Margarita Ma

Biography

Margarita Ma (Ma Jinling), known by her stage name Ma Jinling or Eve, is a Chinese film actress from Hong Kong, born on May 9, 1935 in Hong Kong to parents originally from Foshan, Guangdong Province. Her father was the musician Ma Gen, and she studied at Dezhen Primary School. She began her acting career at age 13 as a child actress and attended lectures as an auditor at New Asia College. She participated in over a hundred films. In 1953, she joined Yonghua Film Company to shoot Mandarin-language films. In 1960, she co-founded the 66 Film Company with her friends including Li Fengsheng, with their debut production "Two Generations of Love" in December 1953. After the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s, she emigrated to the United States and has resided there ever since. In the 1980s, she was elected the founding president of the New York Sino-American International Lions Club in the United States. In 1954, she visited Taiwan Province and attended President Chiang Kai-shek's inauguration ceremony. On June 8, 1954, she returned from Taipei to Hong Kong with actor Tang Di. On July 31, 1957, she traveled to Singapore with manager Chen Zhurui from the Singapore万国 Entertainment Company and participated in stage performances at Da Hua Theater with the Hong Kong Silver Star Film Troupe led by Zhou Manhua, performing in several plays including "Ten Thousand Taels of Gold," "A Virgin's Heart," "Joy at the Door," "Tea Picking Girl," "A Mute Carries a Madman," "Perfect Couple," and "Palace Lament." After the performances, she toured various cities in Malaysia for three months before returning to Hong Kong. In the 1960s, some newspapers reported that her husband was Ma Xi, who acted in the 1955 film "The Great Family," but she denied this in a Hong Kong interview in the 1990s, stating that her husband in America has the surname Lei and they have one daughter.