Do You Remember These Erstwhile Ch 8 Actors?

The doe-eyed former model, whose most memorable facial trait was the mole on her forehead (which she had removed after she quit full-time acting), started her career in showbiz after coming in third in Star Search 1995. Her memorable portrayal of a prison convict in her debut drama Beyond Dawn (1996) bagged her the Best Newcomer title at the Star Awards the same year. She was also the envy of women everywhere when she snagged a role opposite Aaron Kwok and Daniel Wu in the action flick 2000 A.D.

Though she declines to elaborate on it, Phyllis, now 44, worked as a patient relationship manager at an aesthetic clinic and left the job after she got married to an Australian businessman in 2012. Watch her as a possessive cougar giving 32-year-old Zhang Zhenhuan a hard time.

Millennials may not recognise her but Tang Miaoling was the TV sweetheart who won the hearts of viewers in Pretty Faces (1991), where she played the good friend of Zoe Tay’s iconic character, Bobo. She quit in 1994 after acting for five years in search of a job with more regular hours. Regular hours? Sadly, her ambitions clearly did not lie in showbiz.

The 49-year-old part-time real estate agent, who is married with two children aged 18 and 14, decided to return to acting as her kids are all grown up now. These days, she can be seen playing a coffee stall owner in 118 2, acting alongside old pals Chew Chor Meng and Pan Lingling. Incidentally, Chor Meng, 48, played her boyfriend in the Ch 5 sitcom Mr Kiasu in 2001. Her next role is playing a gold-digger mum in upcoming Ch 8 blockbuster The Lead, starring Rebecca Lim, Shaun Chen and Andie Chen. Er, we hope the producers aren’t so cruel as to make her play Shaun’s mum.

Best known for playing second fiddle to Zoe Tay in The Unbeatables as her younger sis, Cassandra reportedly left acting to relocate to Hongkong with her second husband, and son Lukas from her first marriage of three years to a German man.

The 43-year-old can be seen in 118 2 opposite Hongkong actor Ha Yu as his ex-wife. She will also be seen in the upcoming Ch 8 blockbuster The Lead as the owner of a canteen at a TV station… Is it just us or do former actresses in their 40s get way more interesting roles when they return to Ch 8?

The boyish actor may have impressed viewers with his turn as a rich man’s son in the hit drama Tofu Street in 1996, but it was his headline-grabbing stint as Mr Quan Yifeng that hooked public interest. Peter married the Ch 8 host in 1998 and the tumultuous union ended in a high-profile divorce 10 years later. These days, it’s their 18-year-old daughter, budding actress Eleanor, who’s turning heads (good luck on the Mu Lan auditions, Eleanor!). After his divorce, Peter got hooked on gambling and racked up a debt of almost $100,000…

… Happily, in a classic story of redemption, the born-again Christian now earns an honest living driving a cab, gradually paying off his gambling debt with his monthly salary, which the 48-year-old says is a quarter of what he used to get during his showbiz days. He remarried in 2011 and now has two sons. In Hero, he gamely portrayed a role that mimicked his real life story. We certainly hope his most recent turn in Dream Coder, where he played a cheating husband opposite Joanne Peh’s character was not inspired by his own life.

She’s always referred to as the “Little Genie” but Fiona Xie was always most famous for being Fiona Xie the celebrity. Her sexy minx rep was cemented when she ran down Orchard Road in a bikini for the seminal scene in The Champion. Sadly, she quit showbiz after she (in)famously dropped out of Ch 8 drama Together at the last minute in 2009 and moved to Hongkong with her then Australian-American boyfriend.

After a seven-year hiatus, Fiona, 35, returned to TV playing a psychiatrist in Ch 5 drama Left Behind. She stepped it up and showed how truly serious she was about changing her image when she strapped on rubber gloves to tackle cockroaches and bedbugs in the cluttered homes of RenovAID. In her own words, “my mama would be proud”.

She was Mrs Lobang King version 2.0. Lynn Poh inherited Quan Yifeng’s star-making role as blur queen Zhu Zhu in Ch 8 sitcom Don’t Worry Be Happy when the latter was embroiled in a controversy after she fought with a bowling alley assistant and was fined $1000 in 1996.

Lynn, 40, was most recently seen playing the devoted Japanese wife to Chen Hanwei in Ch 8 drama The Truth Seekers, which also starred Desmond Tan and Rebecca Lim.