KAT, Oh, Leslie..., from My Hong Kong Travelogue, online (closed)
(This next was written to the sweet sounds of Leslie Cheung, in the dark with only the faint glimmer of light from the stage & the multitudes of glow sticks to light my page.)
Leslie appears onstage in a Jean Paul Gaultier angel suit with fluffy white wings on his impeccably toned shoulders. Projected light patterns flit onto circular tube scrim circles center stage. Giamongous square stadium packed with fans of Leslie Cheung – soap star, canto pop star, actor – they all have whistles & glow sticks, no mickey mouse gloves tho’. Some with really fucking cool flashing red glow sticks. Yan tells me he’s totally gay (he looks it/acts it/swishes it) & all his girl fans are in denial. Hurrah for canto pop, yeah baby.
Devil horn ballet dancers, their black & white silk flutters & flows. In the audience a sea of multi-colored light sticks sways in perfect time. A woman in black runs up & hands L.C. an enormous bouquet of mixed flowers. Although I can’t speak Cantonese, I can tell that he has a great rapport with the audience, telling jokes & stories. Yan translates every so often, at a particularly cute joke. Everyone cheers & blows their whistles at every single lull in the music. Yan’s friend Sarah, who got us the tickets, is singing along with a rapt, adoring look on her face, transported back to the hero-worshipping age of 12.
Leslie Cheung is soooo disco w/ the solid gold dancers creating a sparkling spectacle all around him. Now for the movie montage interlude where we are treated to a gigantic screen split into 4 parts, showing him in a few of his more popular roles. He’s a gangster, a cop, a side-kick, a hero, a man dressed as a woman, a Hong Kong action star. Next he sings “American Pie” in English, Yan & I sing along, caterwauling at the top of our lungs, sighing “oh, Leslie…” He’s such a cutie, I think I have a crush on him (I always did like mah boyees oh-so femme). Now he’s singing a Chinese folk song w/ the loudest acoustic guitar in the universe played by someone else. Now back to regular canto pop, the epitome of pop-pop music indeed, what every pop star, Asian or not, aspires to. & Leslie Cheung’s got it down, after all, this is his come-back tour.