When I first went to Hong Kong 25 years ago, I came as a lover of Hong Kong Cinema, especially martial arts movies. I met my friend and colleague, Bey Logan, who is a walking encyclopedia of that genre. I also met many other incredible people like Jackie Chan, John Woo, and the great producer Peter Lam. It was just an extraordinary group, but of all these people, no one stood out more than Sir David Tang (who wasn’t a “Sir” at the time).
I first met David at his restaurant the China Club because one of my best friends in life, Giuseppe Cipriani, owned the restaurant just below it on the top floors of a skyscraper. That’s how space works in Hong Kong — you can’t have a restaurant on the ground floor.
It was love at first sight with David. What a rascal, rogue, and imperial gentleman who had no tolerance for bullshit whatsoever. “Opinionated” is a word we think of when someone makes a salty political comment and David was one of the most politically incorrect human beings I have ever met. As the producer of The Producers on Broadway, I told Mel Brooks right after a run through, “that is the most politically incorrect theatre I’ve ever see”. Mel responded: “That’s the idea!” And in the same spirit, that was David’s idea about life. He suffered no fools gladly and called everything as he saw it.