Liu Xiaoqing

Liu Xiaoqing (Chinese: 刘晓庆; pinyin: Líu Xiǎoqìng) is a very famous Chinese actress. Born on October 30, 1951, in Fuling, Sichuan Province, she appeared in some of the classic movies in mainland China before she was 30 — Qiao Zhe Yi Jia Zi (Look at This Family) in 1979 and Xiao Hua (The Little Flower, starring Chen Chong) in 1980. Her roles, though small, were memorable. Her breakthrough role was her portrayal of Cixi, a ruthless (and the last) empress of Qing Dynasty, in a series of two films — Huo Shao Yuan Ming Yuan (The Burning of the Imperial Palace) in 1983 and Chui Lian Ting Zheng (Reign Behind the Curtain) in 1984. Her portrayal of Cixi has won her numerous awards in Chinese film festivals and she reprised the role later in two more unrelated films.

Her offscreen life is as colorful as the one onscreen. She first made a splash in the life of Chinese people by publishing a short autobiography My Road. And a famous quotation from this autobiography is "It is tough to be a human; but it is tougher to be a woman; it is the toughest to be a famous woman; and it is so tough that the toughness is beyond anybody's imagination to be a single famous woman." She was dubbed as the "richest woman in China" since she successfully ventured into real estate business when China was modernizing itself and becoming more capitalistic. She literally became a billionaire overnight. She promoted her capitalistic success by publishing a book titled From A Movie Star to A Billionairess. She was also linked to have offscreen romance with some of her co-stars.

One of her latest film was Chun Hua Kai in 2004 in which she played the title role, Chunhua.