1988

Record Maker, Record Breaker

 August 1988

Imagine 12,500 people in the Hongkong Coliseum uniting in a standing ovation. Picture Ann Bridgewater, Sam Hui arid Paula Tsui sharing the stage with one of Hongkong's most-popular entertainers. Remember that off-stage Jackie Chan, Anita Mui, Sally Yeh, George Lam, Connie Mak and Willie Chan were waiting to congratulate the star of the Territory's longest running, male solo concert series. That was Leslie Cheung's last night of a record-breaking 23 at the Coliseum.

Despite the previous 22 consecutive, three hour-a-night shows Leslie maintained an incredible enthusiasm and energy. His singing and dancing were, as ever, almost faultless, and the show bubbled with excitement.

Unlike the first 22 gigs though, the audience revelled in their uninhibited, and noisy, love for their idol. Apart from Leslie's sex appeal, the format had a lot to do with the audiences' response, his fluid but scripted performance easily swept the audiences' of their collective feet.

When over a hundred TV screens, built into the stage, showed segments of his popular movies Chinese Ghost Story, The Rouge and A Better Tomorrow, the atmosphere grew to fever pitch.

Then when Leslie appeared in the traditional ancient Chinese student costume, which he wore in the film, the audiences just could not stop yelling.

The stage design was not as spacious as that of Leslie's last concert in 1986. The entrances were a bit narrow, making it difficult for the dancers to get on and off the stage.

In the second half of the show the mobile centre stage was raised up with hundreds light bulbs flickering in the dry ice. The perfect setting for the romantic ballad The Wind Blows On.

Ann Bridgewater was the evening's special guest as on the previous nights but on Saturday, instead of wearing the black and red low cut evening gown, Ann squeezed into a pure black tight skirt given to her by Leslie to thank for her contribution to the show's success during the past nights. She also went for a more mature look with a smart new coiffure.

Unfortunately though the dance beat number just did not match what she was wearing. She looked too sophisticated for the number and could not dance well in such a tight skirt.

Also, Leslie is an accomplished dancer but the show did little to show­case this talent.

The only English song he sang was Victor Laszlo's touching romance Stories. Though he studied in England for a few years, the English pronunciation was, at best, vague and owing to the excitment sparked by the earlier uptempo hit, Leslie had to start twice before the audience would allow the gear change in mood. Band leader Chris Barbida's piano solo in Stories was a stunning testament of his musicianship. One of the hallmarks of a Leslie Cheung concert is the balance of sound and vision entertainment. In Chinese Ghost Story, Leslie wore a traditional Chinese silk costume with and the all-female dance troupe wore the long black hair and billowing white robes of ghosts but not all the dances met this standard. Before the first encore, Leslie appeared as an English highwayman but the dancers mismatched costumes were from a much earlier period.  Even worse, their hooped skirts and wigs were completely unsuitable for the ballet steps which were choreographed.   It seemed there was little liaison between dance tutor Alvin Leung and : the costume designers.

For the evening's finale Leslie left the safety of the regular scripted show and, consequently, lost a lot of credibility. He pretended not to know Sam Hui was waiting in the wings to share the final curtain while most of the 12,500 audience obviously did know.

After a duet with Sam, Silence Is Golden, Leslie was so overcome with Paula Tsui's entrance in a glittering green outfit that he could hardly stand.

As a second encore Leslie sang Deanie Yip's Lucky Me which he said it meant a lot to him and after that the audience were making for the exits when the lights went down again and Leslie delivered a third encore - his greatest hit to date Sleepless Night.

That final, unrequested encore summed up the show for many. Professional, spectacular but rarely spontaneous.

Newspaper ( Hong Kong )