Yang Huai-min recalls playing the “handsome Chen Shimei”: “Just execute Chao Chien-ming”

Yang Huai-min became known as the “handsome Chen Shimei” after playing the doomed villain in the 1993 CTS television drama Justice Pao. Decades later, the veteran actor has revisited the role while commenting on a real-life divorce that revived public interest in the classic story.

Chen Hsing-yu, daughter of former President Chen Shui-bian, divorced Chao Chien-ming, triggering considerable controversy. Many people took her side, and residents in Tainan organized and funded a “Justice Chen Shimei Arts Festival” in support of her. The event also brought renewed attention to Justice Pao’s “The Case of Chen Shimei.”

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You should just execute Chao Chien-ming.

When Yang recently heard about the festival’s popularity, he responded with a joke: “You should just execute Chao Chien-ming.” In the television drama, Yang’s Chen Shimei is sentenced to death by Justice Pao and placed under the Dragon Head Guillotine.

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I interpreted this faithless husband as someone who wanted to climb through marriage and power, yet could not hide his inferiority and helplessness from growing up poor.

Yang wrote on Threads that he initially hesitated before accepting the role, but wanted to test himself by playing a villain. He interpreted Chen Shimei not as a one-dimensional bad man, but as someone desperate to rise through marriage and power while struggling with insecurity over his poor background. In the story, Chen first feels pity when he sees his children, then hesitates when ordered to send them to the palace. The director told Yang to suppress that hesitation, warning that Chen could not commit the later acts of cruelty if he continued to show mercy.

Yang said he eventually understood that the character had reached a point of no return and could only move forward by hardening his heart. He spent time preparing for the role because he wanted to portray a person who had once possessed an innocent nature, but pushed himself toward the edge through unchecked desire. His performance combined Chen’s refined appearance with his ruthless betrayal of his wife and children, creating one of the most memorable portrayals of a faithless husband in Chinese-language television.

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At that moment, he could only move forward, with no way back. The only way forward was to harden his heart.