HONG KONG – Hong Kong singer-actor Adam Cheng’s eldest daughter Angelina Cheng has died at the age of 55 in the United States.
Entertainment gossip channel Smart Travel broke the news on Sunday, reporting that the cause of her death was believed to be suicide.
It also included a recent photo of Ms Cheng and the notice of a memorial service for her, which stated her full name as Angelina On Yee Cheng. It indicated that she was born in August 1968 and died in September 2023.
Ms Cheng is the 76-year-old actor’s daughter with ex-girlfriend Lo Wai Yu, whom he met when he was attending an artiste training course in the 1960s. Cheng and Lo dated for three years.
Cheng, famous for his roles in martial arts shows such as The Legend Of The Book And Sword (1976) and Heaven Sword And Dragon Sabre (1978), married Hong Kong actress Lydia Sum in 1985, with whom he has a daughter, singer-actress Joyce Cheng, now 36.
Joyce was in the news recently for not being seen in public for almost six months, reportedly due to depression.
The actor later left Sum, whom he divorced in 1988, for his current wife, former Taiwanese actress Kuan Ching-hua. He and Kuan have two daughters – Winnie, 33, and Cecily, 30.
Sum died at the age of 62 in February 2008 after losing her battle with liver cancer.
Smart Travel host Tsar Pang said Ms Angelina Cheng had no contact with her father since her childhood days – except when he was paying for her college fees. She was raised by her mother in Canada before moving to the US.
Ms Cheng’s church friends mentioned that she met her father several years ago, when he was performing in Las Vegas.
The friends, who knew she was unhappy recently, were unable to contact her on Sept 26 and 27. They were also unable to contact her mother, and decided to call the police as they were worried she had an accident.
The police broke into her apartment and found her body inside.
Pang said the church held a memorial service for Ms Cheng last Saturday, and urged her father to contact it to handle her funeral matters as her mother was uncontactable.
Pang told Hong Kong’s Ming Pao Daily News that she learnt of Ms Cheng’s death through her church friends and disclosed the matter in the hope that her parents would show up to deal with her funeral.
Kuan told the Hong Kong media on Monday that they are handling the matter and that Adam Cheng is emotionally affected by the news.
“According to our understanding, Angelina’s mother is still alive and living in Vancouver,” Kuan said. “Relatives and friends had contacted her by phone, and her number has been passed to the church.”
She said they hoped Angelina’s mother would come forward to handle the funeral due to legal issues over Ms Cheng’s estate, and that she and Cheng would try to help if possible.
