Patricia Mok embraces 'ugly' robot role in I Want To Be Boss

In local film-maker Jack Neo’s upcoming Chinese New Year comedy I Want To Be Boss, Singaporean actress and comedienne Patricia Mok plays a household robot in a Singapore where artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics are an everyday reality.

Mok, 53, says playing the smart machine Ling Ling was a personal milestone, as it is her biggest movie role yet.

She was speaking to The Straits Times on the sidelines of a press event for the film, held at Famous Treasure restaurant at Capitol Building on Jan 22.

But there was a catch – her robot character comes dressed in a skintight silver suit.

“It was very fitting. I had to go on a diet,” she recalls. Her goal was to reduce her tummy bulge, which her slim frame highlighted.

“I went to a slimming salon with a machine. It goes piak, piak, piak on the tummy and, every day at lunch, I had to say, ‘no carbs, no carbs, no carbs’.”

Help came in the form of silicone bra inserts that drew attention to another area.

“When they gave me the stick-ons, wow, suddenly I had a figure. Nobody will notice what’s down there when you have something up here,” she jokes.

 

In I Want To Be Boss, which opens in Singapore cinemas on Jan 24, Ling Ling is an intelligent robot housekeeper purchased by restaurant boss Dongnan (Henry Thia) to improve the strained relationship with his wife Nan Sao (Aileen Tan).

Meanwhile, Dongnan’s former apprentice Steven (Zhang Shuifa) betrays his mentor by opening a rival restaurant. Actor-director Neo also appears as Dongnan’s friend Qiang, while Dawn Yeoh plays a social media personality known as Food Critic Influencer Queen.

In the movie, Ling Ling’s looks become the subject of a joke. Mok, whose film debut was in the hit comedy Money No Enough (1998), is the model of helper specially chosen by the family because she is too plain to arouse the men in the family.

Mok believes that her willingness to take advantage of her unconventional looks for comic effect has given her the career she has today. She has appeared in several Neo projects, including I Not Stupid (2002), Homerun (2003) and the sequel films Money No Enough 3 (2024) and I Not Stupid 3 (2024).

She had risen to fame performing in the TV variety show Comedy Nite (1990 to 2003), which also featured Neo.

 

“When Jack told me he was going to do this movie and that I would be the robot, I knew straightaway I wouldn’t be the pretty one. With my teeth, how could I be the pretty one?” she says.

She illustrates her point about going where more image-conscious actresses will not.

In one scene, Ling Ling opens her mouth wide and inserts a vacuum tube hose into it. She then cleans the home by inhaling.

“If Jack asks me to do it, I will go ahead and put that vacuum cleaner tube in my mouth. Other actresses don’t want to ‘uglify’ themselves on-screen. I won’t hesitate,” she says.

Earlier in January, Mok’s father, former air force officer Mok Kok Chye, died at the age of 85. In June 2024, in a Father’s Day essay penned for the Chinese-language daily Lianhe Zaobao, the actress wrote about how he had supported her in her career by asking family and friends to vote for her during the Star Awards and by comforting her when she did not win.

“Last night, I watched I Want To Be Boss at the premiere, and it’s a pity my dad doesn’t get to watch it, because it’s my biggest movie role so far. I’ve done so many movies in which I’m not even the second or third lead. When the movie ended, I was a bit upset. But I think, it’s okay, my dad is in a good place now,” she says.

Neo also spoke to ST at the same event, which featured a Chinese New Year lo hei ceremony and a birthday celebration for him. He turns 65 on Jan 24, I Want To Be Boss’ theatrical release date.

 

He spoke about how, in a movie about the threats and promises of AI, he embraced the technology in creating the nine songs heard in the film. He wrote the lyrics, with AI providing the music, including the vocals for all songs except the final one, which is sung by cast member Yeoh.

“The first time the software generated the song, it sang it so well that I cried. With this technology, you can get voices that sound like those of superstars,” he marvels.

He is bullish about AI, despite scammers using AI-generated social media advertisements that show him and frequent film collaborator, local actor Mark Lee, hawking dubious products. The deepfakes in fact inspired Neo to include a subplot in the movie, about a woman who is catfished and cheated of her savings by a scammer using an AI-generated identity.

Neo goes so far as to say that creators who decry the use of AI will get left behind.

“AI is around you, and you have to accept it. The world is moving in that direction.”