Yuen Qiu AKA The Landlady From Kungfu Hustle Was Quite The Beauty When She Was A Young Student

Maybe it's because of how iconic Yuen Qiu's styling was in the movie, it's become almost impossible to imagine her not looking like The Landlady.

But as it turns out, Yuen Qiu was quite the beauty in her youth. In fact, the actress was reportedly known as one of the prettiest girls in her school.

However, she wasn’t some delicate princess. When she was 10, she became part of the Seven Little Fortunes, a Peking opera performance troupe consisting of the China Drama Academy’s best students who were trained in acrobatics and martial arts.

Other members of the troupe included Jackie Chan and Sammo Hung, so yes, she could kick butt just as well as the rest of them.

Unfortunately, Yuen Qiu had trouble finding fame after joining showbiz as a stuntwoman.

Before Kungfu Hustle came along, one of her more notable film appearances was in the 1974 James Bond flick The Man with the Golden Gun, where she had a small role as the butt-kicking niece of one of the characters.

In 1985, she married martial arts director Lu Chun Ku and retired from acting to concentrate on taking care of their two children. Although Jackie and Sammo offered to help relaunch her career, it wasn’t until 18 years later when she made her comeback.

And that comeback was, as you may have guessed, in Kungfu Hustle, and the story goes like this: In 2003, Yuen Qiu accompanied two of her friends to the auditions for the movie, where she caught director-producer-star Stephen Chow’s eye just by smoking in a corner with a “disdainful expression” on her face.

According to reports, Stephen wanted to cast Yuen Qiu so badly that he went to her house to try and convince her to act again. She was smoking and playing mahjong when he came, and impatiently asked him “What do you want? Don’t stop me from playing mahjong” before going off to a corner to read a newspaper.

Instead of being offended by her curt response, Stephen’s eyes lit up. He had found his Landlady.

Despite the rather rocky start to their working relationship, Yuen Qiu was very dedicated to the role and willingly gained 14kg in two months before filming started. The part won her Best Supporting Actress at the 2005 Golden Horse Awards and helped revive her career.

Photos: IMDb, Weibo, YouTube, Yuen Qiu/Weibo