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Nicholas Tse: scandal didn't hurt career
2003-03-10
HONG KONG - Nicholas Tse may have been convicted in a car-crash coverup, spent two weeks behind bars and taken a half year off from singing and acting, but the pop sensation insists he's stronger than ever.Tse planned a news conference Wednesday to announce his comeback, and said ahead of the appearance that he's being paid 40 percent more now than he was when his troubles mounted last year. He's already been giving a few media interviews. ``I don't understand the mentality of Hong Kong people,'' Tse was quoted as telling the South China Morning Post for a story that appeared Tuesday. ``Lots of parents are saying: 'Don't see Nicholas Tse as your idol any more because he is a criminal,' but contracts have been re-signed before anything else and all of a sudden I have more than 10 scripts in hand.'' Tse, who is 22, was convicted in October of conspiring to pervert the course of justice by agreeing to let a chauffeur stand in as the driver after Tse crashed his Ferrari in March. No one was hurt and it has never been clear why Tse sought to dodge blame for the accident. Tse spent two weeks in jail while awaiting his sentence, which turned out to be 240 hours of community service. Tse was quoted as telling the Post his ``price has gone up by 40 percent,'' but he did not elaborate. ``It's like you crash your car, you go into community service, but now I'm giving you more money to come back. Well, thank you,'' Tse said. Tse told Time magazine that he would never want to relieve the fiasco with his Ferrari, which he said was a gift from his record company, the Emperor Entertainment Group. ``Now I wish they had just given me the cash,'' Tse was quoted as telling Time. Tse told the Post that his time in prison was made tolerable by fellow inmates who were kind to him. ``People are nice in there, I mean, really nice,'' he was quoted as saying. He said he will go back to visit his new prison friends, because ``I will always remember who helped me.'' Tse's record label did not immediately return a reporter's phone call Tuesday from The Associated Press. AP
'Taikonaut' Gets Cool Hong Kong Welcome (2003-10-31)HK's "bad boy" back to work after brush with law (2003-03-12)Nicholas Tse: scandal didn't hurt career (2003-03-10)Hong Kong Paparazzi Cause Problems (2002-11-19)HK government urges jail for popstar Tse (2002-11-10)
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