Remembering Hong Kong’s ‘Queen of Swords’
Cheng Pei Pei, a pioneering actress and star of movies like “Come Drink With Me” and “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” died July 17. She was 78.
One of the foremost stars of Hong Kong’s wuxia martial arts boom in the 1960s, Cheng returned to acting in the 1990s and 2000s with a series of high-profile roles. Her representatives confirmed her death Friday.
Born in Shanghai on Jan. 6, 1946, Cheng relocated to Hong Kong in the early 1960s and quickly found work with the prestigious Shaw Brothers Studio. Her first leading role came in 1964, in “Lovers’ Rock,” but it was her performance in King Hu’s 1966 epic “Come Drink With Me” that proved to be her big break — earning her the nickname “The Queen of Swords” and making her a star in the Chinese-language film world. Over the next few years, she helped create the wuxia swordswoman archetype, highlighting the strength and complexity of female martial artists in a previously male-dominated genre.
In the 1970s, Cheng paused her acting career and moved to the United States to build a family. She returned to the silver screen over a decade later, with roles in films like the 1993 comedy “Flirting Scholar,” which saw her acting opposite Stephen Chow. She later found a global audience as the scheming “Jade Fox” in 2000’s “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” which made multiple homages to early wuxia films.
Cheng continued to work regularly over the next two decades, with her last feature role coming in 2020’s live-action “Mulan.”
Cheng was diagnosed with a degenerative brain disease in 2019. Before her death, she agreed to donate her brain to the Brain Support Network, which conducts research on neurodegenerative disorders.
