| My Date with a Vampire | |
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Promotional poster | |
| Genre | Fantasy, jiangshi fiction, horror comedy, supernatural, romance |
| Written by |
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| Directed by |
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| Starring |
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| Opening theme | "Who's in the Dream" (夢裡是誰) by Linda Wong |
| Composer | Michael Lai |
| Country of origin | Hong Kong |
| Original language | Cantonese |
| No. of episodes | 35 |
| Production | |
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| Production location | Hong Kong |
| Running time | 45 minutes per episode |
| Production company | ATV |
| Original release | |
| Network | ATV |
| Release | 30 November 1998 – 15 January 1999 |
| Related | |
| Vampire Expert | |
| My Date with a Vampire | |||||||||||
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| Traditional Chinese | 我和殭屍有個約會 | ||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 我和僵尸有个约会 | ||||||||||
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My Date with a Vampire is a 1998 Hong Kong television series produced by Asia Television (ATV). The series is a spiritual successor to Vampire Expert ,a similar two-season television series aired on ATV in 1995 and 1996. It blends aspects of the "hopping" corpses of Chinese jiangshi fiction with those of European vampires,along with elements of Chinese mythology and modern horror legends. The series is also a tribute to Lam Ching-ying,the lead actor of Vampire Expert and a prominent cast member of the Mr. Vampire franchise,who died of liver cancer in 1997. It was followed by My Date with a Vampire II (2000) and My Date with a Vampire III (2004).
Kuang Guohua was a Chinese guerrilla fighter during the Second Sino-Japanese War. In 1938,he was duelling with Yamamoto Kazuo,a major of the Imperial Japanese Army,when they were interrupted by Jiangchen,the progenitor of all vampires. The two men and Fusheng,a boy who was hiding nearby,were bitten by Jiangchen and they became vampires.
In the present-day (1998),Kuang has changed his name to Kuang Tianyou and now lives in Hong Kong,where he works as a policeman. Fusheng lives with him,pretends to be his son,and attends primary school. During this time,Kuang meets Ma Xiaoling,the heiress to a clan of sorcerers dedicated to ridding the world of evil supernatural beings. He gradually becomes embroiled in a love triangle with her and Wang Zhenzhen,her close friend and confidante.
Meanwhile,Yamamoto has become the influential boss of a big company in Hong Kong and has a small group of vampire followers under his command. Planning to turn every human into a vampire,Yamamoto unleashes his minions to attack people and spread the "vampire gene". Chaos break out in Hong Kong as vampires multiply and roam the streets freely. Kuang teams up with Ma and their allies to stop Yamamoto and manage to destroy him. However,a sorcerer called Rahu later resurrects Yamamoto and controls him to do his bidding,preparing to carry out a ritual during a blood moon to dominate the universe. Once again,Kuang,Ma and their allies combine forces to confront Rahu and put an end to his evil plan.
The script for My Date with a Vampire was written by Leung Lap-yan in 1997. Leung attempted to market the script to Television Broadcasts Limited (TVB) but was rejected,so he went to Asia Television (ATV) instead. Chan Sap-sam,who wrote the script for the two sequels,revealed that Lam Ching-ying,a prominent cast member in the Mr. Vampire franchise,was their original choice for the lead actor,and that Joey Meng did not have a place in their initial cast list. However,after they finalised the script,they were unable to contact Lam,who was critically ill. Besides,ATV's top management was not pleased with the script because they felt that it did not fit people's impressions of how vampires should be like. ATV's top management wanted to cancel the project after Lam died of liver cancer in 1997. Faced with these problems,Chan decided to make bold changes to the script and create a new character –Ma Xiaoling,a female ghostbuster wearing high heels and a miniskirt who is greedy for money. Sin Chi-wai,the producer for the series,recommended Joey Meng to play Ma Xiaoling. When Eric Wan was offered to play the male lead character in the series,he wanted to turn down the offer because he felt exhausted,but eventually agreed as he became more interested in the story.
According to Netease Report,Fox Networks Group will remake the series. [1] Cora Yim,the head of Fox Networks Group Asia,claimed that one-third of ATV's inventory had been acquired by Fox Networks Group,including 28 television series;My Date with a Vampire is one of the 28. [2]