Liu Wai-hung, born in Hong Kong in 1957, is an actor, television host and director best known as 'Ah Chan' in the 1979 TVB drama The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, in which he once devoured 30 hamburgers in a single scene, a talking point of the day. He grew up in a squatter area in Kowloon Tsai and in Shek Yam Estate in Kwai Chung, and while in Form Three spent his summer-job pay on a Super 8 camera, shooting a kung-fu short for the Urban Council's experimental film competition, which sparked his interest in production. After his breakthrough he formed a production company with Lan Nai-tsai, Kent Cheng, Danny Lee and Ray Lui, joined Yong Jia Film as an assistant director in 1983, and in 1985 directed his first feature, the comedy Chase a Fortune, in which he also acted alongside Danny Lee and Wong Ching. From 1990 to 1992 he co-hosted three series of the TVB sketch show The Funny Half Show with David Wu, in which his cross-dressing character Mrs Mit became a classic. He left TVB in 1996 and ran beauty, karaoke and roast-meat businesses, went bankrupt in 1999 and cleared his debts by 2006. He then farmed organic rice in Luoding, Guangdong, for many years, before moving to Malaysia, where he opened a dining and entertainment complex of about 15,000 square feet in Kuala Lumpur in 2025 and a fishball stall in early 2026.
'Ah Chan' grew from a television part into a byword in Hong Kong for mainland immigrants, mirroring the identity anxieties of the late 1970s, while the satirical sketches of The Funny Half Show set a topical-comedy template for local television; his later turns in business and farming made him an example of an entertainer reinventing himself.
Achievements
- 1979 · Played 'Ah Chan' in the TVB drama The Good, the Bad and the Ugly; the nickname became a byword for mainland immigrants in Hong Kong
- 1985 · Made his directorial debut with the comedy Chase a Fortune, in which he also acted alongside Danny Lee and Wong Ching
- 1990 · Co-hosted TVB's sketch show The Funny Half Show with David Wu, playing the cross-dressing character Mrs Mit