Lam Ching-ying

Biography

Lam Ching-ying, originally named Lam Gen-bao, was a Hong Kong actor renowned for portraying Taoist priests in zombie films. He was also Bruce Lee's personal martial arts director. He studied at the "Spring and Autumn" drama school founded by Fen Juhua, and joined the Peking Opera troupe in 1963, training under Fen Juhua and Yu Zhan-yuan alongside members of the "Seven Little Fortunes" such as Yuen Woo-ping, Hung Kam-po, and Jackie Chan, practicing Wing Chun. He began his career at age 17 as a stuntman and martial arts director at Shaw Brothers. Due to his slim build, he worked as a body double for actresses like Cheng Pei-pei. His first film as martial arts director was "The Big Boss" (1971), co-directed with Han Ying-chieh. He was a core member of the Hung Gar gang. He won the Hong Kong Film Award for Best Action Choreography in 1982 for "The Prodigal Son" and again in 1983 for "Winners and Sinners". His career skyrocketed after the 1985 film "Mr. Vampire", where he played a Taoist priest and received a Best Supporting Actor nomination. In 1995, he was hired by Asia Television at a million-dollar salary to star in the TV series "Vampire Expert", which achieved high ratings and a sequel. In late 1997, he was diagnosed with liver cancer and passed away on November 8 of that year. He married Cheng Bing-bing in 1983 and divorced five years later, then entered a relationship with Yuen Qiu-dan in 1996.