Wang Danfeng
Chinese star who tilled fields during the Cultural Revolution
WANG DANFENG, who has died aged 93, was one of the most influential Chinese film stars of the late 1940s and early 1950s; later she became a victim of the Cultural Revolution and was banished for 15 years to a rural farmland, where she worked in the rice fields.
She appeared in more than 50 films, including Hong lou meng (1945), Marriage (1947), Diary of a Nurse (1956), Woman Barber (1962) with Yelu Gu, and The Peach-blossom Fan (1963) directed by Sin Jing.
Sometimes known as “the Chinese Audrey Hepburn”, Wang Danfeng’s allure lasted long after her retirement in the 1980s. Like her western counterpart, Wang Danfeng’s popularity increased further still among a younger generation who were obsessed by her “old world” glamour and her pioneering status as a woman who lived by her own terms.
She was born Wang Yufeng in Shanghai on August 23 1924. Aged 16 and still in high school, she was discovered by the film director Zhu Shilin, who was looking for a virginal beauty to play a supporting role in The Dragon Dungeon and Tiger’s Den (1941).
Interest in the young actress quickly gained pace when Zhu Shilin, who suggested changing her name to the more appealing Wang Danfeng, gave her the female lead in New Fisherman’s Song (1942). A box-office success, it catapulted her to stardom.
During the next decade she was cast as the persecuted wife or the abused lover in a string of melodramas and crime dramas; her favourite, Dream of the Red Chamber (1944), co-starred Zhou Xuan.
As the Chinese Civil War raged, Wang Danfeng moved to Hong Kong and signed a lucrative contract with Great Wall Movie Enterprises, taking the lead in half a dozen features. She returned to Shanghai in 1949, the year in which she was hailed as one of Hong Kong’s four greatest film actresses alongside Li Li-hua, Zhou Xuan and Bai Guang.
The country’s film industry was now under the single ownership of the Shanghai Film Studio. Wang Danfeng continued to work, most memorably in Diary of a Nurse; the section in which she hums the song The Little Swallow to put a baby to sleep is one of the most famous scenes in Chinese film history.
In 1957 Wang Danfeng joined the China Democratic League, becoming vicechairman of the 9th China Democratic League Shanghai Municipal Committee. But six years later she was criticised by the authorities for her role as the patriotic courtesan Li Xuangjun in The Peach Blossom Fan. With her male co-star Feng Zhe and the film’s director Sin Jing, she was persecuted and did not work for another 15 years.
Although Wang Danfeng attempted a comeback after the Cultural Revolution, she failed to re-establish her star status. Her final film appearance was in 1980 as a Japanese scientist in The Jade-coloured Butterfly. She and her husband returned to Hong Kong where they ran a vegetarian restaurant called Gong De Lin.
Throughout her early career there had been interest from Hollywood, though she refused all offers. In 1985, however, she attended President Reagan’s second inauguration.
In her late 80s Wang Danfeng was fêted by young film makers who tried to woo her out of retirement, but she remained content being remembered for her past work. Last year she was given a standing ovation at the Shanghai Film Festival after being wheeled on stage by her grandchildren to accept a Lifetime Achievement Award.
In 1951 Wang Danfeng married Liu Heqing, whose father Liu Zhongliang was co-founder of the Cathay Film Company. He died in 2016 and she is survived by their four daughters.
Wang Danfeng, born August 23 1924, died May 2 2018