Sharla Cheung Once Lent S$3.5mil To A Showbiz “Friend” Who Refuses To Pay Her Back To This Day

Remember when Chinese actress Yang Mi publicly declared that she would never lend money to her friends? Well, this story shows us why that controversial stance — she was called “heartless” and a “miser” ‘cos of that — might be a wise idea after all.

On Wednesday (Mar 10), veteran journalist Bai Lu Mei, who’s famed for juicy celeb exposés, penned a column in Hongkong’s Apple Daily about former actress Sharla Cheung (also known as Cheung Man or Zhang Min), who was apparently a little too generous with her hard-earned dough.

While the 53-year-old enjoyed a successful film career in the ‘90s before her retirement in the mid-noughties, being a top star didn’t necessarily net her the most trustworthy friends.

According to Bai Lu Mei, Sharla used to have a gang of buddies with whom she would eat, drink, and have fun back in her heyday. She was also like the ‘big sister’ of the group and took good care of them.

Alas, some of these ‘pals’ repaid her by taking advantage of her generosity and empathy, and persuaded her to invest in all kinds of businesses — from restaurants to beauty salons to fashion boutiques — that ended up failing and losing money due to poor management.

However, perhaps the worst incident happened when someone, who was also said to be working in the movie industry, asked to borrow a whopping HK$20mil (around S$3.5mil) from Sharla as they claimed to be in a bad financial state.

Now, that much cash is certainly no small amount today, but it was worth even more over 20 years ago, which is presumably when she lent the money. Still, for some odd reason, that didn’t set off alarm bells in Sharla’s head and she “foolishly” agreed to do it “without a second thought” (as Bai Lu Mei put it).

We reckon nobody would be surprised to hear that she eventually came to regret this as her debtor kept coming up with excuses not to pay her back over the years, even though he appeared to be living a good life on the surface. How horrible.

One day, an exasperated Sharla approached Bai Lu Mei to rant about her situation, saying: “I earned that money by staying up all night filming and have shed blood and sweat for it. Even after going after him for my money for so many years, he still refuses to pay me back. You could help me by having a word with him.”

Bai Lu Mei added that since Sharla didn’t issue an IOU in black and white at the time she lent the money (seriously? Even for literally millions of bucks?!), it would be very difficult for her to sue the other party.

Sharla has since become a devout Buddhist and now believes that everything is up to heaven’s will, so she has decided to let things go and no longer worries about this matter as she has become indifferent to fame and fortune.

Still, we think her debtor should be absolutely ashamed of himself.

Photos: Sharla Cheung/Weibo, IMDb