Choo Kok Leong (1910–1996) was a Malaysian Chinese born in Kuala Lumpur. A graduate of Wadham College, Oxford, he worked in the Malaysian government and at an agricultural college after university, and served as a director of several Malaysian banks, rubber companies and tin-mining firms. Cathay Organisation, founded by the Loke family, began with cinemas and film distribution in Singapore and Malaya before extending into Hong Kong production and studios. In 1959 Choo became a director of Cathay Organisation (Singapore) Ltd, the right-hand man of its chairman Loke Wan Tho, and that same year was appointed a Malaysian senator. When Loke Wan Tho was killed in a plane crash in Taiwan in 1964, Choo succeeded him as chairman of Cathay Organisation (Singapore). In 1965 he restructured Motion Picture and General Investment Co Ltd into Cathay Organisation (Hong Kong) Ltd and became its chairman, continuing the group's production and distribution work in the colony until Cathay closed its Hong Kong production unit in 1971, after which the studio passed to Golden Harvest. Over his six years running Cathay in Hong Kong he produced more than ninety films of considerable range, mainly Mandarin pictures, making Cathay one of the two major production forces alongside Shaw Brothers; the more notable ones include The Story of a Nobody (1966), Raw Courage (1969), A Good Wife (1970) and The Swordsman and the Swordswoman (1970). Reserved and introverted, unlike the sociable Loke, he nevertheless kept production going until the unit closed, largely extending the company's active years. He retired in 1985 on grounds of age, after which his daughter Choo Meileen took over the group's affairs, and he died in 1996 at the age of eighty-six.
After Loke Wan Tho's fatal plane crash, Choo Kok Leong took over Cathay, restructured MP & GI into Cathay Organisation (Hong Kong) and kept its Mandarin film production going until 1971, producing more than ninety films as a pivotal manager in post-war Hong Kong cinema.
Achievements
- 1959 · Became a director of Cathay Organisation (Singapore) and was appointed a Malaysian senator the same year.
- 1964 · Succeeded Loke Wan Tho as chairman of Cathay Organisation (Singapore) after Loke's death in a plane crash.
- 1965 · Restructured MP & GI into Cathay Organisation (Hong Kong) Ltd and became its chairman.