Sir Run Run Shaw, the Hong Kong mogul who created a massive Asian media empire spanning movies to television across nearly 90 years, has died at the age of 106.
He died peacefully at his home in Hong Kong surrounded by family.
“With his vision and energy, he had built the company to become Hong Kong’s premier television station and a world leader in the Chinese-language television industry,” one arm of his sprawling empire, TVB, said in a statement.
Hong Kong Chief Executive CY Leung has expressed his condolences to Sir Run Run’s family.
“Sir Run Run Shaw has for a long time promoted the entertainment industry in Hong Kong, his philanthropy also has spread from Hong Kong to China and beyond,” he said.
“He is an elder that we very much respect.”
One of Hong Kong cinema’s defining figures, Sir Run Run popularised Chinese kung-fu films in the West and helped turn Hong Kong into the ‘Hollywood of the East’.
Born in November 1907, he founded the Shaw Organisation with his brother in Shanghai in 1926 while still a teenager.
Four years later the firm became Shaw Brothers studios, which grew to be Asia’s largest studio by 1958.
His studio produced more than 1,000 films and invested in numerous others, including Ridley Scott’s classic Blade Runner.
A picture about a Tang Dynasty beauty, The Magnificent Concubine, became the first Chinese movie to garner an international award when it won the Grand Prix for Best Interior Photography and Colour at the 1962 Cannes Film Festival.
He set up Hong Kong’s largest free-to-air television operator TVB in 1967 and served as its executive chairman until 2011, then appointed chairman emeritus.
Chinese film mega-stars such as Chow Yuen-fat, Tony Leung, Stephen Chow and Andy Lau all had their breaks in TVB television dramas in the 1980s.
Sir Run Run was knighted in 1977, and received a BAFTA special award for contributions to cinema in December 2013.
Its London headquarters is home to the Run Run Shaw Theatre.
He set up Shaw Prize in 2004 awarding scientists in the areas of astronomy, mathematics and life and medical science.
His investments in schools across the territory are thought to number more than 4,000, and Shaw College at the Chinese University of Hong Kong is named after him following an establishment donation of nearly $US65 million in today’s terms.
A former general manager of TVB, Stephen Chan, told the South China Morning Post on Tuesday that the tycoon placed high emphasis on education.
He said Sir Run Run had once told a Hong Kong government official “Don’t think education is ‘expenses’. Education is ‘investment'”.
Original story: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-01-07/an-hong-kong-movie-mogul-sir-run-run-shaw-dies-aged-107/5188894?section=australianetworknews
