Candice Yu On On
Biography
Candice Yu On On, born on October 22, 1958 in British Hong Kong, originally named Yu Tak Ying. Her grandfather was of mixed Australian ancestry, giving her one-eighth British blood. She is the youngest of eight siblings. Her parents divorced when she was 10, and she lived with her mother in a single-parent household. She grew up in Kowloon Bay Kwun Tong and attended St. Rose's School. She was a prominent athlete in school, participating in basketball and school-level sprint competitions. After graduating from secondary school in 1975, she entered the entertainment industry. At age 16, before graduating, she was invited by her mother's friend and famous talent scout Tsung Wai King to appear in a San Miguel Beer commercial. In 1975, she appeared with the Wynners band in her first film "The Fun, the Luck & the Tycoon," where director, screenwriter and actor Wong Chun gave her the stage name "Candice Yu." She later gained the attention of both RTV and TVB, joining the latter to appear in her first TV series "Seventy-Three" in 1976. That same year, she gained widespread popularity playing "Princess Fragrance" in the TV series "The Legend of the Book and the Sword." In 1977, she joined Shaw Brothers films and appeared in numerous martial arts films adapted from Gu Long's novels directed by Chor Yuen, gaining great popularity among film fans. In 1978, she briefly joined CTV and appeared in "The Golden Sword." After the station's closure, she moved to RTV and began singing TV drama theme songs, with her first being "Broken Dreams" from "Dragon Sabre" in 1979. In 1980, she sang a duet with Kwan Ching Kit "Tears on the Road" from "The Underworld." She was selected among the Top Ten Television Stars in the Hua Qiao Wan Bao poll in 1980 and 1981. In 1982, she sang the theme song for the film "Lonely Fifteen." She currently serves as Vice President of the Hong Kong Film Workers Association and is one of the few artists who have worked at all television stations producing original dramas in Hong Kong television history.