Wong Jing Praises Kenneth Ma for His Versatility
Hong Kong director, Wong Jing (王晶) has been shifting his focus towards the mainland Chinese film market. Wong Jing is known for his eye in scouting talent and lately, he has been full of praises for TVB actor, Kenneth Ma (馬國明).
In radio interview today, Wong Jing said, “Kenneth Ma still has the potential to go further. I quite like him. His has the qualifications to be become a Tom Hanks, in the ability to portray diversified roles.”
This was not the first time Wong expressed his admiration of Kenneth as an actor. In August 2012, when Wong revealed that he will be producing drama Across Heaven and Earth <風雲天地> for TVB, he had wish to cast Kenneth in the lead role. Unfortunately, Kenneth could not film the drama due to schedule conflicts.
It is Kenneth’s sense of humor that caught Wong’s eye nine years ago. In an earlier interview, Wong said, “I like Kenneth Ma the most because he can do comedies. Many years back, he was in Scavenger’s Paradise <同撈同煲> with Roger Kwok (郭晉安). At that time, I already felt he was good. I’m good in judging people and I know if he can or cannot act.”
Grooming Successors
Starting his career as a scriptwriter in TVB in the 1970s before branching into film, Wong is happy to collaborate with TVB again. But he has no intention to join the television studio’s management team. Wong said, “If I wanted to join, I would have done so ten years ago.I have reached the final stage of my career. Television is after all my roots. I really want to spend the last ten years of my career to do something for them. Hopefully I can groom a group of successors, be it in front or behind the screen.”
In the 1990s, Wong Jing hit Hong Kong box office gold, producing multiple blockbusters in comedy, action, and even soft-porn genres. He notably developed the careers of popular film actresses such as Chingmy Yau (邱淑貞) and Sharla Cheung (張敏), who were known as “Jing Girls”. However, in recent productions, Wong has resorted to casting mainland Chinese actresses instead. Wong said, “There are lots of choices among mainland actresses. And they are all graduates of professional acting schools. Shandong women have particularly good physiques, like Gong Li (鞏俐), Brigitte Lin (林青霞) and Joey Wong (王祖賢) . And so is Kimmy Tong (童菲). There are now few choices among Hong Kong-born actresses.”
Internet TV Will Not Work
In July 2014, Hong Kong audiences will be given more choice in television programming options through HKTV’s Internet broadcast launch. However, Wong believes that HKTV stands little chance against TVB, which has an established history and market share. Wong said, “A young knife has nothing against a machine gun. That’s tough! I dare not say that the knife will not be able to beat the gun.” Wong added that few people would continue to look at their phones after they get home but would prefer to watch television from a bigger screen instead.
This article is written by Karen for JayneStars.com.
I thought he got progressively worse and here an experienced producer says he is great.
honestly, i also felt so … his acting in earlier dramas seems better
I disagree w Wong. its been yrs since myself n my husband turned on a tv. we watch all r shows n movies online.
Wong Jing has never heard of Netflix or Hulu.
I believe Hulu and Netflix are restricted to certain geographical areas only. And is subscription based?
Netflix is available in every market except Asia. You can probably guess why.
Hulu is available only in the States. They are both subscription based (you can pay monthly and cancel whenever), but you can easily set up your own VPN to get around those restrictions.
Tom Hanks??? lol
“Wong added that few people would continue to look at their phones after they get home but would prefer to watch television from a bigger screen instead.”
I agree with him. Like how naysayers say PC will die because of the emergence of tablets. No it won’t. Many still prefer TVs. Yes there are many who watched internet TV so to speak but mostly are those who download torrents, etc which is illegal. Blu ray still makes good business. There will be intergration with internet and TV as in big TV watching sayyy Hulu etc. In fact lots of people watch online because there isn’t much option on TV. If the same series is HD in internet and HD on TV, I am sure viewers will switch to TV. HKTV won’t win the war against TV giant like TVB but hopefully will give some competition. A healthy competition is good.
You do realize OTT programming are available in set-top boxes and on Smart TVs? Lots of people have devices such as tablets, android usbs and video game systems where you can watch OTT programming. It literally takes a minute to install apps to watch OTT programming. Cable/satellite providers like Bell in Canada have switched their delivery model to IPTV as well.
The content will still be available on the same hardware you’re used to, it’s just that the delivery is different.
” If the same series is HD in internet and HD on TV, I am sure viewers will switch to TV.”
If people are watching with the older versions of TV or have an outdated digital cable box, there is ultimately no “HD”. And HD channels aren’t free (at least not with some providers). And there isn’t much difference except that the quality is very high or the programme channels is a bit different.
HKTV may stir up competition (which is good), but it won’t ever replace TVB.
I disagree… and Wong is lost in the past. The fact he thinks people are streaming only to their phones/ipads indicates that.
I haven’t paid for cable or Satellite TV in over two years now. 90% of what I watch is streamed over the internet.
My TV is internet ready as many new TVs are. It connects directly to the web and I can run apps from it. I subscribe to Netflix, and I watch it for about half my TV needs. The other half of my TV needs comes from streaming DramaFever from my iPad to my AppleTV device to my large TV. All in HD.
Television companies are slow to adapt. I know for a fact that many of them DON’T want to adapt. Those that also have internet arms (like Comcast, Bell Canada, Rogers) prefer to bill their customers separately for Internet AND for Television because there is more return to do that – but the day is coming where they will offer both TV and internet in the same package in order to keep your TV dollars.
Rogers is already buying up content rights in Canada in the hopes of launching online competition against Netflix. And Bell has started to bundle their TV/Fibre internet offering. The problem for me is that they are STILL charging way to much for the services.
Between Netflix and DramaFever I spend $14 a month and have all the dramas and movies I could possibly want to watch. A lot better than the $130 a month I used to spend with Bell to receive 200+ channels, of which, I only ever really watched 4 or 5 regularly.
Do you want to know how HKTV can win? They can win by making their service available world wide and keeping the price low. If it was $7.99 a month and I could subscribe to it I would do it immediately.
“Those that also have internet arms (like Comcast, Bell Canada, Rogers) prefer to bill their customers separately for Internet AND for Television because there is more return to do that – but the day is coming where they will offer both TV and internet in the same package in order to keep your TV dollars.”
Do you want to know how HKTV can win? They can win by making their service available world wide and keeping the price low. If it was $7.99 a month and I could subscribe to it I would do it immediately.
^
http://www.shaw.ca/bundles/ , http://www.rogers.com/web/content/bundles-landing , https://www.telus.com/order/service .
Rogers, Shaw, Telus are doing that already, bundling both TV, phone and internet into one package. The thing with HKTV is that there’s a lot of uncertainty of how their programming will work since you have to buy this little adapter first but not all of its programs is free. So is it a monthly fee? No one knows, until it’s July 2014. 🙂
Bundles are different… I have a “Bell” bundle as well for internet, phone, and mobile. What I’m talking about is a single bill for internet and TV.
So instead of $75 for internet and $120 for TV where you bundle them and save $5 each.. you pay $99 and get BOTH internet and TV showing as one thing on your bill.
Bell is currently looked at billing something like this for their internet/fibre TV…
“HKTV…have to buy this little adapter first but not all of its programs is free”
I definitely would “not” get the adapter right off the bat. I would try free with ads first.
DramaFever doesn’t have Chinese subtitles? And, $7.99/month (same as Netflix) for HKTV is waaaay too high since database is much smaller than Netflix.
$7.99 a month would be worth it if it was 720p with zero lag and commercials…but it’s definitely not going to be like that when they start up the station.
So instead of $75 for internet and $120 for TV where you bundle them and save $5 each.. you pay $99 and get BOTH internet and TV showing as one thing on your bill.
^ Maybe you prefer seeing the bill as one thing for both Internet and TV, but there are people who like to know the exact details (like exactly how much I am paying for phone, internet and tv) and whatnot. It is a premade bundle, except they are showing you the details of your bundle and the exact costs, not necessarily a bad thing.. 😐
I definitely would “not” get the adapter right off the bat. I would try free with ads first.
^ Uh, don’t you need to buy the adapter in order to watch it?
source: http://hk.apple.nextmedia.com/news/art/20140111/18587968, image of the adapter: http://hk.apple.nextmedia.com/news/art/20140111/18587968
And in today’s SingTao entertainment news, it mentioned that since January, TVB’s newest pay-to-use service (GOTV) already has ten thousand viewers/subscribers. If TVB is charging $71 CAD ($499 HKD,) per year or $8 CAD (59 HKD) on GOTV (where you can see unlimited recent and old dramas and all of their previous dramas), then HKTV will need to charge less than that.
Bubblez… you almost have it 🙂 You keep seeing them as TWO separate items, I’m talking about them become ONE item.
So buying “Internet” will bring you both the internet and TV. There is no separation.
I have friends in high places with one of the providers in Canada, and I can tell you that they are thinking of moving that way because they think that is the way the market will go. TV revenue is down, and more and more people are leaving Satellite and Cable services and moving to internet. So to “protect” their TV business they’ll just package internet/TV together at one thing – ‘Entertainment’.
They don’t WANT to do it, because they can charge the consumer MORE when they are separate, but they feel they have to in order to fight the Netflix/Hulus of the world.
Their belief is that if they force TV as part of the internet package you buy, you will drop the Netflix/Hulu packages because you are already receiving TV with your internet “for free”.
MW – DramaFever not having Chinese subtitles for me is ok, as I don’t understand 😛
And I just noticed the comment about HKTV requiring a set top box? I guess that’s because there aren’t a lot of SmartTVs in HK/China? I think as long as they can also produce an App for SmartTVs or for Apple IOS/AppleTV then they are good to go. Restricting to that box is not wise 🙁
Ohhhh okay..
Maybe this will happen in the near future but as long as the different theme packs/addons for TV exist.. it would be hard to implement this. :S
“And I just noticed the comment about HKTV requiring a set top box? I guess that’s because there aren’t a lot of SmartTVs in HK/China? I think as long as they can also produce an App for SmartTVs or for Apple IOS/AppleTV then they are good to go. Restricting to that box is not wise :(”
^ HKTV said they needed the adapter to secure the internet connection bu the price varies for the types of adapters.
I think the source below is more clear on what to expect (:
http://www.techorz.com/miscellaneous/hktv-ott-cmmb/
“Their belief is that if they force TV as part of the internet package you buy, you will drop the Netflix/Hulu packages because you are already receiving TV with your internet “for free”.”
And, as soon as they bundle internet/TV, new ISPs will spring up to provide internet only because there will be a demand for it so that people can mix and match. haha 🙂
“DramaFever not having Chinese subtitles”
Immediate turn-off for me right there, especially if I have to pay.
Here’s another source: http://unwire.hk/2013/12/20/hktv-online/top-news/ 🙂
“如果以網絡型式的話就最簡單了，手機、平板上安裝個 APP 便可以了；個人電腦的話，登入專用的網址便可。想要有穩定的連接的話，可以選用 CMMB 形式接收。各位可以買一些 USB CMMB 手指/ 電視盒 連接電腦／電視便可； iOS/Anroid 手機平板亦有相應的配件加裝，車主可以加裝 CMMB TV 便可”
So it’s an App but if you want to secure the internet (Wifi) connection (i’m guessing), you want to purchase the adapter. So it’s like streaming.. hence there would be a lag depending on one’s internet connection. And it says that it targets both domestic and oversea markets.
“HKTV said they needed the adapter to secure the internet connection bu the price varies for the types of adapters.”
Immediate turn-off right there if I have to install any adapter or install any app in order to watch HKTV dramas. Again, free dramas with ads is okay.
“nstall any app in order to watch HKTV dramas. Again, free dramas with ads is okay.”
“如果以網絡型式的話就最簡單了，手機、平板上安裝個 APP 便可以了；個人電腦的話，登入專用的網址便可。想要有穩定的連接的話，可以選用 CMMB 形式接收。各位可以買一些 USB CMMB 手指/ 電視盒 連接電腦／電視便可； iOS/Anroid 手機平板亦有相應的配件加裝，車主可以加裝 CMMB TV 便可”
The adapter is only needed if you want to have zero lag, a stronger Internet connection
“The adapter is only needed if you want to have zero lag, a stronger Internet connection”
Thanks for clarifying that the adapter is optional. In that case, I look forward to trying HKTV for “free” later this year.
Your welcome (:
That’s only if they go according to their plan.
MW said
“And, as soon as they bundle internet/TV, new ISPs will spring up to provide internet only because there will be a demand for it so that people can mix and match. haha ”
The problem with that is that Rogers owns pretty much the entire cable network in Canada, and Bell owns all the telephone infrastructure. So those new ISPs need to “buy” their bandwidth from Bell/Rogers. There have already been court cases where Rogers was rate limiting some ISPs and especially peer-to-peer traffic from “independent” ISPs… Somehow, the big two (in Canada at least) will always get their money 😛
Well, looks like monopolies may need to be divided again. haha 🙂
Bell owns all the telephone infrastructure
^ Isn’t it Telus? At least, it’s Telus in BC. 😐
Bell owns about 40-45% and is East Coast while Telus dominates the West Coast and has about 20-25% of all telecom.
Rogers took it a step further then other ISPs by throttling ALL encrypted data transfers and not just targeting P2P. This was noticed by someone who played World of Warcraft and the CRTC gave them a deadline to stop it after years of lying to their customers.
I’d recommend you go with an indie if you have one in your area. I went with Teksavvy cable who buys their bandwidth from Rogers after we won the UBB fight against the Big Three trying to sell Data Usage and Bandwidth as one and bits as a limited commodity.
Basically paying less money for roughly the same speed and got an upgrade from 60GB to 300GB (If you go over it can roll over next month’s quota as long as you don’t pass you don’t pay extra).
Don’t even need a TV subscription, grab everything off the Interweb.
It’s actually all the new stuff like tablets, consoles, phones, etc. that are becoming more like a PC then the other way around. Nothing compares to what you can do on a custom built rig for a couple hundred bucks.
Your TV screen nowadays is basically a big monitor for your PC for those who can setup a HTPC and whoever said that the delivery is different has the right idea. As the older generation dies off the newer one won’t need the older methods of watching television.
Your Internet connection will be your TV, your phone, your gaming machines all in one instead of having it all split off into a landline/data plan, cable, fiber, etc.
my tv is my monitor. I watch online shows more than I watch tv. some more I don’t have astro at home.
Who is he kidding?! Does he not realize how popular KPOP DRAMAS are online? Does he not realize how many Americans stream their shows? Ya sure Asia is restricted especially when it comes to creative content, however it is wrong to generalize that a lot of people still turn to their TV’S . Technology is advancing. I’m sorry but judging from his words, he sounds like the type that refuses to advance and accept revolutionizing.
Agreed! I love DramaFever! Over the past year I’ve watched more K-Dramas than TVB dramas… and from what I’ve watched, they are better written as well 😛
I personally think when it comes to Korean dramas, no body can beat them when it comes to the story, romance, passion etc… I usually find tvb story to be off story sometimes.
I also only watch shows on my computer now. I rarely watch tv except for the occasional sporting event. It’s so easy to connect your computer to your tv that I feel like I’m watching tv anyways.
I only subscribe to Crunchyroll but I also like going to DramaFever and Hulu. You don’t have to subscribe to these sites as long as you’re okay with watching commercials. I think HKTV can get some nice exposure if they can strike a deal with either Crunchyroll or DramaFever to stream their dramas.
Kpop dramas. Lol.
Tom Hanks? Lol this guy is hilarious, I don’t think Kenneth is versatile at all, comedy roles are his worst ones the dude is not even funny and overdoes it. His recent performances is getting worse and worse, I’m not hating on him but he just have no charisma when he’s on screen he always look so bored and out of it.
Agree
i always associate WJ with crass comedies. For him to be praising someone for his acting ability and versatility is a big joke! KM is not even a good actor let alone versatile.
@rofl are you talking about raymond lam instead of kenneth ma? 😛
KM
sorry…never find Kenneth Ma good acting!
thank you wong jing! ma ming must be happy to get praised by an experienced movie producer who has made some of todays a list movie stars into stardom! which surely hold much more value than some random old actors who probably never do casting in his entire life!
Everyone knows Wong Jing is a Category 3 film producer, for him to see potential in Kenneth is not really a good sign….unless you’re into those kind of sexually explicit scenes then go for it. Look at half of the movies he produced in his recent movies, a majority of them can’t act and they’re just there to do those sex scenes, besides I honestly don’t see Kenneth having that talent at all he looks super uncomfortable when he films those intimate scenes that it’s just hilarious.
from vegas to macau cat3? wrong! wong jing also made some good movies and made some movie stars got their breakthrough! are you a casting director? if not then wong jing has thiusand times more credibility than you! and mind you it’s because of his talent that kenneth reaches breakthrough in on call and finally promoted to lead actor and even make a great couple with the mature charmaine sheh!
The last good movie Wong Jing made was over 10 years ago, I’m no casting actor but a viewer you can tell if someone possess that quality to make him a versatile actor and Kenneth is just not one of them. He was decent in On Call but it wasn’t great, the only reason people loved him in that series was his character and if another actor played his character the result would of been the same. Are you speaking of that new romance series he’s in with Charmaine? In case you haven’t heard, audiences weren’t generally happy with his performance, once again proves that he’s not versatile at all.
Kenneth Ma sucks. Best young (if u can call them young) actors in tvb right now are ruco chan and bosco wong
Thumbs up for Ruco and Bosco (but i prefer Ruco heehee)
He is too old to be a movie star
At 40, Tom Hanks was already an established star for at least a decade.
At 40, Kenneth Ma is still “developing” and lives with his mother. LOL!!
Comparable???
Disagree with Mr. Wong…i am not a fans of HKTV…i just a fair audience…I watch a lot of movie and tvb drama on line…in my pc…even TV can connect to website to see it if you prefer seeing in big screen…