Lee Hom's " Forever 1st Day " Album Diary

89/09/23~89/09/29 @ Part 16

Dear Friends,

Today I am writing to you from my hotel in Hong Kong, I just arrived from Shanghai after a long week of shooting "China Strike Force" and I am exhausted. Although I have bruises and scratches all over my body from doing my own stunts, I have a great sense of accomplishment and pride from this week's filming. I also have a deeper appreciation for the work of previous action movie stars like Jackie Chan and Jet Li (not that I could ever compare to the amazing work they have done!).

To be completely honest, my Friends, in Hong Kong action movies, what you see is what we did. These stunts are for real. These stunts are often dangerous and frightening, but when working with such professionals, mistakes never happen. They cannot happen because if they did.I shudder to think of the consequences. I've learned to trust members of the stunt team with my life, and we've grown quite close because of it.

This week I found myself hanging off the edge of a building with nothing but a wire to hold me 70 feet above the busy streets of Shanghai. The chilling rain was pouring down provided by three fire hoses, and every inch of me was soaked completely through for at least 2 hours. In between shots, I had to stay suspended on the wire, so the crew brought me hot ginger tea to drink so I wouldn't catch cold. The shot was filmed so that it looked like I was climbing up a thin vertical pole on the side of the building hand over hand all the way up to the roof. All the while I was quite conscious of the fact that if the wire broke, I would not be here writing to you today or ever again!

While I was suspended up there, horrible memories of a concert in Kaoshiung in the summer of 1996 entered my mind. It was one of those celebrations held by a major radio station, however, this year for some reason, it was poorly organized and the artists had no opportunity to rehearse. There were several other singers performing that night, and I was supposed to fly onto the stage with a wire, attached to my waist. I knew it was a bad idea to use the wire without a rehearsal, but there was really no time to protest. Soon enough, the MC said, "Here's Lee-hom singing 'Love Rival Beethoven'" and the crowd began to cheer. I held the microphone in my hand and got ready as the first measures of the introduction began. Five men offstage began to pull me up, up, up. Well, just as I was beginning to be lifted, the wire snapped across my body, and down I fell, hitting the ground backstage.luckily I had only gotten a few feet off the ground and was able to get up and run quickly, from backstage to center stage to perform my song without missing my entrance. That night, I sung "Love Rival Beethoven" with my heart beating crazy in my chest! I kept thinking how stupid and dangerous it was for me to have agreed to use a wire for my entrance, and how lucky I was to have not gotten seriously hurt.

When we finally finished the stunt in Shanghai, it was six a.m., I was tired, cold, sore, and soaked, but at the same time euphoric. This was a high point of my week and at that moment I knew I wanted to share it with you all. I watched the playback in Stanley Tong's monitor and I knew that that shot was worth it, it looked so cool, like I actually was scaling the wall of the building all the way up to the roof. But even more exhilarating than watching the playback, was the knowledge that: I did it. Even though, it was dangerous, we now had it on film forever.and nothing can ever take that away from me. Some risks are just worth taking.

Love,
Homeboy