31 Facts About Michelle Reis

Michelle Reis was born in Macau, then a Portuguese colony, on 20 June 1970 as Michele Monique Michelle Reis.

Michelle Reis did not acquire her Chinese name, Lee Ka Yan or Li Jiaxin, until after elementary school.

Michelle Reis is of mixed ancestry; her father, Francis Reis, was a Hong Kong-born ethnically Portuguese Macanese, and her mother, Wu Guofang, is Chinese and was raised in Shanghai before moving to British Hong Kong after World War II.

Michelle Reis has an older sister, born in August 1962, known as "Yuet Chi".

Michelle Reis recalls her childhood being devoid of toys or new clothes and dominated by "her mother's tears and parents' endless bickering".

Michelle Reis's father became more absent, resulting in Reis being raised primarily by her mother.

Francis Michelle Reis was unsuccessful in his career, "achieving nothing", resulting in the family living in poverty.

Wu Guofang, Michelle Reis' mother, worked two jobs a day to provide for the family.

In 1982, when she was 12, Michelle Reis filmed a second advertisement.

Michelle Reis attended Maryknoll Convent School and matriculated from St Paul's Secondary School throughout her studies.

Years later, Michelle Reis recalled the phone call, which she found hurtful.

Michelle Reis' father died at the Prince of Wales Hospital in Hong Kong on 22 August 1995 after fighting a blood disorder for eight months.

In 1988, after encouragement from others, Michelle Reis auditioned for the 1988 Miss Hong Kong Pageant.

Michelle Reis was predicted to win the "Best Photogenic Award", which gave Reis the self-confidence to continue on this career path.

Michelle Reis won the pageant, becoming Miss Hong Kong 1988 at the age of 18 and winning the contest's "Miss International Goodwill" title.

Later that year, in late 1988, Michelle Reis would become the first Miss Chinese International and was awarded the "Best Photogenic Award".

However, Michelle Reis starred in some roles in this early part of her acting career that would distinctly represent her acting style, and bring her out as an actress.

The film was a box office hit and Michelle Reis then starred in its sequel released later that year, Fong Sai-Yuk II.

The drama's eclectic setting and merger of wuxia, science fiction and fantasy genres, as well as its visual aesthetic was considered at the time groundbreaking in Hong Kong, and the demented mixture of beauty and darkness in the acting material Michelle Reis worked with cemented her signature acting style.

The film would then go on to serve as premise for Michelle Reis starring in The Other Side of the Sea, where Michelle Reis would again portray a cold-blooded professional killer who must reckon with going on the run and betrayal after becoming disillusioned with a life of killing.

Michelle Reis' character was a notable departure from her earlier roles, allowing herself to be filmed at fisheye lens angles, in grungy colours and with an appearance that was glamorously-dressed, stylish, and decidedly grunge, an appearance that would become emblematic of Michelle Reis' style, but at times dishevelled in contrast to the polished appearance of her Miss Hong Kong days.

Michelle Reis' character was described as a "chain-smoking, quivering, obsessive mess who faxes kill-plans and masturbates in PVC fetish dresses", and was interpreted as a ironic depiction of supermodel glamour or MTV music videos.

Fully declaring herself as an actress, and breaking away completely from any kind of innocent or clean-cut image in a way that likely shocked many of her fans, Michelle Reis received critical acclaim for her portrayal of the role and immediately established herself as an A-list actress, becoming amongst Hong Kong's most famous actresses.

The role would establish Michelle Reis as having fame beyond the Chinese-speaking world, becoming her most well-known role outside of the Chinese-speaking world.

In 1997, Michelle Reis starred in the action sci-fi mystery thriller Armageddon as Adele, Andy Lau's character's dead fiance.

In 1998, Michelle Reis starred as the ambitious prostitute Emerald in the arthouse film Flowers of Shanghai.

Around the beginning of the 2000s, Michelle Reis began to withdraw from acting to focus on family and charity businesses whilst making occasional public appearances.

Michelle Reis is fluent in seven languages - Cantonese, Mandarin, Shanghainese, English, Portuguese, Japanese, and Italian - and has used several of these languages in her films, such as Shanghainese in Flowers of Shanghai and Japanese in The City of Lost Souls.

On 23 November 2008, following a public two-year courtship, Michelle Reis married business tycoon Julian Hui, son of real-estate billionaire Hui Sai Fun.

Michelle Reis's initials are derived from the first initials, "J" and "M", of his parents' names.

On 15 January 2022, Michelle Reis was rushed to ICU after a near death experience due to breathing complications.