After walking the runway at the China Fashion Week last year, 80-year-old Wang Deshun easily disrupted the Internet and is now a household name.
Named as China's "hottest grandpa," Wang is now embarking a new role by starring in a movie, which allows him to raise awareness of the plights of China's senior citizens.
Wang will be playing a man suffering from Alzheimer's in the upcoming film "A Song of Cotton."
According to the Global Times, Wang plays as Mr. Sheng, who is retarded both in mind and movement due to the disease. He lives with his care-worker Cotton, played by Yan Bingyan, a middle-aged woman dumped by her husband due to her inability to bear a child.
The two develop a subtle connection to each other while living together, wrote the Global Times.
Yan, described this connection as "a relationship of employment and a bit over it, somewhere near that of lovers."
Viewers can look forward to some "daring" scenes in the film, particularly one where Mr. Sheng mistakes Cotton for his deceased wife while the former dries his hair after a bath.
"I invented that part," Wang said. The actor also has several scenes in the shower where he exposes his bare back.
Wang Dashun's catwalk may have pulled the trigger for his worldwide popularity, but the actor wants to be more than a sensation. He also aims to be a symbol of hope for people his age, as well as a man to look up to by the younger generation.
"One way to tell if you're old or not is to ask yourself, 'Do you dare try something you've never done before?'" Wang said in a separate interview with The Wall Street Journal.
"Nature determines age, but you determine your state of mind," he added.