Chapter 79

Fong Sai Yuk II was a production of Jet Li's own company, Eastern Production. It was also his second project after undergoing a slight career shift. Jet Li had risen to massive fame in Hong Kong through the Once Upon a Time in China series, which was wildly popular across the territory. Because the character of Wong Fei-hung became so deeply ingrained in the public consciousness, Jet Li was frequently hailed as "Master Wong" simply for walking down the street. For any actor, having a single role become too deeply rooted in the public imagination has its drawbacks, as it tends to box them into one specific type of character. That had been Jet Li's situation prior to Fong Sai-Yuk. During the period when Jet Li had a falling out with Golden Harvest, the studio even went so far as to boast that without Golden Harvest and without Tsui Hark, Jet Li was a nobody. Stung by those remarks, Jet Li swore to prove Golden Harvest wrong. With the backing of Taiwanese film investors, he established Eastern Production and teamed up with Yuan Kuei, one of the Seven Little Fortunes, to direct and produce Fong Sai-Yuk.