So the movie did finally get made after all. Last Thursday evening at the Paramount was the premiere of Milk & Fashion, touted as the first film to feature "non-Asian actors speaking Chinese in lead roles of a feature film for the first time ever". The crowd gathered as early as 7 pm to feast on the buffet. The room was packed with a diverse population of foreigners, Shanghainese ladies and numerous dubious characters. The seats were all taken. The sound system was too loud, and at 8.30, they began with a series of pop singers who performed for a crowd who couldn't seem to care less. The hosts were unconvincing and their cues badly rehearsed, ‘milking’ the applause conspicuously. more ›

In August 2005 we told you about former Growing Pains star Jeremy Miller's frenzy of acting activity here in Shanghai, but after a series of public appearances and tete-a-tetes with us media folks, he disappeared off the radar. We assumed that he was making the movie Milk and Fashion, which was plugged during all his appearances, and which we figured were more or less orchestrated for that purpose, since he normally doesn't appear in public and pose for pictures with kids for the hell of it. more ›

Here they are, based on total pageviews: more ›

Shanghai's only daily English-language newspaper Shanghai Daily has just launched a new website, and so far Shanghaiist is impressed. The paper's previous site was a subscriber-only mess of PDF files, although online content was available at the sloppy english.eastday.com, which doesn't appear to be accessible today. The new site -- it's just a "soft launch," so tread lightly -- at first glance appears to be clean and easy to navigate. Shanghai Daily now offers RSS feeds, which is great, and it looks like they even plan to try their hand at blogging ... kind of (here, here and here). There are free classifieds (jobs, real estate, rentals) and a city directory with tons of addresses (only in English right now, unfortunately) and phone numbers. But, so far it looks like a great addition to the world of Shanghai websites. They seem open to suggestions, too -- so feel free to leave your thoughts as a comment to this post. more ›

Former child actor Jeremy Miller -- the least famous cast member of 80s sitcom Growing Pains -- has found work in China, one of the few remaining countries where he might actually get recognized on the street. Growing Pains, which stopped production 13 years ago, was one of the only Western imports to hit Chinese televsion in the 90s, and thus was wildly successful. And what does this fading Far Eastern fame get someone like Miller? A part in a struggling uber-indie Chinese film production called Milk & Fashion, enticingly billed as "Asia's first feature film centering on ballet." That should fill the seats. more ›