Why Chen Tian Wen is still stunned like vegetable

SINGAPORE – Could this be Chen Tian Wen’s year at the Star Awards? The 52-year-old acting veteran is up for awards in not one, but three categories.

For one thing, Chen is on the Top 10 Most Popular Male Artistes list for the first time since 2002.

“I was quite stunned like vegetable,” he quipped about his nomination, pointing out that it has been nearly 20 years since he took home his one and only Popular trophy — back in 1997.

Chen’s career renaissance took off last year with the viral success of his Mr Unbelievable character from the Channel 5 sitcom Spouse For House, whose catchphrase is the musically-delivered “stunned like vegetable”. Mr Unbelievable also had his own movie, released in December.

The other awards Chen is up for are Best Supporting Actor, for his work in the drama 118; and the Evergreen Award, a new category for actors over the age of 50. If he could take home only one award, though, the one he wants the most is the acting award.

“At least, that would be a form of acknowledgement,” he said. “(The) Top 10 is a game for the young people. If Mr Unbelievable has one million supporters and each one of them made a call, that would probably be enough, right?”

The “young people” Chen needs to surpass include first-time Top 10 nominees Aloysius Pang, Jeffrey Xu, Sheila Sim and Chua Enlai.

For Pang, who took Best Newcomer last year, the nomination comes as a reward for his hectic year of constantly appearing on viewers’ screens. The 25-year-old was in six dramas, including the currently-airing Life — Fear Not.

“I was worried that people might get sick of me because they were seeing me so often on TV,” he said.

The opposite is evidently true — but popularity, while important, isn’t something this serious actor is preoccupied with.

“You cannot make someone like you. I don’t like to think about things that I cannot control,” he said.

In contrast, Sim made no bones about how “thrilled and excited” she was to be in the Top 40 for the first time. “It almost feels surreal because I grew up watching the Star Awards and I always wondered how (the nominees) felt ... And now, I’m one of them. It feels really, really good,” beamed the 31-year-old, who also received a nod for Best Supporting Actress for her work in 118.

While Pang and Sim are seeing success early on in their careers, it’s a different story for Xu, who is in the running for Top 10 Most Popular Artiste for the first time in his five-year career.

“I just feel that my hard work in the past year has been noticed. The company has also given me lots of opportunities — I have had quite a lot of exposure this year. What I’m most grateful for is the feeling that, as a non-Singaporean, I have been accepted and acknowledged by Singaporeans,” the Shanghai-born 27-year-old said.

Also reappearing on the Top 40 list after being left out last year are popular “duke” Zhang Zhen Huan; Life — Fear Not’s Zhang Yaodong, whose last nomination — and win — was in 2012; and erstwhile “princess” Jesseca Liu, whose new acting contract with Mediacorp made her eligible for the first time since 2010.

Left out in the cold this year is de facto leader of the “dukes”, Desmond Tan, whose many high-profile endorsement deals are evidently no indicator of his popularity. Fans were shocked when his name wasn’t called out for a Top 10 trophy last year; this year, even a nomination has been denied to the 30-year-old, who spent most of his year working in Channel 5 and appeared in only one Mandarin drama.

Another “duke” missing from the list is Ian Fang, who scored his first Top 10 award last year. Fang appeared in four dramas during the year, but perhaps detrimentally for him, was assigned to play whiny, ignoble characters in each one.

It may seem inexplicable that Tan and Fang have been displaced by the self-professedly Mandarin-challenged Chua Enlai, who appeared only in variety programmes and not dramas, but it’s worth noting that Chua began appearing on television as far back as the 1990s, while Tan’s and Fang’s careers are eight and five years old respectively.

Still, one thing is sure in the popularity game: You can’t make all of the people love you all of the time.

For the list of nominees and voting details, visit http://tv.toggle.sg/en/channel8/shows/star-awards-2016

Catch the Star Awards Part 1 on April 17 at 7pm (Walk Of Fame at 5.30pm) and Part 2 on April 24 at 7pm (Post-show party at 10.30pm) on Mediacorp TV Channel 8.