Maggie's new role: empowering young women

Maggie Cheung, the internationally acclaimed Hong Kong actress, had been looking for a change. "I would love to try anything but films," she said in a recent interview.

Now she has found it.

Since she vanished from the big screen after filming 2004's Clean - a role that won her accolades at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival - Cheung has devoted her immense energy and talent to a wide array of other endeavors.

One of her proudest recent accomplishments is a charity project called the Women Innovation and Dream Fund, which launched earlier this year. The fund, co-sponsored by the cosmetic house Olay and the Soong Ching-Ling Foundation, sponsors 10 university students - providing them with financial backing and mentorship - to help them realize their dreams.

Cheung said the idea for the project was born from a conversation with a close friend two years ago. Cheung says she wants to give other women the opportunity to pursue success, and especially to help them overcome initial obstacles in the workplace.

"Although we (my friend and I) are accomplished now," she says, "I can see many young women are facing the difficulties we once had. So we want to help them."

Cheung will serve as a "life mentor," together with four other outstanding women from different fields, for the students selected for the program. "I want to share my experience with those girls, helping them know themselves better," she says.

Cheung also designed the logo for the fund, which resembles a tree spreading its branches.

Charity work, a guest stint as a fashion designer, and a new relationship with Ole Scheeren - a German architect who helped design CCTV's eye-catching new Beijing headquarters - have recently kept Cheung more than busy.

The celebrated 43-year screen idol says she has no immediate plans to star in another film.

Cheung says that only the chance to play a truly exceptional role would lure her back to the hectic schedule of movie production. "I would not want to simply reprise a previous roles, for repetition is meaningless," she says. "That means fewer and fewer roles seem appealing to me now."

Cheung says she loves taking risks. In a sense, taking a long break from the big screen - her original claim to fame - may be a risk, too. But the multi-talented woman is not afraid to turn over a new leaf. If she makes a decision and it turns out to be wrong, she says, at least she will have learned a lesson.

For now, Cheung has another goal: to remain anonymous on the Beijing subway.

"If everyone was pointing to me and said 'that's Maggie Cheung,' that would be no fun," she says. Sometimes, despite wearing large sunglasses and hiding her recognizable face behind fashionable scarves, she is still recognized by an observant passenger. In those instances, Cheung will simply say, "Please, don't tell."

(China Daily 07/09/2008 page18)