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Whenever my name, Anthony Wong, is mentioned, people immediately start yelling and swearing.
A biographical video on Hong Kong actor Anthony Wong: his mixed-race childhood, abandonment by his British father, and how he came to be labeled a 'Hong Kong separatist' by mainland China after 2014.
Key Takeaways
- Anthony Wong's personal history of abandonment and identity struggles shaped his public persona.
- Mainland China's blacklisting of Wong is presented as escalating from his 2014 Occupy-era actions to his 2019 protest support.
- The 'Hong Kong separatist' label is contested: Wong has repeatedly denied independence advocacy.
- The video illustrates how entertainment industry politics and online backlash can end a performer's mainland career.
What the video covers
- Anthony Wong, born 1961 in Hong Kong to a British father (Frederick William Perry) and a Cantonese opera singer mother, grew up in poverty and abandonment.
- His father left Hong Kong for Australia when Wong was about four and later refused to pay for a collect call from his mother when Wong was 12.
- Wong faced discrimination as a mixed-race child, was nicknamed 'foreign ghost,' and was sent to troubled-youth schools before finding support from a teacher.
- He rose to become a celebrated Hong Kong actor and won multiple Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor awards.
- In 2014, during the Occupy movement, he sheltered students and criticized police; the video says he never explicitly supported Hong Kong independence.
- Director Wong Jing publicly attacked him in October 2014, after which mainland productions reportedly removed or replaced him and his name became associated with the 'Hong Kong separatist' label.
- Wong responded on Facebook with 'Absurd Accusation,' questioning when he had become a 'foreign force.'
- In a 2018 BBC Chinese interview he said his intention was not to support the protest movement and that he was not a pro-independence figure.
- At the 2018 Hong Kong Film Awards he introduced himself with his Chinese name, which the video presents as a provocative gesture.
- During the 2019 anti-extradition movement, his public support for protesters further deepened his blacklisting on the mainland; the video frames this as part of a broader pattern of celebrities being punished for political stances.
Chapters
- 00:00Introduction: Why Anthony Wong Was Blacklisted
- 02:17Early Life and Mixed-Race Origins
- 05:33Father's Abandonment and Mother's Hardship
- 08:03Childhood Discrimination and Troubled Youth Schools
- 16:01The 2014 Occupy Movement and Wong Jing's Attack
- 30:00Wong's Response and the 'Foreign Force' Controversy
- 40:04The 2018 BBC Interview and Hong Kong Film Awards
- 51:40The 2019 Anti-Extradition Movement and Lasting Blacklist
Full Transcript — Download SRT & Markdown
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Why was Anthony Wong blacklisted by China?
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Is he really a Hong Kong separatist?
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Wong posted on Facebook: "Time to say goodbye to the Hong Kong stage."
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Many friends are familiar with Wong in Hong Kong.
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However, this face has disappeared from mainland China for 12 years.
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Since 2014, a fixed label has been attached to his name: "Hong Kong separatist."
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This is where it gets strange.
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A man cursed as a traitor and called a separatist actually read "Red Flag" magazines when he was young.
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He risked never returning by going to the Diaoyu Islands to participate in protests.
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In 2018, he said to the BBC cameras: "I am actually more Chinese than the Chinese."
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How did someone who claims to be more Chinese than the Chinese become a so-called separatist?
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What exactly did he say or do that made Beijing feel compelled to drive him out?
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Today, let's tell the story of Anthony Wong.
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When talking about mixed-race people in Hong Kong, many people have a specific impression in mind.
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Wealthy and good-looking, with fluent English.
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Anthony Wong's childhood was the exact opposite.
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On September 2, 1961, he was born at the Ruttonjee Hospital in Hong Kong.
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His birth name was Anthony Perry.
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An English name.
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His father was Frederick William Perry, a British man.
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Born in 1914, he served in the British Royal Air Force.
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He came to Hong Kong in 1955 to work as a director at the colonial government's supplies department.
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Note the timing: when Perry arrived in Hong Kong in 1955, he brought his wife, a daughter, and twin sons with him.
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A few years later, his family returned to Britain, while he stayed in Hong Kong alone.
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Wong's mother was another woman he met in Hong Kong, named Wong.
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She was from Taishan, Guangdong.
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In her youth, she studied Cantonese opera under master Lam Fei-lung.
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She sang at a restaurant for a living; that was where they met during those years.
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No one can say for sure how they met.
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When Anthony Wong grew up and asked his mother, he only got some blurry fragments and a few old photos.
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A Chinese woman singing in a restaurant.
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A British official in the colonial government, and an extramarital affair.
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This relationship had no future from the start.
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When Anthony Wong was born in 1961, his father gave him an English name but never gave him a home.
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His mother actually lived a very hard life during those years.
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Shortly after Wong was born, his mother noticed that Perry was acting strange and worried he would abandon them.
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Her emotions became increasingly unstable.
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Not long after, his mother suffered another severe economic blow.
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She had invested the money Perry gave them into a private mutual aid fund, but the organizer ran away, and all the money was gone.
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Anthony Wong was only a few months old at the time.
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His mother mistook laundry detergent for milk powder and fed him a mix of it.
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After drinking it, Anthony's mouth turned white and he couldn't stop crying.
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His mother finally came to her senses, rushed him to the hospital, and years later, Anthony said he suspected his mother had wanted them both to die that day.
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It was only when she saw his horrific state that she couldn't bear it, snapped out of it, and ultimately saved his life.
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Anthony Wong doesn't have many memories of his father, but there is one scene he has remembered his entire life.
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Once, his father took him to a hotel in Central for dinner and ordered a plate of beef chow fun; when it arrived, it was cold.
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His father asked the waiter to take it back, but when it was returned, it was still cold.
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With a sweep of his hand, his father knocked the entire plate onto the floor.
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The waiter knelt on the ground, bowing while cleaning it up, repeating, "Sorry sir, sorry sir."
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Many years later, when Anthony Wong told BBC reporters about this, he said he was very young at the time, and his first feeling was being frightened by his father.
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His second feeling was that it didn't have to be like that.
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That situation was truly pathetic.
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The image from back then was truly vivid.
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When Anthony was four, Perry took his British family to Australia and never returned.
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His mother named him Anthony Wong, incorporating her own surname and the fact that he was born in the autumn; later, her voice gave out and she couldn't sing, so she worked as a live-in maid for wealthy families.
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She would wake up at 3:00 AM and work until midnight.
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After only a week, both of her feet were swollen.
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The final contact between father and son occurred when Anthony was 12.
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That year, he needed to have surgery on his eyes.
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His mother, desperate, made a long-distance call to Australia, hoping the boy's father would help; long-distance calls were very expensive back then and ordinary families couldn't afford them.
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The phone company had a method called "collect call."
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You would place the call first.
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The operator would ask the person answering if they were willing to pay for the call.
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Only if they agreed would the connection be made.
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This was the type of call Anthony's mother made.
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However, Perry refused to pay; he insisted the Hong Kong side pay for it themselves, and from then on, Anthony Wong never had news of his father again.
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From that point on, throughout his upbringing, that feeling of being abandoned never went away.
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Later, his mother remarried.
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Logically, this should have been a good thing, as the child finally had a home.
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But the household was crowded and complex, and he could never truly fit in.
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His mood worsened and his temper grew; with no other choice, his mother sent him to a technical school.
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At the technical school, he encountered another problem: his appearance.
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In Hong Kong at that time, those of mixed-race descent often faced two kinds of discrimination.
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The British looked down on him for having a Chinese mother, and the Chinese shunned him for having a foreigner's face.
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How deep did this discrimination go?
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In 19th-century Hong Kong, when mixed-race people died, neither British cemeteries nor Chinese burial grounds would accept them.
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It wasn't until 1897 that Robert Hotung, who was also of mixed heritage, paid to build a cemetery himself.
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Only then did Hong Kong's mixed-race population finally have a place to be laid to rest.
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If a wealthy and influential man like Hotung faced such treatment, one can only imagine what a mixed-race child would encounter.
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In school, his classmates gave him a nickname, "foreign ghost."
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Today, these words might seem harmless, but back then, hearing them made him want to fight.
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He later described his own childhood like this: "Foreigners wouldn't play with me, and the Chinese called me a ghost.
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Looking so strange, I didn't know which side I belonged to."
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Talking about his appearance back then, he said, "If you looked weird, people would only bully you even more."
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How did a child with no place on either side manage to get through it?
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Many of us were scolded as "bad kids" by adults when we were young, but that was usually the end of it.
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We went to school the next day just the same.
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Anthony Wong was different; he was truly treated as a bad child and sent to a school for troubled youth.
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He attended so many elementary schools that he couldn't even count them.
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One after another, not a single one could keep him.
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Several schools simply branded him a problem child and rejected him, so by the time he was 12, he had fallen behind and was still in the third grade.
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Finally, the Education Department arranged for him to enter the St. Jude's Center School.
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He was later transferred to the Tseung Kwan O Center School.
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Schools like these are known in Hong Kong as "cluster schools."
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They only accept children with behavioral issues who cannot be managed by regular schools.
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To put it bluntly, it was halfway to a reformatory.
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But it was at this school that he first met a teacher willing to give him a helping hand.
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Encouraged by his teachers, he passed his exams and entered a middle school.
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In middle school, he entered a singing competition
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acting roles in the mainland, was working hard to learn Mandarin, took photos with the Chief Executive, and even joined a government-funded arts institution. From 1997 to 2013, he had been constantly adapting to the new rules. At first, he showed no signs of
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wanting to go against Beijing; no one expected that at the peak of his career stability, he was only a year away from being blacklisted. The term "cutting ties" is rarely used by Chinese people nowadays. However, if a celebrity gets
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into trouble and their partners immediately issue a statement to draw a clear line, people will call it " cutting ties." For many mainland audiences, the first time they heard this term was in the autumn of 2014, when it happened to Anthony Wong. In
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2014, Hong Kong spent a whole year arguing over how to hold the Chief Executive election. On August 31st, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress set the framework for the Chief Executive's universal suffrage. Candidates had to first
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receive majority approval from a nominating committee before they could run. Many Hong Kong people felt this was not the universal suffrage they wanted. They wanted candidates to be directly nominated by citizens, without needing to go through a nominating
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committee first. In their view, the 8/31 framework was equivalent to screening people before the public could vote. In the end, wouldn't the people they could vote for still be within a range selected by Beijing?
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Back in June of that year, before this incident, Anthony Wong and Hins Cheung, among others, sang a song together called "Ask Who Has Not Appeared." The song was adapted from "Do You Hear the People Sing?" in the musical Les
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Misérables; coincidentally, this song was later adopted by many as the theme song of the Occupy Central movement. On September 28th, the Occupy Central movement officially broke out. The police fired tear gas at the crowds gathered in the Admiralty area. Later,
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this movement occupied the city center of Hong Kong for 79 days. At that time, Anthony Wong was in Shanghai filming a TV series. He spoke out on Facebook to sympathize with students and criticize the Hong Kong government and police for
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using tear gas against citizens. At the time, he was also the chairman of the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts Alumni Association, so he used that status to call on the school to open its campus during the emergency to let
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students in for shelter. Note that the things he did were sympathizing with students and criticizing the police; he never said a word in support of Hong Kong independence. But it seems that was already enough. On October 16th, Hong Kong director Wong Jing posted a
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message on Sina Weibo, naming three people. It went like this: Mr. Anthony Wong, Mr. Chapman To, Ms. Denise Ho, we have had very pleasant collaborations, and I respect your right to have personal political views, but I absolutely do not agree with them. To
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avoid awkwardness, your contact information will be deleted from my phone and computer. Wong Jing is one of the three most profitable directors in Hong Kong and one of the first to head north and earn the most in the mainland
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. He has collaborated many times with Anthony Wong, but the two had significant conflicts before 2014. In 1998, Golden Harvest produced the film The Storm Riders. It was directed by Andrew Lau. Manfred Wong was the screenwriter and producer. Best Picture
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Show was one of the production companies for this film. This company was co-founded by Andrew Lau, Manfred Wong, and Wong Jing in 1995. Anthony Wong had a role in the film, but he had developed a thyroid condition those
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years and had to take steroids, causing him to gain a lot of weight and suffer from facial swelling. His career was also at a low point. Wong Jing thought his face was too swollen and told the crew not to use him. It was Andrew Lau
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who insisted on keeping him. Around that time, Anthony Wong attended a film premiere and ran into Wong Jing. He went up to say hello and politely asked if there was any work to make money, using the slang "got any work to fish
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for?""Fishing" means looking for work to earn money. Wong Jing replied to him in front of a crowd with two words: "Go fish." This meant "go fish for trash." Anthony Wong smiled and walked away at the time. But he said he would remember
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those two words forever. After this, they seemingly collaborated on films like Colour of the Truth, Eight Heroes, Fox Volant of the Snowy Mountain, Slim Till Dead, and I Corrupt All Cops; they were all Wong Jing's productions, and Anthony Wong accepted the roles. The
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Hong Kong film circle is very small; actors need to eat, directors need talent, and they share mutual acquaintances and even friends. But it was an open secret that the two had a poor relationship. During the Occupy Central movement, Wong Jing targeted
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Anthony Wong again, publicly deleting his contact info. In the eyes of mainland production companies, this Weibo post meant this person was blacklisted. Anthony Wong simply replied by wishing Wong Jing a safe journey. What were the other two people
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named by Wong Jing doing at the time? Chapman To had already broken out in a war of words with mainland netizens that March for supporting Taiwan's Sunflower Movement. As a result, his starring film Let Go for Love was
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boycotted in the mainland and bombed at the box office. After the Occupy Central movement broke out, he declared on Facebook that from today on, anyone against the movement, regardless of their reasons, would no longer be his friend. Wong Jing's post cutting ties
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was published the day after Chapman To's statement. Denise Ho also supported the movement, and her level of support was far greater than the previous two. He didn't just voice his support online; he personally visited the protest site, and on October 10th,
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he co-founded the "Arts and Cultural Sector Monitoring Group" with singer Anthony Wong and other cultural figures . To support the peaceful protesters fighting for universal suffrage. To demand an end to the violence against them. He was also one of the conveners
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of this group. Six days after Chapman To posted on Weibo, on October 22nd, Xinhua News Agency published a signed commentary titled, "Don't Even Think About Eating Our Rice While Smashing Our Pot." It singled out Chapman To, Anthony Wong, and Denise Ho, accusing
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them of openly supporting Occupy Central, claiming they were taking vast sums of money while biting the hand that feeds them. The article further claimed that nearly 100,000 netizens had voted in a single day to boycott these artists and block their
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performances from airing in mainland China. In that same article, Xinhua explicitly highlighted a positive role model: Jackie Chan. The article quoted Jackie Chan saying, "There is no strong country without a wealthy one." Around the same time, the Communist Youth
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League's official Weibo launched an online poll listing Anthony Wong, Chapman To, and Denise Ho, labeling them as supporters of the illegal Occupy movement and asking netizens to vote. An official party media outlet and a party youth organization took
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action one after another within a short span. Anyone who has worked within the mainland system understands that at this point, it is no longer just the personal opinion of a director. The real blow soon fell on Anthony Wong's
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career. The film starring Wong, "The Woman Knight of Mirror Lake," was scheduled for release on November 7th.
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A day before, cinemas posted notices stating they would not show the film because Wong was a supporter of the Occupy movement, claiming they were following the call of theater chains to maintain stability and prevent foreign interference. Additionally, on the
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mainland version of the movie poster, Wong’s image had been replaced by Charlene Choi. Wong wrote a response on Facebook with a four-word title: " Absurd Accusation." He rhetorically asked when he had become a "foreign force." A man who risked never
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returning by traveling to the Diaoyu Islands was suddenly labeled by a Beijing cinema as an accomplice to foreign forces. A few days later, the People's Daily online opinion channel published another commentary. Titled, " Anthony Wong Calls Others Stupid, Might
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as Well Act Like Pigsy," the trouble for Anthony Wong was far from over. A year later, he told Hong Kong media that he hadn't had a single film role to shoot all year, resulting in zero income. Even some people he used to be
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close with no longer dared to contact him. Along with the singers and entertainers named with him, as well as Anthony Wong who also took a public stance during the Occupy movement, these individuals all faced various forms of bans in mainland China.
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Furthermore, the accusations kept escalating. At first, Anthony Wong was criticized for supporting the Occupy movement, but soon, rumors spread online claiming he had called mainlanders "locusts" and provoked mainland fans. Whether he actually said these words or not, there was either no
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evidence provided, or it was taken out of context. Yet, as the rumors spread, he went from being an "Occupy artist" to a "Hong Kong independence artist." Wong himself came out to explain that what he originally wrote was a question
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, asking if the Hong Kong Equal Opportunities Commission was officially labeling mainlanders as "locusts." In the end, someone removed the question mark, turning it into him calling mainlanders "locusts." By the last day of 2014, December 31st, Wong finally
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couldn't take it anymore and posted a statement on Weibo. "I am not a supporter of Hong Kong independence, I have never supported any Hong Kong independence movement, nor have I ever made any pro-independence remarks." He even added a curse word, calling
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independence activists idiots. The absurdity lies in this: from waving the red flag as a teenager to risking his career, Wong spent half his life identifying as Chinese. A year ago, Hong Kong netizens even called him a " pro-Beijing" artist, saying he was too
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close to Beijing. After one movement, just because of a few words, his career in mainland China, built over a decade, was reduced to zero overnight, and he was branded a "Hong Kong independence" supporter. Is Anthony Wong being wronged? All he really did was say a
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few things online, sympathizing with students and criticizing police brutality. Moreover, saying these things was not necessarily extreme; it is completely different from someone like Denise Ho, and has nothing to do with Hong Kong independence. The problem is that from Beijing's
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perspective, whether it is relevant or not does not matter. A celebrity's influence is too great; a single comment they make online could be shared by hundreds of thousands.
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Beijing wanted to make an example of someone, and Anthony Wong just happened to be the chicken picked for the slaughter. More importantly, in the eyes of the authorities, sympathizing with students or criticizing the police are effectively the same thing. It is
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seen as opposing Beijing's control over Hong Kong. But if this were to be discussed openly in the mainland—why Anthony Wong supported the Occupy movement and what the students were actually fighting for—it would be impossible to avoid the topic of
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universal suffrage and one-person-one-vote, which is exactly what Beijing does not want the public to ponder. Therefore, the easiest way is to follow the netizens 'lead and slap the "Hong Kong independence" label on you. The two words "Hong Kong
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independence" are understood by the common people the moment they hear them , and they are hated just as quickly; no one bothers to ask any further. This situation has a lot to do with Wong Jing. If it weren't for Wong Jing
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naming names, Anthony Wong might not have been pushed into the eye of the storm. So why did Wong Jing single out these three people? That November, he gave an interview to a magazine. He said these people had reached an
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extreme point and would lead many young people to make irrational decisions. The reporter asked him who was behind the Occupy movement. He said it was basically the Americans playing tricks behind the scenes. Everyone knows the reporter finally asked him, "If this
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lasts another year or two, will you still maintain this stance?" Wong Jing said, "I'll always persist; I have nothing left to lose." These were honest words. Wong Jing lost nothing, but Anthony Wong, who was named by him, was effectively blacklisted from then
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on. When the movement just began in late October, Anthony Wong wrote something on Facebook. "If I have to sell my dignity for a meal, I'm sorry, that dinner is too expensive. I can't afford it, and my family can't afford
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it.""We are not beggars; we are a group of artists with conscience." From then on, Anthony Wong started growing his hair long. He declared that as long as Wong Jing was alive, he wouldn't cut his hair. Not cutting his hair as long
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as Wong Jing is alive—that was obviously a figure of speech; it wasn't realistic. In June 2017, Anthony Wong was going to Taiwan to promote the film "The Sleep Curse." Before departing, he cut the long hair he had grown for
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three years and told a Taiwanese magazine that he suddenly realized this person was not important to him at all.
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"Not important" was just talk, though. From then on, the two were locked in a constant public war of words. Anthony Wong openly cursed Wong Jing, referring to him as "Old Wong Jing." He said his skin was thicker than the Earth's crust
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. Wong Jing retorted that Anthony Wong was a two-faced hypocrite whose career was ruined by his own mouth, adding, " If there are two beggars cursing you on the street, would you argue with them?" He also claimed Anthony Wong had hated
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him since 1999 but still made over ten million off him, calling him spineless. Of course, the war of words with Wong Jing was actually a minor issue. The real trouble came from the boycott by mainland netizens. Anthony Wong later
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told the BBC that those years felt like returning to the 60s, seeing that kind of atmosphere again. There was a coincidence in 2014: when the Occupy movement erupted, he was in Shanghai filming a TV drama called "Cruel Romance." In it, he played a character
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named Qiao Aotian. He was clearly a patriot, yet he was brought to court by others as a traitor. When filming the final scene, Qiao Aotian stood in court to defend himself. Anthony Wong later lamented that those lines were written
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before the movement took place, but he felt as if he were constantly reciting them: "Nobody knows what I’ve done, and no one believes how much good I’ve done." But that’s how the world is, confusing right and wrong, black and white. How many people have
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done terrible things yet are held up as patriotic heroes? As for me? Think whatever you like of me; I couldn't care less. In 2015, he won Best Actor with this role, yet he claimed he didn't care. In reality, Anthony Wong
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couldn't help himself; after being blacklisted, he began to explain over and over who he really was.
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Misunderstandings happen to everyone, but the more you explain, the less the other side listens, assuming you're just feeling guilty. This is exactly the kind of life Anthony Wong lived for the next few years. In May 2017, he posted a short message in English on
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his Facebook: "Looking for my father." The post featured an old black-and-white photograph. It showed his young mother holding him as an infant, with his British father standing beside them. By that time, his father had already been gone for over
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50 years. In February 2018, BBC Chinese published a long interview with him. In this interview, he explained that his intention was never to support the protest movement, nor was he the " pro-Hong Kong independence" figure his detractors claimed. But in that
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polarized climate, anything you said would be twisted. He then added that he is actually a very traditional Chinese person in his personal life. One of his original quotes went like this. " Honestly, I am more Chinese than the
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Chinese.""I still have the Earth God and the Kitchen God at home." The Earth God here refers to the traditional deity worshipped in Cantonese households. The Kitchen God, or Lord Kitchen, is his tradition. When discussing the future of Hong Kong, his
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views might have upset many young people there; he said that cultural reunification with China is a historical inevitability. "Cultural integration is an inevitable return."" Such a place is only a matter of time." Listen, is this something a "
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pro-independence" activist would say? A man who calls himself "more Chinese than the Chinese" and says Hong Kong's return is inevitable would surely be labeled a nationalist abroad. Yet, the reason for his mainland ban was being " pro-independence." This interview also
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brought an unexpected result. After the interview was published, many people helped him track down his father's whereabouts. Less than a month later, his father's family actually got in touch with him. On March 20, 2018, two elderly British men arrived in Hong
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Kong and met Anthony Wong. They are the two sons of Perry, from his home in England, and both David and John are now 74. They also have a 77-year-old sister, and before this, they had no idea their father had another family in
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Hong Kong. That year, Anthony Wong was 56, and he used three English words to describe his feelings in that moment.
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Amazing, impossible, miracle. Meaning shocking, unbelievable, and a miracle. But this meeting also brought some belated news: his father had already passed away back in 1988. Which means for the 30 years Anthony Wong spent searching, his father was actually
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already gone. He wanted to tell his mother, but she was suffering from Alzheimer's and could no longer respond to him. With the family matter somewhat settled, the trouble outside continued; that March, Jackie Chan, as a CPPCC member, told reporters there is only
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one kind of film, "Chinese film," and Hong Kong films are also Chinese films. Many Hong Kong netizens were unhappy, feeling he had forgotten his roots.
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Over a month later, on April 15th, at the 37th Hong Kong Film Awards ceremony . Anthony Wong went on stage to present the Best Screenplay award and first introduced himself. My Chinese name is Wong Chau-sang, which means "the yellow
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is faded," but there are still signs of life in autumn. Just like Hong Kong films, full of vitality. He then spoke of the secret to screenwriting: within reason, yet beyond expectation. Then, shifting gears, he asked: "Will there still be Hong Kong films next year?"
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That is the "beyond expectation" part. As for "within reason," we have Hong Kong films every year; it's only logical. The audience was silent.
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Because Jackie Chan was present, many media outlets wrote that Anthony Wong had "slapped" Jackie Chan. Late that night, Wong posted a long article on Facebook, saying the script was submitted a week prior, he wasn't targeting anyone, and he even
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apologized to Jackie Chan. Then he emphasized once again: I do not support independence. And that Hong Kong is indeed Chinese territory. He also mentioned his participation in the Diaoyu Islands protests again; look, from that 2014 solemn statement to
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telling the BBC in 2018 that he is " more Chinese than the Chinese." And now using the Diaoyu Islands incident, he has put forward everything he possibly could. Yet, the other side hasn't heard a word of it. On April 14, 2019, the
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day of the 38th Hong Kong Film Awards ceremony. Hong Kong's*Apple Daily* published an interview with him, noting that for over four years, he has said several times on different occasions.
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At the time, he only sympathized with the students in the Occupy movement, he did not support the movement, nor was he for Hong Kong independence. But such explanations have had no effect. In an interview, Anthony Wong helplessly mentioned that no major films are
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looking for him anymore. And no matter how much more he says, they won't. He even said that if there were a chance, staying here wouldn't be meaningful.
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That very night, he won the Best Actor award at the Hong Kong Film Awards for the third time for the film "Still Human." This is a low-budget film directed by newcomer Oliver Chan. To support the newcomer, they didn't take
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a salary, agreeing to share profits only if it made money. In this film, he plays a middle-aged man paralyzed in a wheelchair. Interestingly, in the award list released by the Hong Kong Film Awards, the Best Actor category was not
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listed. Upon hearing this news, Anthony Wong couldn't help but sigh, saying this is simply absurd. This was nothing , because two months later, something even bigger happened in Hong Kong. In the summer of 2019, the Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill
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Movement broke out in Hong Kong. This time, the tone of Anthony Wong's comments was completely different from 2014. When a person tries to explain for five years and is never heard, resentment builds up, and naturally, it needs to be vented. It started because
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the Hong Kong government wanted to amend the extradition bill. Once amended, those arrested in Hong Kong could be extradited to the mainland for trial. Many Hong Kong people worried that once this door opened, anyone could be sent north. Consequently,
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starting in June, millions took to the streets to protest. In September, the Hong Kong government announced the withdrawal of the bill. But street conflicts had already spiraled out of control; they didn't stop. Protests became increasingly intense, and police
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enforcement became more brutal. During this period, Anthony Wong began expressing his views online, with each statement sharper than the last. He compared Hong Kong at the time to Nazi Germany in 1933 and wrote an English lyric on Facebook: "Hello darkness, my
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old friend." Hello darkness, my old friend. This is the opening of the Simon&Garfunkel song. At a film seminar , he even told the audience directly not to visit Hong Kong for the time being because the police were truly
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crazy. In October 2019, the Hong Kong government invoked the Emergency Regulations Ordinance to ban masks.
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Anthony Wong sarcastically remarked, " If breathing isn't safe, what's the point of talking about the law?" In November, when police surrounded the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, using water cannons and tear gas against the protesting students inside, he uploaded
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a video calling out to the world in English, "Help, help, help Hong Kong." That same year, at a friend's performance, he played the song that was later banned in Hong Kong, "Glory to Hong Kong." Compared to 2014, Anthony Wong had undergone a massive
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change. During the Umbrella Movement, he only said he sympathized with the students but didn't support the movement, and would issue statements to clarify his stance. By 2019, he stopped clarifying and instead directly lashed out, calling the police crazy and
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cursing the government. He even called on foreigners to come and help Hong Kong. Of course, there is a boundary here; no matter how much he criticized, he never spoke of Hong Kong independence. On his Baidu Baike entry, he is described this way for that year.
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Supporting rioters during the anti-extradition turmoil and smearing Hong Kong—from supporting the Occupy movement in 2014 to backing rioters in 2019, the labels grew larger, and his name became increasingly untouchable in the mainland. After the anti-extradition movement, Hong Kong
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society split into two. Those who supported the movement were called " Yellow," and those who opposed it were "Blue." Between people, it seems only these two labels remain; even those who immigrated to other countries are forced to pick a side. There's no need
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to say which side Anthony Wong was categorized into. What’s worse is that he previously only lacked opportunities in the mainland, but within a year, his chances in Hong Kong were also rapidly diminishing. There weren't many Hong Kong film companies
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willing to hire him for movies anymore. After all, Hong Kong cinema has long been inseparable from the mainland's market and capital. If you want to make money, you have to enter the mainland market. To enter the mainland, you
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cannot use people that the mainland disapproves of. At this time, he was already 58 years old, so in May 2020, Wong boarded a plane to Taiwan.
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Officially, he went to Taiwan to film a TV series. But after arriving, he soon said something provocative that made many in the mainland restless.
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Conflicts and remote verbal sparring between mainland and Taiwanese artists occur from time to time, and one Taiwanese artist is particularly keen on doing this. His name is Huang An.
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Huang An is a Taiwanese singer who was popular in the 80s and 90s, with his representative work being "New Mandarin Duck Butterfly Dream." Later, he developed his career in the mainland for a long time. He is now best known
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not for singing, but for reporting Taiwanese artists for supporting Taiwan independence on Weibo. At the end of 2015, Chou Tzu-yu, a Taiwanese member of a Korean girl group, was relentlessly reported by him for holding a Republic of China flag on a
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show. In January 2016, Chou Tzu-yu was forced to record a video apology. In May 2020, Anthony Wong arrived in Taiwan to prepare for a Taiwanese drama . At that time, it was the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, and entry
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required a 14-day quarantine. He wrote on Facebook: "In Taiwan, isolating for 14 days, I'm okay." A fan commented: " Become a Taiwanese citizen," and he replied with three words: "In the process." It was these three words that caused an uproar across the strait.
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Many in Taiwan welcomed it, while those in the mainland scolded him. Since the anti-extradition movement, a group of young people from Hong Kong had already gone to Taiwan; in this atmosphere, a celebrity with such a clear stance supporting the movement saying he would
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naturalize in Taiwan inevitably led to political associations. Huang An also joined in, posting on Weibo that Wong is "a disgrace to the Wong family." On May 13th, a netizen forwarded this remark by Huang An to Anthony Wong.
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Anthony Wong replied, "I don't identify as Huang at all," and casually mocked the mainland's "Little Pinks." Many took this as a joke. Although he was born with that name, it is indeed a foreign name. "Perry" is his father's
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name. But his father abandoned him long ago. In Hong Kong, he is simply Wong. " Wong" is his mother's surname, and " Chau-sang" is the name his mother gave him. Yet now, he says he doesn't even identify with the surname Wong. This is
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clearly not just a play on words; it also marks a point after Wong arrived in Taiwan. On June 30, 2020, the Hong Kong National Security Law officially took effect. This law defines four categories of crimes: secession, subversion, terrorist activities, and
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collusion with foreign forces. The maximum penalty is life imprisonment. But what constitutes "subversion" is not clearly defined. This means that saying the wrong thing could lead to trouble. Correspondingly, many things changed completely from that point on; some things that could be said in
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Taiwan could no longer be said in Hong Kong. Meanwhile, Anthony Wong began developing his career in Taiwan. In 2021, his Taiwan drama "Heaven on the 4th Floor" was aired. This was his first time acting in a Taiwanese television series. In April of the same
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year, he obtained a Taiwan Gold Card under the culture and arts category. This allowed him to freely travel to and work in Taiwan. However, he did not emigrate as many had assumed. In 2023, he specifically clarified to reporters
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at an event that he had always been in Hong Kong and had never emigrated. His home and his theater troupe are still in Hong Kong. Furthermore, in 2023, he gave an interview to*Mirror Media*and still explicitly denied being a
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separatist. He stated that his remarks were based solely on a humanitarian perspective. Note that this was already after the "Anti-ELAB" movement and after he began working in Taiwan. His criticism of Hong Kong's reality became increasingly sharp, but at least in
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this public interview, he still did not align these criticisms with a stance for Hong Kong independence. The real highlight came in November 2022 at the 59th Golden Horse Awards in Taiwan.
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Anthony Wong won Best Actor for the film "The Sunny Side of the Street." This is a Hong Kong film where he plays a Hong Kong taxi driver. He had previously won Best Supporting Actor at the Golden Horse Awards three times,
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but this was his first time winning Best Actor. By 2025, Anthony Wong was nominated again for Best Supporting Actor at the Taiwan Golden Horse Awards for the film "Happy Today." While his career in Taiwan was thriving, he had
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become increasingly absent from Hong Kong's own film awards, though Anthony Wong had not stopped acting in Hong Kong. In May 2025, he and Chan Shu performed*The Orphan of Zhao*again at the Xiqu Centre Grand Theatre in West Kowloon. That same year, he starred in
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a film called*Suicide Notice*. The director was Chow Kwun-wai. On August 4 , 2025, Chow submitted*Suicide Notice* for censorship in Hong Kong. After waiting over four months, the result came out in December: public screening was denied, citing it as harmful to
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national security. Films starring Anthony Wong could no longer be released in Hong Kong. Of course, I think part of the reason has to do with Chow Kwun-wai. Who is Chow Kwun-wai? He directed a short film in the anthology*
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Ten Years*titled*Self-immolator*. He also directed the documentary* Revolution of Our Times*about the 2019 anti-extradition bill movement, which shows that major Hong Kong commercial productions were no longer hiring Anthony Wong. Therefore, he could only collaborate with directors on the fringes of the Hong Kong mainstream
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market. On January 13, 2026, the Hong Kong Film Awards announced the entries for the previous year. Everyone checked the list carefully and discovered that four films were missing. In addition to Anthony Wong's*The Unpardonable Sin*and *Today Should Be Very Happy*, films
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starring Jennifer Yu and Fan Bingbing also met the criteria but were absent from the list. The Hong Kong Film Awards Association gave no response at the time. Note that one of these four films was starred in by Fan Bingbing.
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Fan Bingbing had been blacklisted in mainland China after being fined for tax evasion in 2018. A month later, in February, the chairman of the Film Awards Association, Derek Yee, was finally cornered by reporters. When asked about this, he initially played
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dumb, but realizing he couldn't avoid it, he said he had been thinking for a month how to explain it but couldn't find a response that satisfied everyone , so he simply didn't comment.
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Ultimately, he just left them with a line from a Buddhist scripture. "If you see all appearances as non-appearances, then you see the Tathagata." This verse is from the Diamond Sutra, meaning that the outward appearances seen by the eyes are not the truth. What he really
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meant is up for everyone to interpret. Anthony Wong was naturally furious, telling Hong Kong media, "Whatever, let it be. I am an artist now, not an entertainer. If you want to see my plays in the future, you'll have to go
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abroad." Six months later, he posted the statement I mentioned at the beginning. Hong Kong stage, it's time to say goodbye. God Theatre, a bigger stage. The "God Theatre" here is the one I mentioned earlier, which he founded with his junior colleague in
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2013. As I said before, in 2014, Anthony Wong was truly not a "pro-Hong Kong independence" artist; that was just a label forced upon him. By 2023, he still publicly denied supporting Hong Kong independence. No matter how he explains it, the mainland still
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labels him as a pro-independence artist . Anthony Wong seems to have spent his whole life answering the same question: Who exactly are you? As a child, he was called a "foreign devil" due to his face; later, he embraced his roots and
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claimed to be more Chinese than anyone. Yet, because he stood with students and criticized the police, he was branded a pro-independence artist by others.
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It’s as if his lifelong affection for China could be wiped away by a few later remarks. He explains himself time and again, only to realize that while he can decide what to say, he cannot control what others call him. But am I
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telling this story just to prove he's patriotic and shouldn't be treated this way? If that were the case, we would still be trapped in the Chinese official logic used to attack him. What I want to say is that identifying with
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one's culture and hometown is fundamentally different from agreeing with the government. Loving this city doesn't mean you must approve of everything that happens here. Feeling something is wrong, offering criticism, or even professional critiques of the government, doesn't mean he no longer
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views this place as home. Or that he can't say he loves it. Anthony Wong can be Chinese and also Hong Konger; he can cherish his culture and also criticize those in power. These identities and choices are not mutually exclusive. The
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truly sad thing isn't that some people dislike him, but that someone born and raised here, who has acted in films for decades, must constantly explain that he still belongs here. Wong said he is looking for a bigger stage, where he
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won't have to explain what kind of person he really is. That’s all for today. I’m Cao Cao. The truth is more precious than gold; see you next time.
Topics:Anthony WongHong Kong actorHong Kong separatistOccupy Centralanti-extradition movementWong Jingmixed-race identityHong Kong cinemaChina censorshipcelebrity blacklist
