Andy Lau

In 1981, Lau signed up for the artist training program offered by TVB, which is where his acting career began.[1] The lead role which led to his initial popularity was in the 1982 TVB series The Emissary. In 1983, Lau's role as "Yang Guo" in the TVB wuxia series, The Return of the Condor Heroes (神鵰俠侶) further increased his popularity. From then on, he would take on many of the lead roles in many TVB series.

In September 1983, TVB was looking to increase their ratings in competition with Korea and Japan for the best variety show. The station then created the show TVB All-star challenge (星光熠熠勁爭輝) featuring almost the entire line-up of the most popular actors and singers at the time.[14] Lau, along with Tony Leung, Michael Miu, Felix Wong, and Kent Tong were branded as the "Five Tiger Generals of TVB" (無線五虎將) due to their popularity on the show.[14]

In the late '80s, Lau left TVB due to contract problems. TVB wanted to bind him to an exclusive five-year contract which Lau refused to sign, so TVB blacklisted him. He then focused on his film career.[6]

Lau's hand print and autograph at the Avenue of Stars in Hong Kong

In 1981, Lau made a guest appearance in one of Susanna Kwan's music videos and caught the eye of the manager Teddy Robin.[15] Teddy Robin then gave Lau a chance to play a small role in the film, Once Upon a Rainbow.[15] This was the first step in Lau's film acting career.[15] He landed a role in Ann Hui's 1982 film, Boat People.[1] Later in 1983 he had his first leading role in the Shaw Brothers-produced action film, On the Wrong Track.[16]

One of his early leading roles included the more serious 1988 film, The Truth (法內情). However, Lau is best known in films for his (often) recurring roles as a "Heroic Gangster", such as Wong Kar-wai's 1988 film As Tears Go By, and Benny Chan's 1990 film A Moment of Romance.

Though a respectable actor, Lau was initially known more for his handsome features. Some people he has worked with have called him a matinee idol, but he has claimed to be an artist.[4] Lau has proved his acting skills in many of his films. His first major acting prize came with A Fighter's Blues, which was his first Golden Bauhinia Award for Best Actor.[17] He would win the Hong Kong Film Award for Best Actor award that year for Running Out of Time.[18] In 2004, he won the prestigious Golden Horse Award for Best Leading Actor for his performance in Infernal Affairs III, the second sequel to the popular Infernal Affairs.[19] He is also known to Western audiences for starring in wuxia films such as House of Flying Daggers, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Cinematography.

In 2005, Lau received the "No.1 Box office Actor 1985–2005" award of Hong Kong, yielding a box office total of HKD 1,733,275,816 for shooting 108 films in the past 20 years.[6][8] The aforementioned figure is as compared to the first runner-up Stephen Chow's (HKD 1,317,452,311) and second runner-up Jackie Chan's (HKD 894,090,962). "I've never imagined that it would be as much as 1.7 billion!" he told reporters. For his contributions, a wax figure of Lau was unveiled on 1 June 2005 at the Madame Tussauds Hong Kong.[20] In 2007, Lau also received the "Nielsen Box Office Star of Asia" award by the Nielsen Company (ACNielsen).[3]

In 1991, Lau set up his own film production company, Teamwork Motion Pictures, which in 2002 was renamed to Focus Group Holdings Limited. His contributions in the film industry as well as his involvement in nurturing new talent in the Asian film industry led him to winning the "Asian Filmmaker of the Year" award in the Pusan International Film Festival in 2006.[3] Some of the films Lau has produced include award-winning films, Made in Hong Kong and A Simple Life, his 100th film, A Fighter's Blues, the Chinese digital film Crazy Stone, and big budget action blockbusters, Firestorm and Shock Wave.

Andy Lau in concert 2011

Lau released his first album "Only Know that I Still Love You" (只知道此刻愛你) under Capital Artists in 1985.[6] This album was not a big hit,[6] but despite having a voice not traditionally associated with popular music, Lau's hard work and perseverance resulted in him becoming one of the most successful singers in Cantopop. His singing career reached stellar status in 1990 with the release of the album entitled "Would It Be Possible" (可不可以), and his subsequent releases only solidified his status as a marketable singer.[6] For that song, he would win his first 1990 RTHK Top 10 Gold Songs Awards. He would then win at least one RTHK award category every year consecutively until the year 2007.

From Jade Solid Gold Top 10 Awards he has won the "Most Popular Hong Kong Male Artist" award 7 times and the "Asia Pacific Most Popular Hong Kong Male Artist" award 15 times.[6] He was also entered into the Guinness World Records for "Most Awards Won by a Cantopop Male Artist". By April 2000, he had already won an unprecedented total of 292 awards.[6]

Many of Lau's songs quickly topped the music charts not only in Hong Kong, but also in Taiwan, Mainland China, and in many different parts of Asia. Some of his most notable hits include "The Days We Spent Together" (一起走過的日子), "If You Are My Legend" (如果你是我的傳說), "The Tide" (潮水), "Forget Love Potion" (忘情水), "True Forever" (真永遠), "Chinese people" (中國人), "Love You Forever" (愛你一萬年), "You Are My Woman" (你是我的女人), and "Secret Admiration" (暗裡著迷). Besides singing in Cantonese and Mandarin, he has also sung in other languages such as English, Japanese, Malay, and Taiwanese Hokkien. One example of a Hokkien song was (世界第一等), and he has also performed a Cantonese cover of Joan Jett's "I Hate Myself for Loving You" (我恨我痴心).

Since the early 1990s, Lau, along with Jacky Cheung, Aaron Kwok, and Leon Lai have been referred to by the Chinese media as the Cantopop Four Heavenly Kings.[5]

Lau sang alongside Jackie Chan during a part of the 2008 Summer Olympics closing ceremony on 24 August 2008. In addition, Lau, who has been supporting disabled athletes in Hong Kong for more than a decade, was appointed as the Goodwill ambassador for the 2008 Summer Paralympics.[21] He led other performers in singing and performing the song "Everyone is No.1" at the Beijing National Stadium just a few hours before the 2008 Paralympics opening ceremony began.[22] He also sang the theme song "Flying with the Dream" with Han Hong during the Paralympics opening ceremony on 6 September 2008.[21]

As a songwriter, most of Lau's creative works are as a lyricist. To date, Lau has composed five songs, which include "Missing You Everyday" (天天想你), co-composed with Eric Moo,[23] "If One Day" (如果有一天),[24] "Happiness Is So Far... So Sweet" (幸福.這麼遠.那麼甜),[25] "Spending the Rest Our Lives Together" (餘生一起過),[26] all of which he also sang and wrote the lyrics, and "Brothers" (兄弟), the theme song of his 2004 film, Jiang Hu, which he wrote the lyrics for but was sung by co-star Chapman To.[27] Most of the songs he has written have been for himself.

To date, Lau has written and published two books. They include his 1995 autobiography, This Is How I Grew Up (我是這樣長大的) written in prose,[28] and his 2012 book, My 30 Work Days (我的30個工作天), which is a collection of his 30 personal diaries he wrote while working on the 2011 film, A Simple Life.[29]

Lau is alleged to have been featured as a non-player character (NPC) as a random pedestrian in a sandbox-style action video game called Prototype. On 6 July, the Hong Kong local newspapers Headline Daily and Sing Tao Daily reported on Lau's cameo.[30]