Rico Chung Kai-cheong (born 1963 in Hong Kong), whose family roots are in Dongguan, Guangdong, is a Hong Kong screenwriter, director, producer and actor. Before turning to writing he worked as an ivory carver, dubbed films at night and took a screenwriting course in the University of Hong Kong's extramural department. In 1984 he joined Asia Television's script department, his first series being a 1985 martial-arts drama; he rose to script supervisor in 1987 and wrote for series including The Magic Star (1987), The Imperial Guard (1988) and Strange Tales of Liaozhai (1988). Leaving ATV for Cinema City in 1988, he wrote two films that year, then returned to ATV to devise variety shows such as Ng Yiu-hon Kung Kung Tsang (1989), Joke 1800 Seconds (1989-90) and The Mainstream (1990) while also writing the crime series Royal File (1989). In 1990 he went back to film, writing a 1991 action picture and forming Tak Yee Production with director Cha Chuen-yee, whose first release he produced. His scripts for a crime drama based on a real dissolving-corpse case (1993) brought his first Hong Kong Film Awards best screenplay nomination, followed by Tuen Mun Sex Maniac (1994), Neighbourhood Cop (1995) and other crime films that made his name. In 1996 his Mongkok Fit Man used repeating narrative to send up the self-mythologising of triad movies, while its 1996 companion mocked the brotherhood myth of the genre. He ended the company after a 1997 picture. In 2004 he began directing, his first film co-written and co-directed with Gordon Chan, A-1 Headline (2004), which won him the Hong Kong Film Critics Society's best screenplay award and a Guild recommendation prize; he then directed a 2007 gangster comedy and the low-budget but commercially successful mainland horrors The Island (2011) and its 2013 sequel. He served as secretary of the Hong Kong Screenwriters' Guild from 2015 to 2017.
Chung moved from television script supervision to film writing, and in 1996 his Mongkok Fit Man and its companion used repeating narrative and self-mockery to dismantle the mythology of triad movies, an anti-climactic experiment within the genre; A-1 Headline (2004) put newspaper front-line work on screen and won him the critics' society screenwriting award.
Achievements
- 1991 · Formed Tak Yee Production with director Cha Chuen-yee, whose first release he produced
- 1994 · Received his first Hong Kong Film Awards best screenplay nomination for a crime drama based on a real case
- 2004 · Co-wrote and co-directed A-1 Headline with Gordon Chan, winning the Hong Kong Film Critics Society's best screenplay award