In 1984, TVB assigned the married actor Ng Man-tat to mentor newcomer Lo Siu-chi. Unexpectedly, Lo Siu-chi became pregnant. She said, "Brother Tat, the child is yours."
Ng Man-tat immediately went home and confronted his wife. Unexpectedly, his wife, Mak Lai-lai, refused to divorce him.
In 2017, at the Qingdao Film Studio, 64-year-old Ng Man-tat was locked in a 70-pound mecha suit, like a drained bellows, each breath requiring immense effort. It was the set of *The Wandering Earth*, in sub-zero temperatures, yet his face turned from deathly pale to ashen due to oxygen deprivation.
Upon removing his helmet, he collapsed into a chair, gasping for oxygen, tears streaming down his face. His assistant, heartbroken, pleaded, "Brother Tat, can't we stop pushing ourselves?"
Ng Man-tat gave a bitter smile and remained silent. His mind raced, calculating: three families in Hong Kong depended on his living expenses; five children needed to go to school, study abroad, and settle down. If he stopped working for even a month, the mortgage payments on those houses and the livelihoods of those families would collapse like an avalanche.
In this "golden supporting actor's" script, aside from humor, the underlying logic boiled down to just two words: paying off debts.
Let's rewind to 1984. At that time, Ng Man-tat was experiencing the second spring of his life.
Before this, he had suffered a complete downfall. In 1979, his role as "Hu Tiehua" in *The Legend of Chu Liuxiang* made him a sensation throughout Southeast Asia, instantly elevating him to stardom. He spent his days in nightclubs and casinos, losing his savings and accumulating gambling debts of 300,000.
In his most desperate moment, it was his first wife, Mak Lai-lai, who refused to abandon him. Mai Lili married him in 1976 after a seven-year courtship. She not only gave birth to his adorable twin daughters, but also silently endured the humiliation when he was sidelined by TVB and besieged by creditors, supporting him through a period when he even contemplated suicide.
However, when Ng Man-tat made a comeback with "The Enforcer," and even received the important task of mentoring newcomers from TVB due to his skillful acting, he forgot this "gratitude."
TVB assigned him the task of mentoring newcomer Lo Siu-chi. This kind of mentorship is common in the Hong Kong entertainment industry, and Ng Man-tat was indeed very dedicated. On set, he personally taught Lo Siu-chi her blocking, memorizing lines, and even took her out for late-night snacks and discussed acting after work.
As they taught each other, the on-screen chemistry spilled over into real life.
When Lu Shaoci stood before Wu Mengda, her eyes red-rimmed, and uttered the words, "Brother Da, I'm pregnant," Wu Mengda was completely stunned. He returned home, looking at Mai Lili, the woman who had stood by him through thick and thin, and the words choked in his throat.
Mai Lili didn't cry, nor did she make a scene. She even refused to divorce him, simply looking at him coldly. This marked the beginning of the demise of Wu Mengda's first marriage. Lu Shaoci also paid the price; as a rising star at TVB, her career came to an abrupt halt due to her pregnancy, and she could only live with Wu Mengda in the awkward position of "girlfriend."
In 1989, Wu Mengda met Stephen Chow on the set of *The Legend of the Condor Heroes*. This was a turning point in his career, a time of explosive growth, but also the beginning of his increasingly out-of-control personal life.
In 1993, while filming *All's Well, Ends Well* in Singapore, Wu Mengda met Hou Shanyan, the second runner-up in the Miss Malaysia pageant. For this man, it seemed that every peak in his career was accompanied by a new romance. Finally, Mai Lili gave up, and their nearly twenty-year marriage ended in 1994. Just a year later, Ng Man-tat married Hou Shanyan in Malaysia after she became pregnant. By then, he was already burdened with the responsibilities of supporting three families.
As a man, Ng Man-tat was cold-hearted in matters of the heart, but when it came to money, he displayed an almost self-destructive "generosity."
According to Hong Kong media reports, at his peak, Ng Man-tat paid each family HK$800,000 per month for living expenses. With the decline of Hong Kong films and his deteriorating health, this amount decreased to around HK$300,000 per family, but it still added up to an astronomical sum.
He once told a friend, "They are very happy now because they don't have to work. But this debt is something only I can settle." For this living expense, he became the most famous "King of Bad Movies" in the film industry. He would accept any script as long as he was paid.
He once filmed 20 movies in a single year, spending his days suspended by wires in period dramas and his nights playing ugly characters in modern dramas, only managing a quick nap in his van between sets. He wasn't unaware of his body's protests; he simply dared not listen.
In 2014, Ng Man-tat suffered heart failure due to a viral infection and was admitted to the ICU. Death had already knocked on his door; he even wrote his will on his hospital bed.
But as soon as his condition improved slightly, his first priority was returning to the film set. His wife, Hou Shanyan, had given birth to a daughter and a son, the youngest of whom was still in school.
On the set of *The Wandering Earth*, he needed oxygen after every scene, and even cried in his room after work. He asked himself, "I'm over sixty years old, why am I still working so hard?"
The answer lay in his monthly bank statements. On February 27, 2021, Ng Man-tat passed away from liver cancer at Hong Kong Union Hospital. On his deathbed, his greatest concern remained the distribution of his estate, fearing his children would quarrel over the small inheritance.
Ng Man-tat was a man of many talents, both womanizers and loyal friends. He was much like the supporting characters he played in movies: humble, greedy, and womanizing, yet always willing to risk his life to protect something in the end.
After his passing, the screen no longer saw the seemingly submissive yet capable Uncle Tat who could support Stephen Chow. His back, bent under the weight of heavy armor, was the heaviest and most absurd testament to the word "responsibility" in his life.
Due to rumors that Ng Man-tat's monthly mortgage payments to three families were enormous, many believed he was penniless at the time of his death. In reality, through his early investments in real estate, Ng Man-tat left behind an estate worth tens of millions.
According to his will, half of the estate went to his current wife, Hou Shanyan, and the other half was divided equally among his five children. This method of distribution sparked heated debate at the time and was seen as his last attempt to balance the relationship among the three parties after his death.
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