Growing Pains
ON TELEVISION, he is a joker, full of smiles and laughter. But in his heart, Bryan Wong hides a deep sadness - he thinks he was responsible for his father's death.
Though it has been 11 years since his father, Wong Fook Fatt, died after suffering from a heart attack, the 36-year-old MediaCorp artiste's voice falters as he describes the events leading up to the death.
It was 1996 and the Channel 8 host was going through a rough patch in his career, having been voted most hated compere in a survey conducted by MediaCorp's predecessor, the Television Corporation of Singapore (TCS).
His brash, over-the-top style of hosting had also been the subject of much criticism in scathing media reports.
His parents did not know about the survey, but the bad press upset them greatly, he says.
'Parents think the world of their children, and nothing you do is wrong, which made me feel like even more of a failure.'
Soon after the negative reports about him came out, his father suffered a heart attack and died six hours later in hospital. He was 59 and had been in good health.
'Deep down, I have this fear inside me that makes me wonder... was it one of the reports that triggered my father's heart attack?' he says, his eyes reddening as he looks to the ceiling, as if for answers.
The memory of his once proud father lying halfnaked and surrounded by tubes on the hospital bed still hurts.
He remembers that just before his father died, the older man said: 'I cannot make it any more.' He made his only son promise to take care of his mother and sister.
Wong takes a while to compose himself before stammering apologetically: 'It's a difficult memory.'
Although he believes his sister, Val, and mother, Margaret, blamed him for the death at first, they are now close 'as I think I have done enough to redeem myself'.
Today, the bachelor lives in the East with his mother, whom he describes as being a 'happy age'. They are so close that his colleagues address wedding invitations to 'Bryan and Margaret'.
After his father's death, he toyed with the idea of quitting showbiz for good, but with no university qualifications, he felt he had no other career option.
'I considered selling insurance or houses, but for that I needed to go for a course. And with no money, how was I supposed to make sure there would be a roof over our heads?' he laments.
Ironically, it took the tragedy to make him the star he is today.
'The passing of my father made me realise that life is unpredictable. I decided not to restrain my actions and thoughts and just be myself and let people take it or leave it. That's when I started to enjoy hosting.'
In 1995, he was given the role of co-host in the Channel 8 lifestyle show, City Beat. The show provided the breakthrough that he needed as its light-hearted and witty style suited him.
He was with the show for five years, until he joined Singapore Press Holdings' now defunct TV station, MediaWorks, in 2000. After that station closed in 2004, he rejoined MediaCorp, and has been there since.
He has made a name for himself as a host of Chinese programmes, but will be appearing in his first MediaCorp drama in July. The Channel 8 show about life in the army was commissioned by the Ministry of Defence, and he co-stars with actors Tay Ping Hui and Rui En.
His title as one of the most recognisable male hosts in local showbiz was solidified when he won the Best Variety Show Host award at last year's Star Awards, organised by MediaCorp to celebrate its talents.
Wong says he is also keen to act or host in English, 'if someone is prepared to give me the chance'.
No more tears
WITH his boyish face, megawatt smile and confident exterior, Wong can pass off for a fresh-faced graduate who has yet to experience the stresses of the working world.
But his friends say that beneath that breezy facade, he is a worrier and someone who needs constant reassurances of his skills.
Good friend and MediaCorp colleague Kym Ng says: 'He cares a lot about how people perceive him, which can cause him some trouble in a career like this.'
Best friend Quan Yifeng, also a MediaCorp host, says that every time he misses out on an award, 'I have to tell him that he is still good even without it'.
Ng adds: 'It's ironic that Bryan is good, yet he doesn't believe it. Then again, he loves to be reminded.'
Indeed, barely five minutes after you meet, Wong declares to you his 'death vow' - a promise to never shed a tear on TV again.
Apparently, his managers had told him two years back to tone down his trademark 'cute and playful image'.
It is advice he took to heart, because he assures you that he is fed-up with being a cry-baby on TV and tired of being criticised for 'acting cute'.
'Being a host is about being yourself and showing your vulnerable side. Yet you can be lambasted after you get too emotionally involved,' he says.
In future, should his emotions get the better of him, 'I'll turn my back to the camera and walk away'.
He is sincere when he says he is grateful for the chance to 'rebrand myself to be a more serious and mature host'.
He adds: 'Besides, I'm quite done with being rowdy, making mistakes and getting lambasted.'
Effectively bilingual, he speaks in English at a machine-gun pace, pausing only for dramatic effect after serving a punch line, or just before he unleashes his loud boisterous laugh.
After he sets the 'crying record' straight, he delights in telling you that last year was 'fantastic' for him.
Not only did he get to be the sole host for Channel 8's reality show The Ultimate Comedian, but he also gave his hosting chops a serious workout on Channel U's financial programme, Dollars And Sense. It was a good experience, though he confesses 'there were a lot of terms I didn't understand, so I had to study my notes every night'.
He was also made spokesman for Korean car brand Ssangyong and drives a sponsored Ssangyong Actyon - a sports utility vehicle.
The icing on the cake was taking home the award for Best Variety Show Host for Home Decor Survivor, a home makeover show, at the Star Awards. It was his first for hosting, although he had been nominated four times before.
Despite over a decade of hosting programmes, he says the award has allowed him to finally call himself a 'certified host'.
'Winning the award is like getting a stamp of approval because before that, I thought I wasn't good enough,' says Wong, who also made it to last year's Top 10 Most Popular Male Artistes list, although this was not his first time.
Bittersweet chocolate
HIS late father was an electrician and his mother used to work as a cook at the Singapore Cheshire Home, a residence for the seriously disabled. His older sister, Val, now works as a financial planner.
Money was scarce when he was growing up. The family lived in a one-room flat in Chai Chee and Wong remembers being hungry often.
To save 40 cents every day, he walked from Chai Chee to Telok Kurau Primary School, rain or shine.
He would convert his savings to dollar bills, cleaning them with a sponge and lovingly ironing them before hiding them under a cupboard.
Occasionally, he would treat himself to chocolate, which he loves.
He has always been a Mummy's boy, he says, and for years thought that his father loved him less than his mother did.
He tells you about one memory that caused him pain for many years: His father used to give him a small bar of Van Houten chocolate but would give a box of Cadbury Milk Tray to Val.
'Because children see things plainly, smaller presents mean lesser love,' he says wryly.
But he admits to having a bad habit of 'thinking too much, and reading too much into things'.
In retrospect, he believes his father, who used to painstakingly hand-make toy guns and kites for him to play with, 'loved both my sister and me equally'.
Looking thoughtful, he says: 'As I've grown older, I reflect on things that have haunted me in the past, and I've realised that my life was not that bad after all.'
He studied at Tanjong Katong Secondary Technical School, and went on to Townsville Institute, a pre-university centre, where he was a student counsellor. By that time, the family's finances had improved.
They had moved to a four-bedroom flat in Tampines and to make up for his past deprivation, he gorged on chocolate, sometimes falling asleep with it in his mouth.
He grew fat and was called 'fatty bom bom' by his classmates. In Secondary 3, he went to a tailor to get some trousers made and was shocked to find he had a 36-inch waist.
He put himself on a diet and after six months of daily runs and doing aerobics to pop tunes by Sheena Easton, got his waist down to 28 inches.
Today, he sports a trim 30-inch waist on a 1.8m frame.
'I am very persistent, and when I set my mind on something, I will make sure it's done,' he says.
He adds that in recent years, he has found a term for 'this kind of behaviour'.
He deadpans: 'It's called being a perfectionist.'
Child star
HE HAD an early start in showbiz.
When he was eight, he was one of 24 children - including future MediaCorp starlet Fann Wong - to be selected out of over 2,000 hopefuls to take part in an acting course organised by the then Singapore Broadcasting Corporation (SBC).
He acted in children's dramas for the next four years.
After his national service, he signed with Carrie Models, making good money and enjoying 'strutting around in fancy clothes'.
In 1992, TCS approached Carrie Models to look for actors for a new English drama. He was an obvious choice.
Unfortunately, the show was Masters Of The Sea. He played the role of Andrew Cheng, a rich kid with dreams of becoming a concert pianist.
The melodramatic family drama was so universally panned that all the actors in it - other than Wong Li-Lin - were temporarily blacklisted from auditioning for other shows, he says.
He adds that he was told to keep a low profile while the memory of the failed show was still fresh.
Still, the mention of the show does not make him cringe.
'As bad as it was, I had a wonderful time with the cast,' he says. 'It's just unfortunate that we all had different accents - British, Singlish and American.'
He tendered his resignation, but as fate had it, TCS' Chinese variety show division was short of hosts. He auditioned, got the job and started life as a Channel 8 host.
He knew he was making progress when people started to approach him to thank him for his honest remarks on TV.
'I don't fake things, and people appreciated my not treating them like idiots with no eyes,' he says, explaining why he won't hesitate to poke fun at a singer with little talent or make a face should he taste something he doesn't like.
A good host, he says, should be able to judge a person's character even with just brief contact.
'This is how I know whether they are able to receive a bit of sweet and sour remarks,' he says.
So I ask him how he would judge me, given how we've just met. He says with a grin: 'You're leaning forward and your arms are uncrossed. I think you can take a little bit of teasing.'
Other than City Beat, he also hosted big events, including the National Kidney Foundation and the President's Star Charity shows.
In 2000, he joined MediaWorks because he wanted to be a part of something different.
It was 'a big risk', but he did it because he wanted to follow his mentor, Mr Man Shu Sum, who had been appointed MediaWorks' chief operating officer.
Four years later, the station closed. He was filming a period drama, The Chronology Of The Deities And Demons, alone in China when Quan phoned him with the news. Ironically, he was preparing to start filming a scene of celebration.
He cried 'for the loss of the MediaWorks family'. Then he applied eyedrops to get rid of the redness and went back to work.
'I played the part of the dimwit - I had to laugh and laugh,' he recalls solemnly.
He harboured some initial reservations about rejoining MediaCorp because 'I was scared people would be nasty and call us traitors'.
He now regrets having such sentiments. He has not met one person who had a bad thing to say. 'It was cowardly to judge without giving them the benefit of the doubt,' he says.
It took him six months to settle back in, but the failure of MediaWorks was also a wake-up call to him to be more serious about planning his future.
Together with Quan and celebrity hairstylist Addy Lee, he opened Heatwave by Monsoon, a hair salon in Marina Square, in 2005.
Last September, he started a design firm with three friends who are architects and designers.
In between filming, he sketches designs for the interiors of homes, shops for and delivers materials, and meets clients.
While he still loves showbiz, he has already thought about his second career - as a host in his own boutique hotel.
He dreams about knowing every guest by name and serving them himself.
With a chuckle, he adds: 'I'll tell them about my past years in the limelight, and how I've been stabbed and walked over and tortured, from sunrise till sunset.'
Quite the drama queen, Bryan Wong. Once a host, always a host.
Flashback
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On growing up poor
'I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried about competition, but at the same time, I'm not going to live my life in constant fear. I don't want to take three steps forward and 10 steps back'
On whether he is afraid of new talent
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