Hong Kong superstar Jackie Chan was already an adult when he discovered that his father was a former spy and his mother was a drug dealer.
The revelation happened during the production of the 2003 documentary “Traces of the Dragon: Jackie Chan and His Lost Family,” which was directed by Mabel Cheung, according to The Guardian.
While Jackie was visiting his father, Charles Chan, in Australia, the action star learned that he had two brothers living in China. His father also revealed that he was once a Nationalist spy and gangland boss while his mother, Lee-Lee Chan, was an opium dealer and a legendary gambler in Shanghai.
“The fact that his mother was an opium smuggler, a gambler and a big sister in the underworld was a big shock to Jackie and also to us,” Cheung said. “Everybody in Hong Kong knew that his mother was like a common housewife, very kind, very gentle.”
Charles, a Chinese nationalist agent, reportedly fled from China to Hong Kong to avoid the rival Communist Party and was hiding in Australia for years, the actor said at the AAP in 2017 via News.com.au.
“My father was spy hiding in Hong Kong and hiding in Australia at the American embassy for so many years,” Chan said.
Jackie’s parents met after Charles arrested Lee-Lee for smuggling opium, which was one of the ways she earned money to support her two daughters from her first husband, who died in a Japanese bombing raid. She was also involved in gambling as well as racketeering.
Cheung described Charles as a “very dignified,” “forceful,” “funny” and “straightforward.”
During his talk with his father, Charles revealed that their family name was actually Fang and that his full name was Fang Daolang.
Charles passed away in 2008 and was buried along with Lee-Lee who died in 2001 in Canberra, Australia.
Images via thiago mope
