Valerie Chow
| Valerie Chow | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese name | 周嘉玲 | ||||
| Pinyin | Zhōu Jiālíng (Mandarin) | ||||
| Jyutping | Zau1 Gaa1ling4 (Cantonese) | ||||
| Birth name | Valerie Chow Kar-Ling | ||||
| Born |
16 December 1970 Vancouver, British Columbia |
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| Other name(s) | Rachel Shane | ||||
| Years active | 1990s–2000s | ||||
| Spouse(s) | Darryl Goveas (2005–present) | ||||
| Children | Carla (b. 12 March 2008) | ||||
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Valerie Chow, aka Rachel Shane (born 16 December 1970) is a former Hong Kong actress, fashion publicist and entrepreneur.
She has starred in numerous films and several television series, most memorably in Wong Kar-wai's internationally acclaimed 1994 feature, Chungking Express, which earned her a nomination for Best Supporting Actress at the 14th Hong Kong Film Awards. A former Miss Hong Kong runner-up (1991), she is also the first Chinese model to be signed by US cosmetics company Revlon in 1998.
Since 2003, she has worked primarily as a fashion publicist and in 2010, opened Mama Kid, a children's designer concept store in Hong Kong.
Valerie Chow was born and raised in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, the only child to an upper middle-class family. Her father was a property developer whom she describes as "tough, direct, and self-disciplined." Chow had spent some of her teens during the mid-80s in Hong Kong where she attended Maryknoll Convent School and completed Form-5. She described these years as having been "difficult" and "stressful," and had initially returned to Vancouver before moving to Hong Kong a second time in the summer of 1991. It was then that she joined the 1991 Miss Hong Kong Pageant, in which she placed first runner-up. This would become her introduction to the entertainment industry. Following a brief study break where she studied Law at the University of Hong Kong, Chow began her career in 1993 as a television presenter for the lifestyle programme, Eye on Hong Kong on TVB Pearl. Her first film credit was a cameo in Peter Chan's He Ain't Heavy, He's My Father, released in December of that year.
As a newcomer, she drew some controversy for her role in the Category-III box office hit Twenty Something, which dealt with sexually explicit themes considered shocking for a former beauty queen. Her following role in Wong Kar-Wai's widely acclaimed Chungking Express also made an impression, which garnered her critical attention and a Hong Kong Film Award nomination. Her career however, took a sharp turn in late 1994 when she played the much maligned role of a "homewrecker" in a hugely popular television series. The image of seductress came to be closely associated with Chow, further cemented by rumours of her alleged affair with Tony Leung Chiu Wai (then already dating long-time partner Carina Lau), whose music videos and album cover she also featured in. In the subsequent period between 1995–97, she was cast in a string of B-movies, usually in the role of a villain. The more notable of these were that of the female terrorist in Jing Wong's High Risk, a moderately successful box-office hit, and a guest appearance in Tsui Hark's acclaimed wu-xia feature The Blade.
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