The Hong Kong crossover stars who played movie villains, then nice-guy roles in TV shows

Hollywood actors like Harrison Ford have been hailed for making the move to small-screen roles, but in Hong Kong this is nothing new

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Hong Kong actors Shek Kin (left) and Lau Hak-suen in Midnight Bells (1950). The two actors, often cast as villains, made the move to TV to play kinder characters. Photo: Hong Kong Film Archive

Published: 7:15am, 18 Dec 2024

Television is no longer the place where film stars wind down their twilight years. Rather, the small screen is where former A-listers experience a late-career renaissance, often by playing against type.

If we take a look at the acting nominations for the 2025 Golden Globes, we see Harrison Ford, 82, receiving acclaim for his turn as a grumpy therapist in Shrinking; and Kevin Kline, 77, for playing a vengeful widower in the psychological thriller miniseries Disclaimer.

Their crossover success might be causing chatter in Hollywood, but something similar was well under way in Hong Kong in the 1970s, when veteran movie actors moved into television as the city’s film industry faltered.

Unlike Hollywood’s squeaky-clean big-screen icons, who received kudos for going bad, Hong Kong actors were celebrated for doing the opposite.

Shek Kin – real name Shek Wing-cheung and also known as Shih Kien – was known for playing the villain in a series of films about martial arts master Wong Fei-hung directed by Wu Pang, but spent the last two decades of his career playing kindly grandfathers in shows on Hong Kong broadcasting channel TVB.