Dha_Zai

2. Some slices of Ming

- his family are higher echelons, obscenely reach & old; Ming is an heir – noblesse oblige: establish a heterosexual family, produce a male heir, have an untarnished reputation, augment the family's fortune and influence;

- Ming is a gay – what a blow!

Ming & the golden ratio or how much has Ming changed

I presume, you are outraged by Ming's behaviour towards Joe2. The last point on the list below contains the answer.


-Ming ceased worshipping Tong, who was an absolute figure of authority for younger Ming;

- fell in love with Joe;

- pursues a different career;

- has become more independent without severing ties with his family;

- hasn't pandered his parents' wishes to establish a heterosexual family;

- understood the difference between love to a person and infatuation with the golden ratio;

- understood what a stable and safe relationship feels like (profound commitment, trust, compassion);

- he admits his guilt and expresses remorse;

- his insecure attachment issue has significantly deepened (Ming perceives Joe's dissapearance as an act of abandonment and punishment; it hurts so much that he reacts violently and callously to Joe2 who resembles Joe1 to the core. It's quite a normal emotional response for an individual with sociopathic traits)

Oh, don't plunge into my construct so eagerly. I'm fascinated with Mek delivering his lines with so strong a need to get them out that it feels overwhelming, and you can't resist but fall into his orbit.

I appreciate that you found it worth reading. Actually, it's been written on request and not finished yet.

If my ear serves me right, Tong has a baritone – noble and emotive - whose timber reminds me of a cello: the dark richness so deftly slipping to a light singing-like quality on the upper range.
You know, baritones are often called the chameleons of the opera world – they are able to play villains as well as heroes or boastful warriors.
Tong is, beyond a shadow of a doubt, a great villain, and his voice makes me feel weak in my knees.

Some glimpses of Tong (3) Warning: Tong & his voice – I'm spellbound

Tong has a charming voice and he knows how to use it so that you will feel butterflies in your stomach: long pauses where you don't expect any; a silky, soft tone (never high-pitched) lulling you into deceitful calmness; his peculiar changes in voice modulation, – oh, my stars and garters! Perhaps it's only me who is so enthralled.
The niceties of short sentences and singular words (his regrets & excuses: he's short of time, he can't give Ming his full attention which his nong deserves; his veiled threats to Joe; his “aggrieved victim” performance on the phone and feverish justifications, – all of them are so nicely cooked, one cannot resist.

I’m absolutely under the spell of how the actor playing Tong portrays his character.
TBC

Some glimpses of Tong (2) Warning: Tong & his psychopathic tricks

An introductory statement: I would venture to say that Tong exhibits many traits of a psychopathic individual, thus he isn't able to feel fear, hate or love as normal people do.

When he talks about his life, he speaks in terms of cause and effect, means to achieve the result and never about feelings, emotions or safety.
Have you noticed that he always emphasises his words with gestures generally considered as amicable & expressing attentiveness? In most cases he leans towards a person & softly touches or pats on the shoulder. Gesture are said to give voice to the inexpressible, but, strangely enough, you feel that there's something wrong about his posture, gestures & voice – they aren't consonant with what his words imply.

As I've previously mentioned. Tong perceives people as pieces on his chessboard: he controls the moves, he's the player. Tong objectifies people, it means that he degrades those around him to mere tools: Ming & Mei – exceptionally worthwhile fans holding his ladder to the sky; Joe - so unpretencious and sincere – a perfect stunt double maintaining Tong's reputation of an outstanding action star.

Tong thoroughly calculates benefits & drawbacks, plans everything well in advance, takes big risks and wins. He manipulates others to get his needs meet, provokes or convinces them to do things they wouldn't normally do; he puts people off their stroke making them expose their soft underbelly, so they aren't able to think coherently enough letting Tong have everything well in hand.

Interacting with different people Tong uses different tricks to demean them or evoke a strong emotional response. For instance, expressing a favourable judgement of Joe's efforts he instantaneously whips him with disdainful remarks. And you can painfully witness how a serene smile slowly bit by bit slips down Joe's face leaving behind a destorted expression of sheer confusion & bewilderment.
As far as Ming is concerned, Tong has to tread much more carefully with a volatile, having a propensity to jealousy and possessiveness young man. Ming treasures family & loalty over anything else so Tong easily propels him into agonies of guilt over Mei or committing an assault on Joe.

Some glimpses of Tong (1)

That's so clear from the very beginning that Tong's ultimate goal is to gain a higher, more prestigious social status and power through entering into wedlock with an heiress of the old money family and produce children. Becoming a part of the prosperous Akkrayotha family whose genealogical tree resembles a 1400-year-old maidenhair tree ensures him ironclad legal status of belonging to bon ton.

Thoughts about Tong (2).
For Tong Joe is a perfect, humble nobody so capable, yet disposable, whose name never appears in credits, which adds glory to Tong's image as his fans are totally unaware of who actually performs all the stunts and physically strenuous scenes. Joe is a mere pawn - collateral damage - on the chessboard of Tong's game, and all of a sudden that miserable pawn is given a unique opportunity to get promoted to a Queen. Tong who is strategic, analytical, and logical in his thinking feels threatened as his final objective to get to the top of the social food chain - old money and old establishment – hasn't been achieved yet, and he is on the verge of downfall: if scandal erupts, his lies are revealed that will be the end of him. Should I say that fans can be vultures to their idols who deceive them or haven't lived up to their expectations?
And in this situation Tong keeps his composure: not a ripple of a true emotion, only a one-sided little smirk. You say he’s a grand actor; I say he's a grand master of manipulation.
Tong hides his arrogance behind charming smiles, covers his taunts with a little bit of flattery or jokes; uses friendly gestures to distract people from spoken lies; scarcely ever raises his voice and seems unfazed keeping such a calm demeanor when everyone around him is just boiling with emotions. Have you noticed how fairly neutral his tone remains throughout the conversations in emotionally tense situations? Tong speaks in so controlled a manner as if he literally had nerves of steel. He is unbelievably composed! And his facial expressions - oh, my stars and garters!
In EP 6, being dissatisfied with his stand-in Tong says about Joe, „The perfect one isn't here.” A flat tone, stillness of facial muscles – you won't persuade me it's owing to Botox injections – no sign of regret or remorse. If Tong was lying on a shrink's couch, he would say about Joe, "I had to teach him a lesson. He should’ve known better than encroached on my territory.”

When it comes to manipulation, isn't it obvious enough that our entire world not only the motion picture industry is built to some degree on people manipulating each other. A little bit of manipulation is even healthy; for instance, if you need to find ways to bring people towards where you want them to go, you need to slither inside their head to figure out what cues will take them in the direction you want them to. This trait can be specifically beneficial in the profession of an actor since wringing out of viewers a desirable emotional response becomes as easy as taking candy from a baby.
Given Tong's popularity – as far as I remember he has been idolised and hailed as the country's most famous lover or most desired bachelor, something like that, I can be wrong – he got this “acting skill” down to a science. So perfectly well does he know how to stir up one's feelings in order to exert a vast impact on the target audience that it's rather hard to believe he isn't able to experience genuine emotions towards others. All Tong's actions either on or off screen are marked by shrewd consideration of self-interest. Of course, I acknowledge that everyone pursues self-interest to an extent, but a psychopathic individual has little empathy or consideration of others.
And for a curtain call, no one dares to distract Ming from worshipping an effulgent star of Tong! The Akkrayotha family is his breeding grounds.
X

Thoughts about Tong (1). Warning: long, chaotic, clipped.
You could stigmatize Tong as an evil personified. You could call him a puppeteer pulling the strings. I'd rather say that Tong exhibits the Dark Triad traits: he's narcissistic, manipulative and psychopathic to a certain extent.
Despite sounding sinister & fear-provoking some traits inherent to the Dark Triad can be not necessarily bad.
For instance, Tong's narcissistic enthusiasm as well as capability of getting on after failing miserably or making a mistake must've helped him a great deal to build a career in a highly competitive and ruthless world of cinematography exploiting individual's physical pulchritude and ability to impersonate someone else.
His thirst for admiration and appreciation is the potent driving force impelling him to strive for success. You can imagine young Tong as an aspiring professional being so much taken up with the desire to find himself victorious in the limelight that everyone else around him unwittingly caught the fever to excel. First, he had to make a name for himself, so that the name can work for him. I assume that striking up an acquaintance with The Akkrayotha siblings was fateful for him or maybe even became a turning point in his career.
He got right to the top of the highest-grossing actors list when, you know, it doesn't matter how good or bad the film is, Tong can pull the box office up.
And the last but not least stroke of brush – Tong has got a perfect stand-in whose impressive performance immensely contributed to Tong's popularity. Tong is able to conceal the fact that his spectacular, breathtaking stunts have actually been performed by a stunt double with the body perfectly mirroring his.
It should be admitted that Tong is a perfectionist, however it's cold perfectionism of a psychopathic individual meticulously weighing all pros and cons of a situation to squeeze the maximum out of it for himself.

As for Tong's reputation amongst people from the industry, it cannot be preserved as unblemished as it was when he got his foot in the door.
I presume that interacting with people in positions of power or great influence, Tong takes on a more restrained and controlled persona. Oh, his relationship with Ming is a separate opera, so to say.
Tong's grandiose ideas about his value and irreplaceability, his thinking that other people are inferior to him inevitably lead him up to becoming less careful about verbalising his thoughts & intentions and behaving in a far more arrogant & dismissive way to the people he works with. So, everyone at the film set has to acquiescently put up with big-star whimsical snits & cutesy-wutesy quips.
Tong is not punctual; he complains about little things; doesn't remember people's names or... what's more likely, twisting the name is his way to stab one he dislikes; avoids appearing in the scenes where his face isn't shown; demands his stunt double appear in certain scenes in his stead under not so subtle a pretext of being tired or unwell; treats a novice actress with disdain (the pool scene); openly disrespects & provokes the director, – the list is long & far away from being complete.

However, Tong never crosses the line: even in a hideous scene that occurs in EP 4 when director Pao shoves Tong in the face that the leading role is going to be given to his stand-in. I could barely stomach it when Pao, unable to find a better way to get even with Tong for being notoriously subjected to indignities and discomforts, makes his final move and takes advantage of Joe.
TBC