While filming local director Jack Neo’s movie Wonderful! Liang Xi Mei (2018) years ago, actor Mark Lee faced a career slump as he felt he was getting outdated.
Speaking at the press conference of his new movie Number 2 recently, the 56-year-old revealed: “At the time, I already had no idea what I wanted to play. That’s not to say that I am very good in my acting, but I was at a point where I felt I could only act as an Ah Beng who speaks loudly.
“Audiences also had the preconception that I could only act as an Ah Beng. I asked myself, ‘Do I still want to continue like this? I might only be able to last another two years before nobody wants to look at my films anymore.'”
It was also during this time that he met actor Jaspers Lai, then an aspiring screenwriter who played Merlion King in Jack’s movie, and Mark felt that it was fate sparking a change in both of them.
“On the set, I saw Jaspers sitting at the same place from morning to evening typing away on his laptop. I asked what he was doing and he told me he was writing a script named Number 1,” Mark recalled.
“At first I thought it was another movie about the lottery, but he told me it was about a man who turned to a drag queen career to earn a living for his family. I thought it was an interesting story and something different.”
Mark then suggested the script to film production company mm2 Entertainment and that he wanted to be part of it.
While playing the main character Chow Chee Beng in Number 1 (2020), Mark felt that the character was someone he could embrace.
He said: “But at the time, I didn’t think that I would perform very well for the character. I only wanted to present different emotions. I enjoyed playing Chee Beng very much.
“I saw a different side of my own performance and presented a different side of myself. Audience also told me they saw something different in me, and that made me very happy.”
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For his performance in Number 1, Mark was nominated Best Actor in the Golden Horse award and the team won Best Makeup and Costume Design.
He explored different scripts and genres to perform, including thriller-action film Geylang (2022) and family drama Wonderland (2023), where he had opportunities to travel overseas to participate in film awards and festivals to interact with actors and directors internationally.
For Wonderland, Mark won Best Actor and his co-star Peter Yu Best Supporting Actor at the Ho Chi Minh City International Film Festival last year.
“I realised that my performance has so much to improve on. After interacting and learning from these actors and directors, I realised they are on an even higher level [as compared to myself],” Mark said, adding that these motivated him to push himself further in his performance.
In the sequel to Number 1 titled Number 2, Chee Beng (Mark) faces a crisis among the drag community after getting into a conflict while working as a property agent. In an attempt to revive his career with the members of The Queens — Money (Jaspers), Pearl (Kiwebaby Chang), Italy (Darius Tan) and Unicorn (Gadrick Chin) — they travel to Thailand with Chee Beng’s rebellious son Mason (Estovan Reizo Cheah), participating in a drag competition in an attempt to regain their former glory.
Bridging generation gap with children
Mark was also asked if he felt that there was a generation gap between himself and his three children — daughters Calista, 16, and Calynn, 11 as well as son Maksonn, 13 — whom he shares with his wife Catherine Ng, 51.
“Yes, there will definitely be some gaps. As parents, we would always think that there are some things that our children would know, but they actually don’t. There are also things that we thought they didn’t know, but they actually do. Children would always feel that their parents don’t understand them,” he said.
He also shared that to keep up in their conversations, he learnt slang words that are used more commonly by the younger generation now.
“I would use words such as ‘slay’ and ‘bro’ in conversation with my children, and they would be surprised that I knew it. I learnt these words and their meanings from young adults that I came across during work and use it with my children to bridge the gap.
“So when I bring them to and from school, they are more willing to open up to me.”
Number 2 opens in Singapore cinemas on Jan 28.
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yeo.shuhui@asiaone.com
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