so many dramas but school is coming up ):
On the other hand, I’m currently halfway through Bottled Passion and it is not bad. 🙂
Just finished Episode 10, I am hooked to the show. Wayne and Kent are not good or evil like the release says. They’re more like good guys doing what they think is right. While I know most traditionalist Chinese guys will sympathize with Kent, sacrificing your daughter to be abused by a brute for 10 years is wrong. However, he did it for the greater good of the country, in the tradition of ancient Chinese ministers. Wayne on the other hand believes in doing what is right like Yue Fei, no matter the political ramifications. He’s a purist and dangerous as a result.
If I were a TVB writer, I’d use the real historical ending of the Song Dynasty as the ending to this series. Wayne against the wishes of Kent allies Southern Song with Ghengis Kahn’s Mongol empire to defeat the Jin Dynasty invasion plot. However, the Mongols betray the Song Dynasty at the end and most of the cast dies.
Historically, that’s how the Southern Song Dynasty ended, they allied with the Mongols to defeat the Jin Dynasty, but then the Mongols betrayed them and conquered them forming the future Yuan Dynasty.
It would be a beautiful tragic story of Politics being chaotic and eternally changing, making patriots traitors and traitors patriots without a clear difference of good and evil.
However, knowing TVB, the writers don’t that kind of skill level anymore.
I like Pierre Ngo acting in this drama. I think he played it very well and believable. Don’t think Lai Lok Yi could pull it off if he was cast in the 1st Prince role. Pierre has improved a lot throughout the years. Really good acting!
only just started watching this – almost thought I’d tuned into “Greatness of a Hero”