Phua Chu Kang only said he’s the best in Singapore, JB, and some say Batam. But don’t be fooled, he was quite a big deal in Kuala Lumpur too, okay?
In a recent podcast interview with Ministry of Funny, Gurmit Singh, who played PCK from 1997 to 2007, recalled his first visit to Malaysia, back when the iconic Singaporean sitcom was also airing there.
“It was a big hit, we were told. What they decided to do was to hold a nationwide PCK lookalike, soundalike contest,” shared the now 60-year-old star.
Gurmit shared that there were 10 finalists for the competition and that he was invited over as a guest judge. The humble actor, at that time, didn’t know how famous he was in Malaysia.
When he arrived at the four-storey mall in KL, where the contest was held, he was shocked by the number of people there.
“The whole place was jam-packed and filled up. I told the management of the mall: ‘Congratulations, very good turnout today. Who’s [arriving] after me? Must be a Hong Kong guy lah ‘cos the crowd is [massive but they told me:] ‘No it’s just you’,” he recounted.
They then made Gurmit sit in front of a table, in the middle of the foyer, presumably dressed up as Phua Chu Kang, while he judged the contest.
But the crazy part only happened after the competition ended.
After the event, Gurmit was walking backstage when he turned around to look at his manager and make-up artist.
Believe it or not, their only words to him were: “Run, run, run!”
Confused, Gurmit then turned behind to see a mob running after them.
“We three ran. We didn’t have time to call our limo, we just dropped into a taxi and said: ‘Drive! Just drive!” ‘cos the mob was coming,” he exclaimed.
What can we say? Don’t play play, PCK is very famous one, okay?