HONG KONG • Actor Anthony Wong apologised to martial arts star Jackie Chan on Monday night after his speech at the Hong Kong Film Awards was characterised in some reports as an attack on Chan.

While presenting the Best Screenplay award on Sunday, Wong made a light-hearted speech he had written "to cheer Hong Kong cinema on", he wrote on Facebook.

The speech seemed to bomb at the show, attended by stars such as Chan, when Wong's punchline, "We have Hong Kong movies every year," was met with silence - but the words took on another life on the Internet.

Media outlets including Apple Daily interpreted the speech as a challenge to Chan, who was quoted as saying in an interview last month that there will be "only one kind of cinema called 'Chinese cinema', and Hong Kong cinema will also be Chinese cinema".

Wong was also alleged to have asked if Chan "represents Hong Kong cinema or Chinese cinema", but netizens did not hear such words during the official broadcast and some suspected the segment had been censored.

On Monday, Wong wrote: "I may be incompetent, but I would not insult a senior on a happy and serious occasion."

Invoking a Chinese historical story of a tragic misunderstanding, he added: "Although I did not kill Boren, Boren died because of me. Here, I have to apologise to Big Brother Jackie Chan."

Wong also denounced the media outlets that distorted his speech and put words in his mouth, said Ming Pao Daily News.

"In a few hours, the online media distorted the message, freely interpreted it, even added to it, forwarded an excerpt that never existed, and it evolved into a living 'Mandela Effect'," he said.

Wong, who has been blacklisted in China after voicing his support for pro-democracy Hong Kong protesters in 2014, said his speech on Sunday had been politicised maliciously and added: "I do not support or believe in Hong Kong independence."