A sarcastic cartoon of Le Hoang

Le Hoang – one of the most famous film directors in Vietnam nowadays, made a sarcastic article on Vietnamese showbiz. This is way interesting so I decided to retrieve this article from Vietnamnet and translate it into English. However, I twisted it a bit to make it suitable for English readers. Hope that everyone enjoy and understand a bit more about contemporary Vietnam.

You can read the original version here.

Why the hell this article matters? You can go out and shout: “Vietnamese showbiz! Bet no one cares.Vietnamese showbiz is not an individual item. It may include everybody and maybe there is no intention to imply any individual, hence, all so-called stars, after reading this article, may murmur: “He should have excluded me out.”

First, it’s no way to distinguish whether Vietnamese showbiz is male or female. You can’t call it 50% female and 50% male because it’s…just a mess of everything blended together according to an ambiguous and bizarre recipe. (You may taste and then describe the taste of this dish (considered it can be called a dish, but I doubt.) if you subscribe to the Vietnamese version of “Just the two of us”, the Vietnamese version of “Vietnam’s got talent”, listen to a whole series of Vietnamese songs and this Lunar New Year you go to the cinema to watch all the Vietnamese movies released for Tet.

Well, come back to the sex of Vietnamese showbiz. Considering it a male, he is too fragile. He rarely fights with fists. But setting aside the fist fight as a standard to distinguish the sex, how come he has a whole collection of bracelets, earrings, necklaces and a bunch of other feminine things. In photographs, he rarely wears suits but he seems to like presenting himself by undoing the upper buttons, winding cordage along his waist or pulling his undershirt over his head. Moreover, he never sits. For Vietnamese showbiz, a chair is totally unnecessary. He should crawl in the stage, sunbathe in a stone block, or lean against a tree foot in a vintage-styled scene. That is the way he get on the cover of the next month edition of a fashion magazine, or at least some websites to get the way to fame.

Considering it a female, she loathes any dresses that are not scanty. “Sô hàng” is an old story. And now, it’s even super-impressive when she is able to show many things other than “hàng”. (See the note below)

Vietnamese showbiz’s means of transportation is always a car. Of course, it does not matter it’s his/her car, or the car his/her neighbor lends, or a renting car. It just matters that he/she has to drive a car.

In streets, cars transport Vietnamese showbiz. In magazines, he/she (Vietnamese showbiz) always stands behind the car (hence you can generally conclude that in magazines Vietnamese showbiz transport cars.) You only need to show up with a car and then many paparazzi can pocket some money and drink beer tonight.

The dishes Vietnamese showbiz like are always secretive. Why? Cuz caring about such subsistence thingies remains for laypeople. For Vietnamese showbiz, just rejecting invitations is already tiring enough.

In TV shows, if asked about favorite dishes, Vietnamese showbiz definitely say that he/she like beef rice vermicelli, sweet potatoes and sour tamarinds to present a cutie and polite image. Don’t be under the illusion that Vietnamese showbiz will say he/she like hot pots or fish sauce dipped pork because these things are not considered noble.

Where Vietnamese showbiz call home is super-secretive, but once presented on TV, living rooms, pianos and stuffed toys. No stuffed toys, no artist. Remember, never ask Vietnamese showbiz whether his/her house is bought or just borrowed if you don’t wanna hear a lie.

A day of famous Vietnamese showbiz always starts from at least 11am. Earlier than that, not a famous one but just a layperson who is seeking the way to fame.  If that is a girl, she will order the servant a bowl of something, then open the notebook to check the social network: what the yesterday showbiz was like, who just got divorced, who got an assault because of stealing other women’ husbands. All at the same time, she picks up the phone, calls her buddy then gossip about all the things available in her news feed. Note that by this time, she has not combed her hair and brushed her teeth.

After that, she goes to a nail salon, then a massage parlor and a hair salon. These steps can take much time, or not, all depending on her pocket of money, her fame in the Vietnamese showbiz world, and whether in that day there are enough rumors to gossip about with manicurists, massage therapists and hairdressers.

Male Vietnamese showbiz appears even more stuffy than the female ver because they always have to relentlessly balance between two sad things: to be short of money and to be compulsory to appear not short of money. If girls’ senorita-style lives are always guaranteed with businessmen (or quasi-businessmen/swindler) who cater them coffee and tea in a luxury restaurant and transportation, the male Vietnamese showbiz have to appear polite, rich, noble, successful while all of these things are still out of reach. On the one hand, they present in public a carefree, polished image and strive to live with unpaid credit. Behind the scenes, they may live a life which is full of hand-to-mouth issues. Male showbiz strive to hide all trivial matters from fan if they still wanna  have their names in showbiz map.

In case of 50% female, 50% male, it is even twice complicated. He/she always has to maintain a public impression of ambiguous, dubious, enigmatic in order to keep the public curious, and more, and more, as days pass by, more curious.

It is undeniable that although Vietnamese showbiz is fragile and very moody – very easy to get angry and very easy to calm down, once in every 5 minutes, you can hear him/her want to sue someone or at least swear to sue someone, and then reconcile after this 5 minutes.

If able to consider Vietnamese showbiz a fish, Vietnamese society is definitely the river. However, the analogy is not quite explanatory. Fish move everywhere in the river but Vietnamese showbiz just head to the youth or where teenagers are. Because only teens are lovely, are able to have money and are quick to call someone their “idol”. To say Vietnamese showbiz is short of the youngest in the world is not a lie.

What do Vietnamese showbiz do in the spring/Lunar New Year?

From old guys to a teens, from famous stars to a rising stars, all of them, both male and female, once a participant of Vietnamese showbiz, will reveal in TV that they will spend more time for families, especially parents. Of course, Lunar New Year is the time for play traditional, setting aside whether this is a truth or a lie. No one is stupid: reveal the truth that they gather in some familiar places, sit in a cozy corner of a cafe, playing cards from dawn to night and……that’s all.  Then one looks at another, either nod to greet or turn around haughtily. Night is, of course, for performance. Of course, Vietnamese showbiz can’t have performances for every night. But that doesn’t matter. He/she can show up in events to get paid, then use the pay to go to a bar, then go to have supper….Still, even in Lunar New Year, Vietnamese showbiz is busy.

In summary, Viet showbiz is quite lovely, too young: even the name “showbiz” has just been around for a few recent years. No idea where this word originates: from the West or China. Born to a poor family where parents quarrel all day over money and neighbors quarrel all day about dogs biting, cats crying, and pigs smelling; Vietnamese showbiz feel inferior from birth. However, thanks to intelligence, relentless efforts and luck, even though having experienced many dark times, Vietnamese showbiz have grown up and mature. But the future remains difficult and thrilling.

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Note

1) “Hang” is short of a folk word, implying the parts in a woman body that usually, clothes hide. (breasts, vagina…). “Sô hàng” with “Sô” derived from English “show” implies to wear as much scanty as possible to accidentally show these parts.

See notorious scandals of “Sô hàng” here.

2) Le Hoang is a famous director in Vietnam from the 1990s. His works used to participate many prestigious film festivals. His breakthrough is “Gai nhay” – Dancing girl – released in 2000 – which involves quite a little prostitution issues in Vietnam in the late 1990s. That was the first time in Vietnam, this issue was presented in the large screen. However, after this famous work, his later movies are considered short of ideas, which still centers on prostitution. He is a sharp-witted columnist about Vietnamese showbiz. Recently he also showed up in the Vietnamese version of “Just the two of us” – Cap doi hoan hao (literally the perfect couple) as a judge and there’s a fan craze in the Internet for his evaluations.

Le Hoang from a profile portrait